My Dead Body: v. 5: A Joe Pitt Novel (Joe Pitt Casebook 5) [Paperback]

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1841496820
• ISBN-13: 978-1841496825
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 1.1 x 7.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,580,170 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Charlie Huston is the author of the bestsellers The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death and The Shotgun Rule, as well as the Henry Thompson trilogy, the Joe Pitt casebooks, and several titles for Marvel Comics. He lives with his family in Los Angeles.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Satisfying end to a great series., October 18, 2009

By 

John - See all my reviews

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This review is from: My Dead Body: A Novel (Paperback)

This is the fifth and final book in the Joe Pitt series. Pitt is a vampyre in Manhattan. Vampyres are much more infected than they are mystical. They lead a harder life than they do in other stories. No Twilight or Sookie-style vampires here. This world of vampyres is a hard one, where only the strong survive (And even then, just barely.)

The Island is an enclosed community of vampyres, geographically sectioned off and ran by different clans. Joe starts off in the series as a troubleshooter for the different clans, but not beholden to any one group - rare, but Joe's skills in handling the "dirty work" make his existence outside of clan politics possible. Each book is self-contained, but does have an overall story from the first book to the last. Things happen in every book that shakes up Joe's world, so although you can read the series out of order, it's better to start at the beginning.

These books are definitely hard boiled. Joe's character reminds me of Parker from Richard Stark's books. He does whatever he has to survive or to accomplish his goal. Huston has created one of the greatest hard cases in modern fiction. And I don't want to shortchange the world he has created. The political workings of the clans, the explanation of how being a vampyre works, etc - make it easy to immerse yourself into this world.

I don't want to spoil ANY of the series, let alone the final book. So let me just say "My Dead Body" is a great book in series of great books, that does a fantastic job of finishing up the story of Joe Pitt.

Also - if you like this series, please also read the Hank Thompson trilogy by Charlie Huston. They're pretty amazing as well.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars About a Pint Low, October 26, 2009

By 

Gary Griffiths (Los Altos Hills, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Dead Body: A Novel (Paperback)

As my previous reviews stand witness, I'm a huge Charlie Huston fan; an evangelist for his quirky prose and off beat story lines, fast action and unapologetic violence. As a series, the "Vampyre" novels with the blood guzzling maverick bad guy Joe Pitt embody all that is Charlie Huston: hip, irreverent, cynical black humor wrapped around a larger-than-life protagonist who, if not loved, is certainly respected. So after devouring Huston's four previous installments of the Vampyre-Ronin Joe Pitt's after dark mayhem, and was really looking forward to episode five, the final chapter in this gore-splattered recharge of a tired genre.

And I was - disappointed. OK, I said it.

In fairness, "My Dead Body" does a good job of tying up the looses ends of its four predecessors. All the familiar faces are back for a final curtain call - the the buttoned down brutality of Dexter Predo, Terry Bird's "you know" progressive/liberal contradictions, the "Count" - punk Renfield turned Enclave leader, the brilliant and brainy "civilian" Amanda Horde, and of course Pitt heart throb Evie, Hurley, Sela, Digga - even the "wraiths" make a cameo - along with a cast of virtually every other clan leader and notable flowing through the pages from "Already Dead" through last year's "Every Last Drop". The central theme - Pitt's infiltration of the "Cure" house to free a young woman impregnated with the supposed Vampyre Messiah by her infected boyfriend - serves only as a convenient vehicle to find a conclusion that should have ended with the discovery of the "Hell Hole" in the previous 'Every Last Drop." But as rich as this ghoulish reunion of Vampyre politics, clan civil war, and Amanda's medical experimentation may have been, a worn out and worn down and blood-starved Joe Pitt left me wanting; the aging warhorse spending more time contemplating his own death than cracking heads as he fades away, piece-by-bloody-body piece. In what is completely uncharacteristic of Huston, a found the pacing uneven, even sleepy in parts, overdosed with arcane medical science fiction and the very real need to dispatch more justice and redemption that Huston's ambitious conclusion could contain within the limits of a 300-page paper back.

Should you read it? You bet - if you've been a fan for the distance, you'll definitely want to see how it all wraps up. If you've never read the series, this is definitely not the starting point - no matter how well it may have been written. But if you've not discovered "Already Dead" yet, you're in for a bizarre and entertaining literary treat.

For me, I'm sorry to see such a great series go out on a rather mediocre note, but hey - I'm in the minority here. Plenty of five star reviews to send this one away, and whether or not I agree, it doesn't change my conviction that Charlie Huston is the most interesting active writer of American pop crime fiction.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Joe Pitt Goes Out On Top, October 22, 2009

By 

TMStyles (California) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: My Dead Body: A Novel (Paperback)

The five Joe Pitt novels are extraordinary examples of stylistic prose and horror noir at their best. "My Dead Body" is designed to end the 5 novel arc and as such, it ties a lot of loose ends together but the casual reader should be advised that "My Dead Body" is not a good novel to first experience this excellent series. In fact, each subsequent novel has become murkier and more entangling than the previous entry and there are parts of this finale that become deeply metaphysical and philosophical. And be forewarned, Huston writes in a sparse economical manner, usually in the first person, and the dialogue flows in real time without each character's comments being identified textually which can lead to confusion at times for the inattentive reader. His styling is in a "stream of consciousness" mode that sometimes seems to leap off the page and in other instances the reader is forced to reread the paragraph to get the proper character identified as the speaker.

In "My Dead Body", Charlie Huston continues the disturbing portrait of his new strangely intriguing world in which gang-like "clans" of vampires (humans who have been infected with the Vyrus) have divided Manhatten Island into territories and fiefdoms, each with its own governing structure, borders, spheres of influence, and purpose in existing. Huston has effectively created a world where vampires coexist with unknowing humans and where the sociological, psychological, and philosophical conflicts between individuals and between clans make for stunning parodies and commentaries on our lifestyles. Indeed, the loyal reader often forgets the vampire/blood dependence angle as the action and the emotions mirror those of any great noir novel that visits eternal themes of loyalty, betrayal, greed, and passion.

Joe has been hiding underground since the action in "Every Last Drop" where he initiated a war among the vampyre clans when he agrees to return to the dangerous world above to rescue Chubby Freeze's daughter who has been impregnated by her vampyre boyfriend--the possibilites of that child are enormous; however, Joe's real motivation is to please his old girl friend, Evie, and to see her once more. Within steps of returning to the surface world, Joe is embroiled in danger, double crosses, and gore as, seemingly, all the clans and all the major characters from the previous novels want to see him dead. Through artful and not so artful negotiations and manipulations, Joe soon has everyone at one another's throats (no pun intended).

While trying to survive and rescue the young couple, Joe stumbles upon a secret developed by Amanda Horde's research that could effectively destroy the entire world as the vampyres know it. Loyal readers of the series will experience the savagery of the Coalition, the Society, The Enclave, and The Hood at war with each other and with Joe. Similarly, Huston ties up the loose ends involving Digga, Predo, Terry Bird, Hurley, the Count, Sela and the rest of our surviving cast of characters. "My Dead Body" is a wild ride with many unexpected stops that, all in all, is a fitting climax to the Joe Pitt saga. I highly recommend the series, but be aware, it is a long way and a far cry from the "Twilight" and the "Sookie Stackhouse" novels.