George Looney

There were some solid hits and some real misses for me in this collection. At times the intersection of faith, sin, and sexuality was explored in interesting ways and the mysticism of the faith healers worked well with the Southern gothic tone. After other stories, I was left wondering what the point was. It’s all full of taboo sex (rape, necrophilia, incest, cheating, etc.) and violence and constantly went back and forth over the line between having it suit and contribute to the story and feeling voyeuristic or like an attempt to be edgy without substance. With the stories being interconnected, I gave some the benefit of the doubt that they might take on meaning later, but by the end, some of them still felt like filler.
I also felt weird about how the female characters were nearly all portrayed as sluts or victims without much else going on for them, but I guess the men were just as much sluts and victims who just got to show off more complexity, so I’ve not fully formed my thoughts on that.… (more)

Maybe, to the northerner, the south is all “gators,” faith healers, sluts, and sex with sluts. And variations of those. In these somewhat linked stories a young faith healer (a boy, really – add underage sex to the list) has sex with a slut and later gets eaten by a “gator.”

We also encounter UFOs, mud-infused rivers, snake handling, physical deformity for the sake of deformity, religious fervor, the mingling of sex and religion – which results in a slut performing a sex act with the severed middle finger of Jesus. That one’s original.

One narrator, a preacher, says “Mystery is the state we live in, everywhere.” I like that.

Some of the stories are strong by themselves. Jammed into one collection they become a parody of forced and inauthentic southern voices. Checking the boxes of southern gothic literature doesn’t make for real southern gothic literature.… (more)