Ambrosial Flesh [Mass Market Paperback]

Mary Ann Mitchell (Author)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 391 pages
• Publisher: Leisure Books (August 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0843949023
• ISBN-13: 978-0843949025
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,397,576 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Biography

Mary Ann Mitchell has published 11 books. Her first book, Drawn to the Grave, was a final nomination for the Bram Stoker Award and won the International Horror Guild Award. She held officer positions with the Horror Writers Association and with the Northern California Sisters in Crime organization. She is now making her books available as e-books.

As a child, Mary Ann Mitchell wrote short stories, essays, and poetry. When she was twelve she sent her short stories to the night editor of The Journal American, who encouraged her to send more. Her mother intercepted the letters and forbade her from writing. Seems some of the family's dark secrets were oozing onto Mary Ann's written pages. Her writing became secret and sporadic. Once she completed graduate school, she became a civil servant. Years later her husband asked her what her dream career would be. She quickly answered that she always wanted to be a novelist.

She began her writing career by taking writing classes at The University of California, Los Angeles and writing several short stories, which her husband encouraged her to submit for publication. Mary Ann Mitchell's short stories have been published in a number of magazines. The short story The Hyacinth Girl appeared in the anthology The Year's Best Horror Stories: XXI, edited by Karl Edward Wagner.

Before writing the Marquis de Sade series Mary Ann read many of Sade's works and a number of Sade biographies. She also read Marquis de Sade, Letters from Prison translated by Richard Seaver. This helped to form in her mind an image of the historical Sade.

She has always enjoyed crime novels and thrillers, especially the noir writers such as Jim Thompson and the brutal street novels of David Goines. Mary Ann has written a crime fiction novel of female vengeance titled Siren's Call.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Hold the scabs and pass the dry skin, August 16, 2001

By 

Ann Linder "kindle rules!" (Saint Louis, mo USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ambrosial Flesh (Mass Market Paperback)

It is really sad when an author as talented as Mary Ann Mitchell produces something as gross, nasty and just plain disgusting as this book in the name of Horror. For those who don't know this book is about the eating of human flesh and assorted tidbits the main character harvests from his body as well as from the bodies others. I stuck with the book through the main character eating his own scabs, through his mutilation of his feet for "snacks" and even through a vile meal he served his poor dumb girlfriend (who brings the tired plot device of the dumb trusting female to tedious life.) This is a book designed to disgust and repulse with a ridiculous plot, a one dimensional dim main character who broadcasts every intention early in the book and does not do one thing that makes reading about him worth the time. This is not a book of horror for people who want to be scared but for those who want to be grossed out and banged over the head with continuous violence and gore (without the distraction of a reasonable storyline.) For those who would like the feeling of reading this book without buying it I would suggest driving around and following the first person you see picking their nose - save your money and buy one of her other novels.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars ...She's written better--MUCH better!!, July 19, 2002

By 

Kimmy "Evil but still kinda' cute" (lock haven, pa United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ambrosial Flesh (Mass Market Paperback)

I became a fan of Mary Ann Mitchell's, when I read her book "Sips of Blood."--Immediately, I was hooked!
So, I sought out her first novel: "Drawn to the Grave"...Again, EXCELLENT...
Then came the second book in her vampire series, that began with "Sips of Blood"--"Quenched"...I couldn't WAIT for the next book..
Then--DISASTER!: "Ambrosial Flesh"
It isn't so much that the book is 'bad', it just does not live up to the standard set by her other books.
It starts out promising..then takes a turn for the BORING, during the second half.
I am HAPPY to report, however, that here latest book, "Cathedral of the Vampires", which is the third book in her vampire series is EXCELLENT!!
So, if you did not like this, particular, book--PLEASE, give her other ones a try! :)

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars this is an evil book, November 7, 2001

By 

James Kosmicki (Grand Island, NE USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ambrosial Flesh (Mass Market Paperback)

As I said in the title, this book is evil. I don't mean evil in the sense of causing great harm or should be banned. I mean evil in the sense that reading it causes me great moral shivers. There's just something WRONG about what this book shows.

I like horror novels, and have always felt myself relatively immune to the "grossout" or "disgust" factor. That is no longer the case. This book has shown to me, once and for all, that there are limits to what my mind can accept as understandable and tolerable.

Cannibalism in and of itself has never bothered me. I've read about the "Alive" soccer team and the Donner Party plenty of times. I'm even a great fan of Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal." But presented as it is in this novel, I shudder and turn away.

And yet, I read the whole thing. Its prose is a bit weak at times and this is one of those "bigger than necessary typefont so we can inflate the page count" books that annoy me, but it does move forward at a rapid rate. Is it believable? NO, and why would anyone ask that of a horror novel? Is it contrived in its plot? Sure, but this is genre fiction we're talking about here. Contrived plots and stock characters are part of the appeal. I gave this book 3 stars because while I found myself disgusted by the content, that's what horror novels are supposed to do. This novel, while not especially well written, helped me discover a limitation in my thinking, and a taboo that I hadn't quite known was there. It has made me think, and good books do that.