Poppy Z. Brite Puns

It is 5:49 AM and I just finished the last page of this book. What. The. Actual. Fuck? I’m giving it 4/5 Stars just for the fact that pzb’s hypnotic writing can make something as gruesome as the contents of this nasty little book seem so incredibly... beautiful? Dare i say exquisite? Im not gonna lie, it took me about 4 months to pick it back up after i sat it down on chapter 5 or so.. but once i did I couldn’t put it back down, and im really happy I did. I also think this was my first Splatterpunk read and i really enjoyed it. I know this is not for everyone but im curious fo hear what y’all thought of it! 😌

Billy Martin's (Poppy Z. Brite) fiction collection ARE YOU LOATHSOME TONIGHT? is on Amazon for $0.99 on eBook (up until 12/12/2021 at 11:59:59 PM EST). I already bought the eBook, so if you're looking for some fiction collections to buy for cheap, now's your chance!

New to this sub and so happy to be here! Any other horror-lit-centric subs I should be aware of?

Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite is the first "splattergore" book that I have read cover to cover and by God, I think I'd do it again. It disgusts me and fascinates me the way no other books I would consider to be similar (Clockwork Orange, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, perhaps even American Psycho) have been able to do. I've even just sat down Last Exit to Brooklyn (maybe not horror, perse but it's certainly some form of psychological warfare upon the reader, imo).

Thoughts on either Brite's work or works like it? Appealing or repulsing? Why/why not?

Hi! I am looking for novels in the style of Poppy Z. Brite’s -Lost Souls- and Caitlin R. Kiernan’s -Silk-.

I am familiar with the rest of those authors’ work those are just my favorites.

Specifically, I am looking for novels that:

• feature characters that are identifiably “goth” subculture
• address trauma and mental illness using horror and the supernatural
• take place all or mostly in our world, not a fantasy world. I particularly like work where the fantasy/supernatural element is unclear whether it’s real or just psychosis
• adult novels not YA
• bonus points if it has a female protagonist or heavily features female characters

Thanks in advance!

Just finished Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite and LOVED IT! It was visceral and intense, would 100% read again. Was wondering if there were any books similar to this one, that still contains main gay/LGBT characters? In addition to all of the disturbing/gorey subject matter?

Thanks!

Poppy Z Brite is an American author from New Orleans who wrote horror throughout the 90s. I discovered them (since the books were written, they’ve undergone gender reassignment, so I use they when referencing their work) when I was in my late teens, and have had to buy myself many copies of their books. That in itself isn’t an easy task, as I’m in a small city in Australia and have to order everything written by them online. If I’m lucky enough to find what I’m looking for.

Their books include Lost Souls (the best vampire novel I have ever read), Exquisite Corpse, and The Crow: The Lazarus Heart. Those are my top three, they’re basically my top three novels ever, and I only read horror or true crime nonfiction. Let the Right One In by John Lindqvist and James O’Barr’s original The Crow graphic novel round out my top five.

I feel like Brite is severely underrated as a horror author, and that the Anne Rice craze in the 90s maybe left them at the back of the bookshelf (at least when it came to vampires). In all my time knowing and adoring their work, I’ve met one person who shared an appreciation. Maybe it’s weird but I cannot stand Anne Rice or Stephen King - I don’t remember ever finishing their books because they don’t hold my interest at all. I find them totally bland, they don’t stir up the horror in my head at all.

I find Brite’s writing more visceral, more real. They have this just... amazing way of describing horrific things that bring it all to life far more than King or Rice. The settings are more grounded in reality, or at least that’s how I feel. Brite feels like horror that could truly happen, even with the supernatural elements in some of their work. Their short stories pack as much of a punch as their full-length novels. I’ve never had that same vivid image in my head reading other, more popular authors writing similar stories. Even the other two books in my top five don’t come close to the vivid images Brite can create with those printed words.

I also adore the fact that Brite’s characters are unashamedly LGBT, they don’t pussyfoot around the “is he gay or isn’t he.” They don’t hold back on the visceral descriptions in that department either - in The Lazarus Heart, the main character is a gay S&M photographer, and another is a pre-op trans woman. These sorts of things I don’t even see now in fiction, twenty-odd years later, unless you’re in the LGBT section of the bookshop. And if you’re in that section, there’s no horror to b

^^^^ I’m also open to general recs! My fave books are the aforementioned exquisite corpse by poppy z brite, the song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, Aurora rising by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman, and the robot series by Isaac Asimov.

Thanks in advance!!

https://www.patreon.com/posts/water-if-god-it-17097727

Here’s the synopsis:

‘It first happened when I was thirteen. I would lie on my back and relax my muscles slowly, limb by limb, fibre by fibre. I would imagine my organs turning to a bitter soup, my brain beginning to liquefy inside my skull. Sometimes I drew a razor across my chest and let the blood run down the sides of my ribcage and pool in the hollow of my belly. Sometimes I enhanced my natural pallor with blue-white makeup, and later a trace of purple here and there, my own artistic interpretation of lividity and gaseous stain. I tried to escape what seemed a hateful prison of flesh; to imagine myself outside my body was the only way I could love it.

After doing this for a time, I began to feel certain changes in my body. I never managed to make my spirit separate completely from my flesh. If I had, I probably wouldn’t have come back. But I achieved a hovering state between consciousness and void, a state where my lungs seemed to stop pulling in air and my heart to cease beating. I could still sense a subliminal murmur of bodily function, but no pulse, no breath. I thought I could feel my skin loosening from the connective tissues, my eyes drying out behind blue-tinged lids, my molten core beginning to cool.

I did this in prison from time to time, without the makeup or razors of course, remembering some boy or other, imagining my rancid living body to be his dear dead flesh. It took me five years to realize that my talent might be put to another use, one that would allow me to someday hold a real corpse again.

I spent most of my time lying on my bunk. I breathed the heady, meaty smell of hundreds of men eating and sweating and pissing and shitting and fucking and living together in cramped, dirty quarters, often with only one chance to shower each week. I closed my eyes and listened to the rhythms of my own body, the myriad paths of my blood, the sweat beading on my skin, the steady pull and release of my lungs, the soft electric hum of my brain and all its tributaries.

I wondered just how much I could slow it all down, how much of it I could stop entirely. And I wondered, if I was successful, whether I would be able to start it all up again. What I had in mind was much more advanced than my old game of playing dead. I would have to be dead enough to fool the guards, the nursing officer, and almost certainly a doctor. But I had read about Hindu fakirs who stopped their own hearts, who allowed themselves to be buried for weeks without oxy

I loved those books and have never found anything quite like them. They were a super intense read and I wish I could find something similar! If anybody has read these and has a suggestion or two I would love to hear them!

Thanks. :)

I've heard a lot of general praise, but I'm not sure what of his works are best.

Hi there,

I can't find this book anywhere and I've been searching for a while. If anyone has it or can point me in the right direction, I'd be incredibly grateful. I’m in the US. Thanks!

Synopsis for those who haven’t read it: Back in 1969 a famous underground cartoonist (kinda like R Crumb) goes nuts and kills his whole family with a hammer, leaving only his 8 year old son alive, then hangs himself. 16 years later the kid (now a talented cartoonist himself) returns to the southern town where his family died, meets another kid on the run from the law and falls in love, and they both move back into the murder house. They are harassed by a malevolent spirit and eventually the guy loses it and thinks he has to kill the boy he loves to understand what love really is. I don’t want to give away the ending so I’ll stop there. There’s lots of cool elements: a lot about comic book culture, computer hacking (hilariously quaint since the book was published in 1993), sex, and music (lots of goth and psychobilly). I loved this book as a teenager even though it’s a little juvenile-edgy seeming now that I’m older. I read it once a year at least.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/372123917432

"This manuscript is an early draft of my novel LOST SOULS, circa 1990. At this point it wasn't even officially titled LOST SOULS yet; this manuscript is not titled at all. It consists of approximately 500 laser-printed pages in two large black vinyl ring binders, and includes many differences from the published novel, including deleted chapters, tons of unauthorized poetry and song lyrics, and several major plot changes (Zillah doesn't die!). It also includes many of my handwritten notes for revision, mostly in purple ink, both on the printed pages and on a separate page of lined notebook paper. The two binders have my decorative labels reading "Prologue, Chapters 1-20" and "Chapters 21-37, Epilogue."

If i hadn't just emptied my bank account buying a laptop yesterday, i'd probably bid on it. I just want to read it.

Hi. I want to talk about a book I read because I have no one else to talk about books with. It is called Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite.

As a brief summary, the plot concerns the meeting of two fucked up serial killers, both of whom are gay and seduce and murder/torture gay "boys" (the killers refer to every man as a "boy") in their own different ways. (Warning: graphic) >!The murderers also perform acts of necrophilia, cannibalism, and other obscene methods of torture. Fortunately, the book rarely describes any of these in detail!<

In addition to the murderers, the book also concerns the lives of Luke, a gay man broken down from his AIDS diagnosis, and his obsession with his ex boyfriend, Tran, whom he attempted to inject with his infected blood. Tran is a Vietnamese-American who is just trying to find his place in New Orleans after his father kicks him out of the house.

In the background of the book is the HIV/AIDS epidemic. AIDS is a major theme of the book, from its public perception and damnation of LBGT folk, to its various psychological effects. All of the characters have AIDS except for Tran, the book's only "pure" character.

First, I am also gay, so having so many characters to identify with in different ways (including, unfortunately, the killers') was engrossing for me. I was especially attached to Tran, not just because of my natural attraction to men like him, but because of his personal journey of just trying to find his place in the world. Luke, as well, is sympathetic for his obsession with Tran, his only love, exacerbated by his denial of his slow, approaching death from AIDS. Every character reacts to their disease in a different way, whether accepting it, denying or ignoring it, or worse. Many characters know they will die, and knowing this makes them act brashly.

Like AIDS, I viewed the two murderers as a sort of infection - a disease which has its terrible ways with human bodies for no purpose but for their own sick natures. They only hunt gay "boys"; their vileness comes from no past trauma, no flaw in their upbringing; it is simply who they are, and what they do. We hate them and their depravity, but at the same time must acknowledge their existence in the world, and the horrors they bring.

All of the book's characters are lonely. One killer staves off his loneliness by >!sleeping with fresh, beheaded corpses as well as sometimes having sex with them!<; The other killer by torturing victims to the point w

By far, my favorite vampire novel of all time. The writing style is so visceral, the characters so charming and fully-formed and of course, the vampire-centered main story is nothing you have ever come across. Lost Souls

I'd been curious of the splatterpunk genre for some time now, and having heard Poppy Z. Brite's named mentioned in it I decided to give one of his books a go. I ended up happening to find Exquisite Corpse at a Half Price and picked it up.

All in all, I'm not sure how I feel about the novel. The violence, both sexual and otherwise, that he depicts in the book is raw and unnerving. I'm often used to violence in fiction so that usually wasn't a problem, but I was surprised how often I ended up feeling at least a little bit unnerved by some of descriptions. It's not even something I could put my finger on specifically, because it wasn't necessarily because of how well the descriptions were written, there was just something to it that managed to unnerve me.

For the book proper, I loved about half of it and hated the other half. I liked what appeared to me to be an analogy between the two primary antagonists and the AIDs virus in the gay community of the 90s. I genuinely had a fondness for Andrew Compton's chapters and narration, and felt that the book honestly would have been better served if it was told entirely from his point of view instead of the switching between viewpoints. The switching bothers me also on the level that it switches from first person narration to third person narration. In a way this wouldn't have bothered me much if Andrew's narrations weren't spread so thin and uncommon throughout the later part of the book, but as it stands it feels like a weird stylistic choice to me, and I'm not sure I understand why she did that.

I also ended up enjoying Lucas' parts of the book quite a bit. I didn't at first because of what his first chapter signaled in regards to how Tran is handled, but the odd nihilism of Lucas' arc was intriguing to me, and he seemed to me the main character to actually evolve and develop throughout the story as the other three main characters have their roles and destinies pretty well set from the get go. Lucas actually became an intriguing figure to me.

Tran didn't. I started off liking Tran and then simply got somewhat bothered by Tran. Part of that I suppose was the way Tran was treated as a fetish, which I understand is an intentional part of the story, but it also just feels like outright like indulging in a fetish on the author's part. Tran doesn't serve as an actual character, but simply as a figure and a thing to be used throughout the story on the part of both Lucas and the villains. I could feel sympathy for Tr

If you've never read Brite, this would be a good time to stick your toe in the water. Of the works I've read, this was easily my favorite.

I really enjoy urban fantasy, and new takes on classic monsters. I devoured everything by Patricia Briggs, Carrie Vaughn, Kelley Armstrong, Rob Thurman and Faith Hunter. Based on the fact I buy from those authors a lot I keep getting suggestions for Poppy Z Brite books.

So I finally decided to give 'Lost Souls' a chance based on the story description. I bought the Kindle book with the Audible version too, mainly because of the discount when purchased together.

I have a rule I try to hold to where I actually read a book (actual or Kindle) before I listen to the Audible version. But I just could not get through the first chapter so put it aside several times.

While cleaning up my Kindle and archiving stuff I've read/listened to I realized still had the Audible version on the Kindle, so I broke my rule and started listening to the book.

I cannot name a single character in the book that is truly likeable. Ghost is the closest one to likeable, but is failing to achieve even that. And the one character you are supposed to truly feel sorry for is not even deserving of that pitty even though she is supposed to be the biggest victim in the book.

One of my biggest issues is just how hard does Poppy Z Brite have to stress that she is REALLY REALLY into homoerotic fantasy. Don't get me wrong, I do not have a problem homoeroticism, but does every activity in the book have to become a homoerotic fantasy? We get it Poppy, you like men having sex with each other, could we get on with the story please.

I am currently stuck at 80% on the Audible book. Mainly because I took a couple of weeks off from buying audio copies of other books I've read and it was the only Audible book on the Kindle. But I just do not know if I will ever finish it. I have listened to previous u sly purchased 15 book series again (among others) to avoid this book.

I guess I am asking people that have read the book if there is any good reason to finish it? I'm not looking for a happy ending with bunnies and lollipops. I just want to know if the completely unlikable character do anything to justify reading/listening to the book?

Not necessarily about vampires but those are fine too.

A while back, author Poppy Z Brite was decorating notebooks and selling them on eBay. S/he wrote some of our favourite novels, and the first book my wife ever lent me, so I got her one for our anniversary. Got it autographed too. Did anyone else get one?

Just finished Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite and LOVED IT! It was visceral and intense, would 100% read again. Was wondering if there were any books similar to this one, that still contains main gay/LGBT characters? In addition to all of the disturbing/gorey subject matter?

Thanks!