Lost Souls

This is very deeply grungy '90s horror, which despite the lavishly (lovingly, one might say) described . . . everything - horror, blood, injury, drugs (so, so many drugs), abuse, rape, nightmares, murder, and so on - within its pages . . . nothing of that feels terribly present. At least for me, most of it was at most disturbing of the cringe and blegh stripe if anything, not the kind of horror that makes an impression or lingers.

I've seen a number of people say they might have liked this book if they'd read it as a teenager, or similar; someone else commented that 30 is too old to start reading Poppy Brite. I'm in my 30s and I can fairly confidently say that I wouldn't have enjoyed this as a teenager either . . . and the heavy content show more might have been enough to screw with my head more than it did reading it now. show less

Twenty-five years after my first reading, I decided to dive back into this one again. I remember little about the first read other than not being that impressed and not knowing what to think about all that "gay stuff" that I read.

All this time later, I like to think I'm more mature and understanding with the "gay stuff"...and no, I don't call it that anymore. And this time around, I was impressed with what I read.

For the sake of clarity, though I know Poppy Z. Brite, female at the time of the release of this novel, is now Billy Martin and prefers masculine tags, I'm going to stick with "she" for the review, as it does refer to Martin 25 years earlier.

To be clear, the novel is not without its faults, but, if what I've read is true and show more this story was written when Brite was just 19, then it's almost impossible for it not to have some awkward moments.

It is, of course, much less shocking that it would have been upon its release, but I still applaud Brite for taking it in some of the directions she did. I can't think of another novel that so perfectly captures the vacuous emptiness of the Eighties and the directionless morbidity of America's youth at the time. Tying in the music of Bowie, Bauhaus, and the Cure, and the poetry of Dylan Thomas, it helped set the mood and the tone for the story.

As others have mentioned, there's little plot, at times feeling like an Eighties vampiric version of Kerouac's On The Road. But if I had to compare it to any other works, I'd say it's a mashup of the New Orleans atmosphere of Anne Rice, without all the boring shit (which is most of Anne Rice), the carnal sensuality of Clive Barker, the casual violence of John Skipp and Craig Spector, and the confused, nihilistic youth of S.E. Hinton. That's quite a punch.

Could the story have been laid out a bit better? Yes. But overall, the word choice, the ideas, the examination of youth...all of it...gorgeous. The movie The Lost Boys only wishes it had this much depth and soul.

Well done. show less

I have a special place in my disgusting heart for Lost Souls. This book is basically the epitome of "vampire porn", for a slightly more alternative market than Twilight. All the references to Tom Waits and Bauhaus strike me as self-aware and repetitive - I did this same thing as a beginning writer. All my characters liked bands that I liked, and I would throw pop-punk references into the story constantly. I've heard from other writers that this makes a work seem "dated" and can sometimes take away from the story. I get it. At the same time, it's endearing - it reminds me of how swept-up the goths are in their image, all liking the same music and being so obsessed with it. It makes them seem youthful compared to the vampires, who are show more decidedly more evil. Real, actual evil, not just playing at evil.

I enjoyed the portrayal of New Orleans as a decadent, haunted city, filled with folklore, where vampires party their days away, dining on Chartreuse and Twinkies and blood. Zillah was not nearly as handsome as I remembered, reading it ten years later (I guess I'm jaded on the "bad boy" image), but I can see how Ann would be bewitched by him. I liked the chapters about Steve and Ghost the best - they were the most likable characters - but I couldn't really get behind the two of them as a couple. I guess I'm torn. I liked that it was so less enthusiastically hypersexual of a union than the other pairings, that it was just the one kiss and nothing else... I guess I just have a thing for confused straight guy characters. But I couldn't see it really happening. It was intimate and sweet, but not realistic.

Agh, I love this book, but reviewing it I sound like such a hater. I guess now that I can see the flaws in it, I can appreciate it more. So I'm changing my previous three-star rating to four stars. show less

If you're going through puberty and feeling weird, this is a great book to read. With enough vampires, gay sex, incest and goth clubbing to satisfy any young misunderstood oddball (and truthfully, I have never been in a single goth club that played "Bela Lugosi's Dead" even once, let alone every night), this is a fun piece of wish-fulfillment. Dark, twisted, unbelieavable and not particularly sophisticated, I'd recommend this to anyone wearing Crow makeup in a rural town in the midwest.

I really wish I could say this book was awful.

But it wasn't. I loved it. If I'd been a goth and younger when I read it, I'd probably think it was the book that changed my life. I wasn't and it didn't, but it's still a gem of its genre.

No, the writing is not the best ever- but I don't feel like that matters. It's the mood and the tone and the plot and what it meant to people when it came out that matters.

It's this, and "Drawing Blood" that provoked fans to really push the world to recognize PZB. It was pure, grassroots word of mouth effort that got her on mainstream bookshelves.

Not that she appreciates that.

She hates "babybats"- aka young goths who loved her vampire novel, and wrote a vicious diatribe against them on her show more Livejournal. Several fans I know were incensed, and immediately dropped her from their list of favorite authors. The fanfiction community for her horror novels died on the vine. People don't want to buy her other books. Who even knows or cares what she's working on now? show less

I received this audiobook for review from Crossroad Press through Audiobook Jukebox's Solid Gold Reviewer Program. I did not receive any compensation for my review, and the views expressed herein are my own.

I love vampires, and I love audiobooks - so I jumped at the chance to review a vampire audiobook! It was not at all what I expected.

Lost Souls is about three androgynous bisexual (although mostly homosexual) vampires: Zillah (the leader) and his two sidekicks (Molochai and Twig). They come to New Orleans to party during Mardi Gras and they come across a bar that is owned by a vampire named Christian. There is an underage human girl (Jessy) at the bar, and she winds up having sex with Zillah while Christian has sex with Molochai and show more Twig. Jessy discovers that she is pregnant long after Zillah and his cronies have left New Orleans. Knowing that human females tend to not survive vampire childbirths, Christian takes Jessy in and has a sexual relationship with her throughout her pregnancy. She does indeed die during childbirth and has a boy whom Christian names "Nothing." Hoping to spare him of his destiny, Christian leaves Nothing on a doorstep and hopes the couple will love him as their own and that Nothing will never know of his true identity.

The book then jumps ahead 15 years when Nothing is a teenager, and he feels that he is totally misunderstood. He decides to run away and find the singers of a band whom he idolizes, and he hitches rides to the town where they live. He turns some tricks here and there, and then is picked up by Zillah, Molochai, and Twig. The vampire trio first intended to drain him, but instead have sex with him. Yes, that's right...Zillah has sex with his son, unbeknownst to him.

From here, the book continues on a downward spiral. This was not so much a vampire story, but more a story of getting high, getting drunk, and getting laid. I am a pretty open-minded person, and I wasn't so much bothered by the M/M and M/M/M and even M/M/M/M action - different strokes for different folks and all that. I am not one to judge, and it takes a lot to shock me. But it did really bother me when Zillah and Nothing hooked up. But wait, it gets worse: They do eventually discover that Zillah is Nothing's father, but they still continue having a sexual relationship! And Christian even tries to justify it saying that there are so few of their race left and that, if they can make each other happy, why not? Ok, this is disturbing. Christian also eventually has sex with Nothing, which brings on a whole new level of "ewwwwww" since he had sex with Nothing's mother and is now having sex with her son.

Let's recap: This book contains teenage prostitution, incest, sex with minors (statutory rape), and there was even an incident of rape. There was also another occurrence of incest, this time father/daughter, that I won't even go into because it was just too offensive.

I did not find this book entertaining. I found it dark and disturbing. It was not at all what I expected, and I will be steering clear of this author in the future!

The narrator, Chris Patton, did a fine job with the book. His voice was clear and expressive, and he was probably what kept me listening despite the book's content.

MY RATING: 1 star. I did not enjoy it at all. This was not for me. show less

I never thought I'd read another author who disturbed me as much as Stephen King, but I was mistaken. In "Lost Souls" Ms. Brite pushes all comfort zones using everything from sex, drugs and rock & roll to incest, rape, graphic violence and a smidge of cannibalism (I say a smidge for reasons that would be spoilerish if I were to elaborate.) However, for being everything I usually can't stand there was something very compelling about the writing. Simply put, I couldn't put the book down and knew if I didn't finish it asap it would just prey on my mind more.

As we start off we are introduced to all the main players of the book and are made to like and understand them. From the melancholy Christian to the boisterous Zillah, Twig and Molochai show more we are presented with vampires you probably wouldn't mind getting to know better. That would be a huge mistake. Our other characters are the lost Nothing (whose name used in the context of the book often confused me), the guilt ridden and guilty Steve and beautiful, brave Ghost. As the story goes on we come to realize how horrifying most of these characters are and despite how we are initially made to empathize with them, it is soon obvious that this attraction was a ruse. Easily Ghost is my favorite character of the bunch, as I believe he is meant to be. How these characters are drawn together by destiny or some other force isn't really explained but from the nowhere place of Missing Mile to the wild Mardi Gras of New Orleans following them on their journey to the end quickly becomes imperative to the reader.

This book, well written for all its disturbing content, isn't one for the faint of heart. I know it will be a while before I can get it out of my head and will probably be surprised with some nightmares just when I think I have. Not to mention that it has left me feeling a little bit unclean for the images invoked, as Stephen King stories always had as well. However, it was an intriguing book as well and I can't say that I'll regret reading it despite any lost sleep that might result.

Of the lyrical writing my favorite line, "No," said a voice from the dark doorway. A weary voice, a voice for speaking long after midnight, a voice to be used when all paths are blocked, when castles have fallen to ruin, when morning will not come again." show less