#chandler morrison

[underdog1224557]

I wish there were fandoms for obscure fucked up horror books so people like me who can’t take anything seriously can joke about the dark plot

[thebanishedreader]

Ongoing Book Review: Dead Inside (Chandler Morrison) Pt. 1

I take way too long to finish books since I read like 7 at a time, so I have decided to start posting my thoughts and reviews as I go along. Also, that way I can actually commit to posting these reviews once I finish the book, which is yet another thing the commitment devils have kept me from accomplishing.

Anyhow, though, here we go: the first ongoing review will cover what I have read so far of Dead Inside by Chandler Morrison.

(CW: mentions of necrophilia, cannibalism, and sex. NSFW I guess).

Description by Seller (amazon.com): "A young hospital security guard with a disturbingly unique taste in women. A maternity doctor with a horrifically unusual appetite. When the two of them meet, they embark on a journey of self-discovery while shattering societal norms and engaging in destructively aberrant behavior. As they unwittingly help each other understand a world in which neither seems to belong, they begin to realize what it truly means to be alive... And that it might not always be a good thing."

Here I am, 15% through the book. I know it's not far, but honestly, it's far enough. All I have to say is-- wow. Wow.

This book kinda sucks. Just an all-around drag. A bore, but not the pleasant boring drawl of a lecturer putting you to sleep. The harrowing, suffocating boredom of having to work a shift with that coworker that you hate, that makes you cringe so hard that it's not even entertaining to hate them anymore. Get me out of here. That's how this book feels.

For a book constantly boasting how readers say it's "not for the faint of heart," it's surprisingly underwhelming. I'm frankly disappointed, and yet this book keeps embarrassing itself so much within only 15% that I can't even be angry at myself for falling into its trap.

My reasoning falls into 3 categories: Let-Down, Cringe, and Excuses.

First things first - I was expecting something raunchy, something gruesome and disturbing. I'm not one of those people who shies away from Dead Dove content, far from it. I love that shit. Literature is a place to explore the dangerous, the taboo, the fucked up-ness of being a person. So, finding a book that pledged it was disgusting, disturbing, and medically horrifying? Sign me up. This book is... not that.

What was promised to be a horror novel that pushes the boundaries of what is too much horror, what toes the line between gratuitous and entertaining, this novel relies on one thing: shock value. And the biggest bummer for that tactic is this: if your audience is not shocked, then there is nothing left supporting the narrative.

Dead Inside relies entirely on the audience not being familiar with horror stories or even true crime stories involving necrophilia or cannibalism. The concept of a perverted security guard using his power to violate corpses is supposed to be mortifying, unbelievably despicable. Yet for a seasoned horror fan, it's nothing short of lame. Juvenile, almost. There is hardly any risk when our security guard goes into a morgue which he holds the key to, wherein there are no security cameras, where he can do whatever he pleases, lay on the floor afterwards, and go back to work-- in a tiny, unbusy hospital. It's boring, it's lame, who gives a shit if this weirdo gets his rocks off in weird ways; it's horrible to think of it happening in real life to the body of a loved one, certainly, but this is horror literature. Stephen King would have had worms crawling up the dude's dick and blossoming into a parasite that whispers in his ear until he castrates himself. Chandler Morrison just has our (I hate to even call him this) protagonist fuck a corpse. Cool, I guess.

2. Number Two. Let's talk Cringe Factor.

This narrator is unbearable. Unbearable. He sounds like the stereotype of a discord edgelord who is narrating this book with the sole purpose of scaring off the normies. He relishes in saying gross things, being gross, all while acting as if he is so much more sophisticated than he is.

It doesn't help that the book is narrated in first person. This goes back to how I described the experience of reading Dead Inside to be equivalent to working a shift with a coworker that is very much not your friend who disrespects you the same way a friend would tease. It's just plain oblivious. Our necrophiliac incel narrator is the epitome of the Riverdale meme where Jughead says "I'm weird. I'm a weirdo. I don't fit in. And I don't want to fit in." Like, Christ man, we get it, you don't shower and your hair is greasy and people don't want to be around you not because you're "weird", but because you're inconsiderate and unhygienic and put 0 effort into anything whatsoever. Having to listen to the narrator's commentary on how he's aware how disturbing his own actions are, how he knows the ordinary person would see him as a freak, it's just so lame. That's the only word I have for it, really. Just completely and utterly lame. This novel reads with the same tone as a Reddit incel jerk-off posting about Elliot Rodger. It's just pathetic, but there's no pity there. It's entirely self-induced patheticness that the narrator excuses as being "unique."

It's fine to have characters in books that are frustrating, irritating, that make you just want to smack them upside the head for yapping too long. But it's never a good sign when the person I want most desperately to shut the fuck up is the narrator. It's not good writing if my method of making the narrator quit talking is closing the book and contemplating whether or not it's even worth finishing. Extraordinarily poor quality character. But it's not intentional - we are supposed to find this character disturbing, threatening, and eerily fucked up. We're supposed to wonder why he got this way, and what it will take to break him. We are supposed to hate him, and relish in his demise. I feel nothing but exasperation from this man. The simplest way to resolve my hatred for him is to close the book and put it away. I don't give a fuck what happens to him. I don't think he even deserves my attention, and he's the narrator. This is bad.

3. And finally. Excuses.

This complaint is a short, but prudent one. The writing quality is mediocre at best. One of the biggest rules of any creative work, but particularly writing, art, and filmmaking, is that your audience is smarter than you think. Leave things open for interpretation. Leave opportunity for ponderance, and analysis. Show, don't tell.

Dead Inside is all tell, with nothing to show. Our narrator is a loser, but Morrison doesn't let us own it. Instead, excuses are made; the most infuriating example of this is after our narrator has finished fornicating with a poor, lifeless victim. The section goes:

"... but my lovers are all equipped with the best birth control the world can offer. As in, dead reproductive systems. I know that goes without saying, but I like to say it." (p. 21)

If it goes without saying, then don't say it. The segment would have been entirely fine without that last remark; if anything, it would have been better, and bolstered the narrator's character as a whole! And this is only one of the outright examples I have of this characterization.

The bitter, dark humor of our narrator would have been brilliantly given if the quote ended at "dead reproductive systems." We would have been left with the pure objectification and lack of emotion our narrator possesses, how he sees dead bodies purely as anatomical tools for his own peak control and pleasure, his own performance. We as the audience would have been victims of him as well, subjected to listen to the gross things he says and does and entirely unable to resist it-- pure puppets for his sick fantasies, just like the corpses he violates. It would have illustrated an actual level of mystique and unsettling nature to the relationship between narrator and narrated and audience. The novel's ongoing themes of fetish and object, the definitions of violation, it all would have been so interesting if only the narrator didn't say something so juvenilely self-aware every five seconds, like he's vying for our attention and approval. Look!!, Morrison makes our narrator constantly wave his hands in our face like a child, Look!! Isn't that fucked up!! Look at how fucked up I can be! Tell me I'm gross, tell me I'm weird!! Look at how gross that is, right!! That's scary, right??

No. It's annoying, and it gets old before it even got a chance to start.

Again, I'm 25 pages into a 191 page book. It's mid as fuck. I hope it turns around, but I don't think it will-- I can see from only 15% where this story is going, I bet I can plot out most if not the entire rest of the book. I think the concept is one spooky "what-if" that goes no deeper than that. Honestly, I'm really disappointed. I wanted to be disturbed. I don't have much motivation to keep reading this book except the pervasive nagging of my soul to finish most books I pick up. Plus, I want to know if I'm wrong about how dog this has so far turned out to be.

If you made it this far, holy shit. Congrats. You're running the Athens marathon by reading this. You're amazing. I'm giving you a small kiss on the forehead.

[litandlifequotes]

Let us make haste, for the night is calling to us, and we alone have the answer it seeks.

Until the Sun by Chandler Morrison

[yourmaddestobsessi0n]

do you like to read? what kind of books if you do? fav author and book?

Yes i love to read, i loveeee romance books, splatterpunk, really sad looks like girl in pieces and classic literature

My fav books (if i have to chose) would probably be the picture of dorian gray, dead inside, RES series, girl in pieces, you’d be home by now, Emma, Devils night series (there is more LMAO)

my fav author(s) is probably Chandler Morrison, Kathleen Glasgow, jane austen or oscar wilde

[victorianappleorchard]

‘Dead Inside’ by Chandler Morrison fanart.

[caffeinebzz]

Here's how Dead Inside by Chandler Morrison would have gone if I was the main character (TW):

*I'm working the graveyard shift as the security officer in a hospital. I walk into the morgue and see a naked doctor eating a baby.*

"Why are you eating a dead baby?" I ask. "That's fucking odd."

She starts crying. "Oh no. I have been found out. I love to eat babies."

My eyes widen. "You're a freak. I am calling the cops."

*She cries while I'm on the phone with the police. She is arrested. I go home and schedule an appointment with my therapist. I now suffer from PTSD. The End.*

[mylifeinfiction]

Human-Shaped Fiends by Chandler Morrison

"Justice doesn't have anything to do with anything."

Boring. Chandler Morrison's brand of 'shocking for the sake of being shocking' extreme 'horror' is—for lack of a better word—boring. The fact that he then injects the meta exercise of literary masturbation that is autofiction into the mix makes it insufferably boring.

I get that Morrison is trying to be subversive by dismantling the (splatter) western genre by taking its tropes to 'shocking' extremes, but he's very clearly not clever—or talented—enough to effectively pull it off. Instead, we're left with a paint-by-numbers western that so badly wants to be some sort of spiritual successor to Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian—just, y'know, without the thematic weight or the gargantuan literary talent of Cormac McCarthy—thus making it little more than a hodgepodge of juvenile scenes of r*pe and m*rder clumsily interwoven with delusional, over-the-top autofiction 'satire' that never manages to achieve anything besides shining a light on Morrison's clear disdain not only for this genre, but for his fans. He's very clearly bored of writing this sh*t. But not nearly as bored as I was while reading this sh*t.

2/10

-Timothy Patrick Boyer.

[glory-of-gore]

I'm so excited I'm shitting myself

[thebookcountess]

Dead Inside by Chandler Morrison

Dead Insideby Chandler Morrison ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 3.5 out of 5. Recently, I have been putting my toes into the waters of extreme horror and splatterpunk, and this book has been recommended heavily in all groups I joined. It is one of the featured books most fans of the two genres have read. Our MC is a college student by day, security guard by night. He is the security guard of a hospital, the…

[sbbarnes]

if you are wondering if I am making this up, ask yourself why I would remember the syllabus so well ten years on.

the professor's name was nancy. she was well over seventy and had some trouble walking. she was t e r r i f y i n g. one time, she kicked everyone who hadn't done the reading out of the classroom. one girl was so scared that, even though she hadn't been sussed out as having not done the reading, she confessed and left.

afterwards, nancy grinned at those of us who had done the reading and went, "I like to do that once a semester to keep people on their toes."

[gunkbaby]

i feel like whenever i talk about books n that i just complain. might make a post of actual books and authors i recommend

[misskriemhilds]

anyways if you are looking for more taboo, guro-y books that are surprisingly thought-provoking and don't mind reading a work deliberately written to read slightly like something off of r/menwritingwomen or with repulsive, kind of unlikable protagonists, i STRONGLY recommend "dead inside" by chandler morrison

[mariocki]

The Hooked Generation (1968)

"Man, you cats are hot! You're hot, baby!"

"What are you talking about, we're hot?"

"You knocked off the Coast Guard men, right? Right? Right? Am I putting you on so far?"

[queerstuffonscreen]

Cheetah in August (2015-2017)

Episode length: 17-31 min.

Country: USA

Genre: Drama

Language: English

A riveting story about a former high school track athlete who's distorted views on love, negatively affects the people closest to him.

Season 1

Episode 1: Pilot (It's Cheetah)

Episode 2: Mahogany Sings the Blues

Episode 3: You Got the Answers

Episode 4: I Lost God

Episode 5: He's Coming

Episode 6: Doors Closing

Episode 7: Steam and Light

Episode 8: Work of Art

Episode 9: Black Arts Movement

Episode 10: Were All Tops

Episode 11: Let's Move Around

Episode 12: Fight or Flight

Season 2

Episode 1: Calling All the Monsters

Episode 2: Reunited and It Feels So Good

Episode 3: Without Love

Episode 4: Here Comes the Boom

Episode 5: Give In

Episode 6: Win Some, Lose Some

Episode 7: Chanel from Hell

Episode 8: Touchstone

Episode 9: Spent

Episode 10: To a Head

Watch on PrimeVideo or Tubi

[savleye]

I was already running late bc I missed the first bus I was supposed to get on. Then when I was on the second bus I started reading the book I'm in the middle of and read the goriest traumatizing raunchiest shit I've ever read. Then when the bus stopped a guy fell and hit his head and started having a seizure. So then a bunch of people were calling 911 and we all had to get off the bus and wait for the next one. By the time I arrived at my college campus my class was already halfway over and I knew the professor was just going to lecture me if I walked in that late. Then I walk to my college's lounge for commuter students bc they're giving out free chicken and waffles and iced coffee today. I then take my food and walk to the library so I can sit down, eat, and start doing my homework. But as I get to the library I put my food and backpack down and run to the library restroom and have the fattest shit I've had in a week. And that was my morning and it's not even fucking 10:30.

[babylonbirdmeat]

Why must I get a job why can't I just write Fucking Vile Splatterpunk Romance all day