Rash [Paperback]

Charles Romalotti (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2001

Four homeless kids, each armed with the shadows of their past, each determined to survive the city streets on their own terms. When one of them develops a psychosomatic skin condition, their world is capsized as the deterioration slowly begins to unfold this darkly suspenseful tale.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A horror story for the industrial generation. A totally convincing and compelling read. -- Martin Bowes, Attrition

Rash is amazing, a masterpiece of underground culture. I was seriously blown away. -- Flax Glor, producer of Radiation Nation TV Show

Romalotti's pointed social satire never overshadows his sympathy for the main players in this nightmare tale. An excellent read. -- Don DeGrazia, author of American Skin

About the Author

Charles Romalotti is the author of the novel Salad Days.

Product Details

• Paperback: 172 pages
• Publisher: Layman Pr (June 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0967923514
• ISBN-13: 978-0967923512
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,529,812 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Reads like an addiction, August 15, 2001

By 

dedkitty.net (NYC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rash (Paperback)

Four brilliantly depicted, very realistic misfit youths embark on a cross-country trek yearning for an escape from each of their own personal hells. Charles Romalotti writes in a graphic, yet very easy to digest style that makes putting this book down after starting it a nearly impossible task, making Rash the equivalent of Heroin for the eyes...it's that good. I spanned the 172 pages within the time alotted me by a two-hour train commute and a fifteen-minute waiting time at my doctor's office. Additionally, it left me wanting more...like any good drug does. This possibly makes Romalotti akin to a "Literary Pusher".

Though it might be classified by some as a Horror novel, I found the story to be extremely believable...most of the events depicted being plausible. The main characters could be the kids you see on St. Marks Place here in NYC, though the bulk of the story takes shape in Texas. The author has an amazing grasp of street life and the Punk subculture...the nuances, smells, and sounds seem to burst forth from each page intoxicating your mind, making it seem as if the you're a witness to these events first-hand, as opposed to just reading about them.

Discovering this new author was, to me, the equivalent of discovering a band that I'd previously never heard of which then becomes a new fave, resulting in countless trips to the used CD store in search of their other releases. Now I have to dig up a copy of his other novel, Salad Days.

According to the credits, this book is being developed into an indie motion picture (yeah!) and the author is now working on a sequel to this book as well, titled Talon. Good for usI, for one, am hurting for another fix.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A disturbed mind, December 21, 2001

By 

Harvest Moon (Grand Prairie, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rash (Paperback)

Lots of adjectives come to mind when reading Romalotti's latest offering--gritty, imaginative, original, raw, risky--but none seem to fit. Indeed, it seems a bit disrespectful to use use such hackneyed words for describing such an original (can't come up with a better descriptor and don't have a thesaurus handy) work.

Rash takes as its subject a handful of post-pubescent misfits, tosses them out in the streets and then...Well, I'll let you find out the rest for yourself. One caveat: Rash is NOT for the faint of heart or the reader looking for the standard adolescent/young adult angst-ridden story. This isn't a book waiting for John Hughes to come along and turn it into a screenplay with a catchy little pop soundtrack. The vignettes (the story is written in a sort of documentary/journal format) read like something Dennis Cooper, Brett Easton Ellis, and Sin Soraco would come up with if left for seventy-two hours in a room without windows. Yes, it's that disturbing.

Get it NOW. You will not be disappointed.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Twisted, December 19, 2001

By 

Jared (Williston, ND) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rash (Paperback)

I just finished Rash the other day. I must say it is one of the most twisted books i have ever read. The character descriptions are amazing, one really gets a feel for all of them. The end though, was jaw dropping. I sat there thinking to myself, "what the...?" I can't wait for the movie and the next book.