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mychekhov's review against another edition
challenging
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.75
"Where is the merit? Why does it exist?"
If you want to read dark anti-traditional tales of erotic excess that apply peroxide-soaked bandages of philosophy in intervals as it flagellates you quite mercilessly, whispering sweet nothings in its veneration of crime and the absolute necessity and sublimity of Evil, you ought to head elsewhere, since you'll likely have the rest of the French avant-garde canon to act as your personal physician and masseuse. Here, you are left in the care of a much more brutal, less-hermaphroditic beast, though his technique is every bit as poetic as his predecessors. There is merit: The prose is superb. And there is that delightful pressure point found in its oblation of lesbian sadomasochism (small snapshots, like polaroids) left for both the reader and the novel's young subjects to explore—a contagion of sexual despotism spreading concentrically from progenitor to offspring, heredity sowing the seeds of transgression inducing the cure 'justifying the means' by some sort of blissfully deranged incident of indecency that began as nothing more than an aging writer's masturbatory fantasies concerning the bestialisation of pubescent girls refined over decades until released to printed press much like one final ejaculatory huzzah at the whole world before succumbing to metaphoric limpness and the physical tomb. And we will know the spell has served its purpose when those nymphets hailing from reality whose very likeliness is shackled and quartered and gynebutchered in these fantasies are prescribed the novel and discover tucked away underneath the bloodsoaked covers of its dreamy text the merit so many of us have missed. Like Isidore Ducasse and De Sade both wrote of their œuvre, nothing here is impermissible for a 14 year-old girl to read.
If you want to read dark anti-traditional tales of erotic excess that apply peroxide-soaked bandages of philosophy in intervals as it flagellates you quite mercilessly, whispering sweet nothings in its veneration of crime and the absolute necessity and sublimity of Evil, you ought to head elsewhere, since you'll likely have the rest of the French avant-garde canon to act as your personal physician and masseuse. Here, you are left in the care of a much more brutal, less-hermaphroditic beast, though his technique is every bit as poetic as his predecessors. There is merit: The prose is superb. And there is that delightful pressure point found in its oblation of lesbian sadomasochism (small snapshots, like polaroids) left for both the reader and the novel's young subjects to explore—a contagion of sexual despotism spreading concentrically from progenitor to offspring, heredity sowing the seeds of transgression inducing the cure 'justifying the means' by some sort of blissfully deranged incident of indecency that began as nothing more than an aging writer's masturbatory fantasies concerning the bestialisation of pubescent girls refined over decades until released to printed press much like one final ejaculatory huzzah at the whole world before succumbing to metaphoric limpness and the physical tomb. And we will know the spell has served its purpose when those nymphets hailing from reality whose very likeliness is shackled and quartered and gynebutchered in these fantasies are prescribed the novel and discover tucked away underneath the bloodsoaked covers of its dreamy text the merit so many of us have missed. Like Isidore Ducasse and De Sade both wrote of their œuvre, nothing here is impermissible for a 14 year-old girl to read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Slavery, Incest, Sexual violence, and Torture
sunnybopeep's review against another edition
2.75
Everyone gets all high and mighty about French erotica, but I bet they’ve never read this before. Anne Rice WHO? I only know Alain Robbe-Grillet. There’s a reason this book was originally sold shrink-wrapped.
This is just a scary, bloody porn book about a man who has the most intensely incestual relationship with his daughter. They get into a bunch of shenanigans, except all of the shenanigans involve watching teenage girls getting burned or beaten or boinked. There’s some peeing, and… a lot of… other stuff I can’t describe. 😐
Actually, I could tell that there was something more substantial lurking under the endless descriptions of sexual torture, but I’m not going to analyze it here because I don’t think anyone should read this. Even so, I can’t pretend like there weren’t moments of intense irony bordering on satire. I did find myself enjoying it at times, and the book was written in a cold, exacting way that made it easier for the reader to disassociate… “Putting Sade back on the bookshelf,” huh…? Yeah, sure… I don’t really think there is enough thoughtful substance for most people to find value in trudging through all the traumatic scenes involving babies.
This book… made me feel nauseous… I need to go pray to God or something…
neeeem's review against another edition
4.0
ending is boring
everything else is disgustingly intriguing
everything else is disgustingly intriguing
schumacher's review against another edition
3.0
Sade worship made dreamy in a way that only Robbe-Grillet could. Don't read this on the train. You'll be institutionalized.
mhlynch's review against another edition
4.0
A well written novel about an alternate world in which the extremes of sado-masochistic torture are as everyday as oatmeal. Does the novel glorify the torture of underage nymphets with all the characterization of a lamp? Maybe! Nevertheless, might there be something to be said about the horrors (or sexual fantasies) abounding throughout the author's mind, displayed with such tender detail and amoral language? Yeah, maybe, probably. In the end, it's well written.
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