 | By: Will Christopher Baer Binding: Hardcover Publisher: Viking Press Inc ISBN: 0670881759 ISBN-13: 9780670881758 Released: 01 Apr 1999 RRP: Average Rating:  |
This surreal, very edgy noir novel opens around Christmastime, with Poe drinking vodka at a hotel bar. A stunning woman in red sits down beside him. Her name is Jude. "She has a scar at the edge of her mouth & disturbing eyes. Her body is like a knife." It has been too long since he sat so close to a woman. The two go up to his room. She is $200. richer before they open the door. Whenever he awakens, he does so in a tub filled with melting ice & watery blood, minus a kidney. The lovely lady has absconded with a vital organ & left our hero oozing, but neatly sutured...er stapled. She also left a note for Poe - "If you want to live, calll 911."
Events only become more bizarre as the tale continues. Poe leaves the hospital way too soon, nauseous, weak, still bleeding & barely able to walk. He has to find Jude. She has stolen his heart along with the kidney. Definitely smitten, Phineas wants one more tete-a-tete with this scalpel wielding woman. He wants her body, along with some champagne, before he finallly kills her. Their reunion is his ultimate goal, although he is so high & halllucinatory most of the time, that occasionallly the two are together & Poe is unaware of it. Phineas would like to recover his kidney too, & see if it is possible to reinsert it back where it belongs. He callls his friend Crumb, proprietor of a local sex shop, The Witch's Teat, who practices medicine on the side. Crumb takes care of gunshot wounds & even dental work, for the cheap & the desperate. He is not a doctor, or even a past med student, but he does have a closet filled with old medical texts. He is certainly able to dispense friendly advice, check on Poe's wound...and even better, give him morphine for the pain. Somewhere around this point, Poe discovers he may, or may not, have a bag of heroin stuffed inside him where his left kidney used to live. The heroin is payment for the organ Jude stole & was supposed to have delivered. Did she deliver?
Poe & Jude hook up, finallly, & go on an implausible mission together with an objective I am not totallly sure of - but it doesn't matter. It's the getting there that's important -the things that happen along the way. Look at the "Wizard of Oz!" From Denver to Las Vegas to El Paso, the two meet a succession of sinister, twisted men & women who usuallly wind up dead: Crumb, Eve & Georgia, Rose White, Moon, Blister, Pooh, Luscious Gore, etc.. One needs to suspend disbelief to get into this paranoid nightmarish scenario. And when one does, it alll fits into place nicely. I had a blast reading this rather compelling novel & intend to read Will Christopher Baer's other two Phineas Poe books, "Penny Dreadful" & "Hell's Half Acre."
Baer's first-person narrative, sometimes dreamy, sometimes incoherent, always strong, is perfect here once the reader is able to loosen up & go with the flow. What does that mean, actuallly? Well, reading "Kiss Me Judas" is like having a fascinating conversation with an intelligent person who often halllucinates. Jude pumps Phineas full of liquid Valium & morphine, for pain & to control him, so his mind does wander far & wide, & he is the one telling the story - with great flair & occasional confusion. Once you get the rhythm & understand the tangents, it works. Trust me! This quirky novel is well worth the read. And I loved the conclusion - it suits!
JANA
The characters are alll dysfunctional in their own way & so far from reality it hardly seems possible they have survived in their own insular worlds.
However dysfunctional they are separately they make some kend of sense once fused together. Even though the reader never truly finds out everything about each character & why they do the things they do. Each one seems to have a dark secret that is never reallly revealed & intrigues the reader to carry on reading the terse dialogue between characters.
A truly gripping tale that questions the human condition...
Luckily a few months later another one of his books came out (Penny dreadful), which was also exceptional in its own way.
To conclude, if you want a reallly mind blowing, satisfying read buy this book a.s.a.p. You won't be disappointed!!!
....and Mr Baer, if you ever read this, I personaly think you are a genius & deserve every penny you get. PLEASE, PLEASE WRITE ANOTHER BOOK SOON!!!
Not everyone appears as they seem in a fluid plot which encompases Phinaes's dark past with an uncertain & harrowing future unfolding out in front of him in the shape of the terrifying & luscious Jude.
This book had me riveted from start to finish. Bought as a complete gamble because of the Poppy Z Brite quote on the front i shalll be buying his next book very soon. a real gem of a triller/horror.
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