A review by everyotherpageorso
Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite

dark sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
I don’t know how I can give this a star rating.
Well written but it’s a book you endure rather than enjoy, which I guess is the point.

Allusion to Konerak Sinthasomphone at the end was really heartbreaking. If you aren’t familiar with the case, Konerak was 14 years old when he escaped Jeffrey Dahmer after being attacked, and police were alerted of an injured and naked boy in the area. Dahmer showed up, said they were lovers, and the police allowed Dahmer to take the boy back to his, where he killed him, despite the protestations of many African-American bystanders.
In the novel’s very clear reference to this incident, it is Jay who is allowed to leave with the injured and naked Tran, despite the protestations of an unnamed black musician, who is ignored and berated with slurs.
  While I understand the objective of putting a real life example of police incompetence (especially when it pertains to marginalized victims) in the novel, I still think it’s  disrespectful to the victim’s memory, as it seemed to me that it was not so much a reference or allusion as it was a line-by-line fictionalization of a real murder, eroticized through the perspective of his murderers. Yes, we do get Tran’s perspective during this as well, but I don’t think this offsets the disrespect of it. 
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