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A review by screamdogreads
Generation Bloodbath by Paul Curran
4.0
Cruelty's the wrong word for what I mean because, although what happened involved cruelty, the overriding atmosphere was one of headless pity.
Generation Bloodbath is one of the bleakest, most unhinged, untethered, nihilistic and brutal pieces of fiction that I have ever had the pleasure of reading. This sort of novel is extremely experimental, and highly transgressive, it also acts as a viscerally angry novel, and perhaps is one of the most abstract books you'll ever encounter. There is a story here, a vicious one at that, but it becomes increasingly difficult to keep a hold on what that story actually is, it's as if you're constantly microdosing over and over, until the words blur together, and then you lose all sight.
The way this book made me feel is actually detestable, it made my skin crawl, it made me want to scream and cry and vomit, it made me wish I had no eyes. There's not even anything particularly disgusting in this novel, at least, not compared to anything else I'd typically read. It's just so oppressive, so suffocating, so highly atrocious that it deals a devastating impact. All I could think of was the blood. There's just so much blood. At this point, the thought may have crossed your mind, why even read this book? That... I can't answer. This book will impact every reader differently, it will cut right through bone and find a home within your soul. The world is a broken place anyway, why not read about the end of it?
Generation Bloodbath is one of the bleakest, most unhinged, untethered, nihilistic and brutal pieces of fiction that I have ever had the pleasure of reading. This sort of novel is extremely experimental, and highly transgressive, it also acts as a viscerally angry novel, and perhaps is one of the most abstract books you'll ever encounter. There is a story here, a vicious one at that, but it becomes increasingly difficult to keep a hold on what that story actually is, it's as if you're constantly microdosing over and over, until the words blur together, and then you lose all sight.
The way this book made me feel is actually detestable, it made my skin crawl, it made me want to scream and cry and vomit, it made me wish I had no eyes. There's not even anything particularly disgusting in this novel, at least, not compared to anything else I'd typically read. It's just so oppressive, so suffocating, so highly atrocious that it deals a devastating impact. All I could think of was the blood. There's just so much blood. At this point, the thought may have crossed your mind, why even read this book? That... I can't answer. This book will impact every reader differently, it will cut right through bone and find a home within your soul. The world is a broken place anyway, why not read about the end of it?
While writing these words on the back of your thigh, between the veins, I discovered a scar, hiding there like the sail from a shipwreck washed into the desert and sunk there until someone dug it up and discovered a way to project our dreams upon its ghostly surface
A drug fueled stream of consciousness fever dream nightmare mindfuck. That's the only way to describe this obliterating story. Honestly, what even was this? Did someone lace my drink before I started reading? Was I strapped into some freakish mind control machine where someone prods my brain over and over? Generation Bloodbath is a pure attack on the senses, an assault on the eyes, at some places becoming painful to even read - which isn't a criticism, it just feels like having needles thrust into your eyes and brain. It's overpowering, this book grabs you and proceeds to ruin your life. It's unending, the suicides, the decapitations, the death, and the blood. Oh Lord, there's so much blood, and so much blood, and so much blood, and so much blood...
At night, the stairs to the ship's galley sound more brittle than whatever bones find themselves somehow under there, but this was never the darkest exist.