Customer Reviews

Decomposition

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Decomposition is the truth about men and women taken to its most morbid outcome. At first, it drives the reader by sick curiousity to peer into this woman's trunk, which is holding her ex-boyfriend's corpse, and into her decomposing psyche. Decomposition draws on themes of the need to possess disguised as love or lust, and the freedom that comes from destruction. The protagonist, even in her most depraved states, is relatable and even loveable. We're taken, willingly or not, to the limits of disgusting human capability because of a shared understanding that what we want, and even need, is not always what is 'good' for us.

"Decomposition" is by far J. Eric Miller's best work yet. His "Animal Rights and Pornography" collection of short stories was only a glimpse of his truly remarkable storytelling. With "Decomposition" we see Miller at his best. The story's pace never falters as the reader is pulled into the mind of the tale's protagonist without ever wanting to look back. This was a great read! I definitely recommend this book!
CK Gauntt

The novel draws you in and is a roller coaster ride to the last page. It reminded me of an adult Robert Cormier novel or David Lynch flick - interesting, intense, bizarre and deeply illustrative that each person's reality is a proprietary thing. How can I like the protagonist and even understand her as her mind flows from beauty to horror without any discernable difference in perspective or conscience? I guess I liked it in a way drivers slow down to watch the aftermath of an auto accident - I wanted to look away, but couldn't stop reading. It is definitely a page turner. I highly recommend it.

Like Miller's Animal Rights and Porngoraphy, this disturbed me. The tone is not as dark as that of some of the stories in Animal Rights and Porngraphy, but the subject matter is certainly similiar (a lot of sex stuff and a little animal stuff--though this time it is an animal doing things to a corpse!) What was disturbing about it was what Miller seems to be tryign to show us about love relationships; I guess I was bothered because I bought into it. It was more satsifying in that we really have time to get to know and empathize with our main character. I also like the idea of the author being male and the book being about a female who has a dead writer named Jack in the truck of her car (makes you wonder what the J stand for in J Eric Miller). Anyway, as with the last of his works, I have trouble recommending it because it gives my mind too much pause on too many unpleasant things, and yet, I found it more than worth it. I'm sure I'll be rereading it again soon, and I don't do that with many books.

In J. Eric Millers dark tale, "Decomposition," he takes us on a journey running to and from something, but proving rather convincingly that the ultimate destination may be somewhere in the middle.

Our unlikely heroine is a young woman who has just killed her boyfriend, although the specific circumstances surrounding the murder do not come to light until much later in the story. She is driving from New Orleans--fleeing a hurricane as well as the scene of the crime--to the lover she jilted in Seattle with Jack's body in the trunk of her car. And while Seattle may be at the end of the journey, she reaches milestones well before she ever reaches George whom she supposes is waiting for her there. She begins her story with an explanation: "What's going on now, it's a love story, kind of. And in it, I'm my own hero. If there was a dragon, it was Jack, and I had to slay him myself and escape the cave in which he kept me. In this fairy tale, George is kind of like the sleeping beauty." (p.2)

As you may infer from the title and subject matter, it is a dark story, sometimes violent and sexually explicit. But not gratuitously so, because sometimes life is just this raw, and Miller does a masterful job at presenting it intelligently and without apology.

As Jack's body decomposes, so do many of her illusions of life; specifically her relationships between her parents, George, and, of course, Jack. But these metaphors and lessons come from an honest dialogue with herself that is sometimes shocking, sometimes humorous; but always captivating for the reader.

And because she's her own hero re-writing fairy tales along this winding road, the villains are not always obvious, and happy endings are not always ensured. But she learns the important lessons albeit alarmingly and indirectly. "I don't need to thank anybody, but I say it anyway, Thank you, and I look at my own two eyes in the rearview mirror. A heat pulses through my stomach, the way I feel when I look at someone I think I love. So I love myself, that's what I've learned, that's the final epiphany I get from stopping home one last time." (p.68)

This is a short read made shorter by its easy flow and for the fact that you won't be able to put it down.

Perhaps in the end it is not a twisted modern fairy tale, but a ghost story because it will haunt you long after.

I found this book to be fascinating. The main character was both hilarious and deranged. She was actually very likable even though she had just killed her boyfirend. It all made perfect sense in a very psychotic sort of way. The rate of decline in her mental status coincided with the decomposing of the bad boyfriend's body. J. Eric Miller has a way of making you laugh at situations that really aren't appropriate to laugh it, but you do it anyway. I look forward to his next book!!