Thursday, October 22, 2009

Book Review: Sideshow PI - the Devil's Garden


Sideshow P.I. - The Devil's Garden By Nathaniel Lambert and Kevin Sweeney
Graveside Tales 155 pages
$10.95

Eddie Ghash is down on his luck, after losing his job in show business he spends two years drowning himself in drink before deciding he needs a new vocation. He is going to be a private detective. Eddie you see works the beat in New Ramoth, a freakazoid city filled with biazrro charcters. Perfect beat for a dog faced boy whose carnival freak show went bust. He learns everything he needs to know from THE IG'NANT ASS BITCHES GUIDE TO SLEUTHING.
This is high concept Pulp fiction noir style bizarro that only takes a few pages to build a universe that is filthy and disgusting. The pages are dripping with gore, goo and slime. It is so gross that it will take a reader with a healthy love of repulsiveness to be able to read it. If you can get with that you will find a lot to like this bizarro horror novel.
Introduced by the fantastic bizzaro literary flag bearer and horror master Gina Ranalli, that in itself is a sign that this good stuff. The two authors did a wonderful job of creating a mystery that involves a murder and conspiracy of biblical scope. Eddie and his former sideshow partners populate a bizarro city that is surrounded by rivers flowing with afterbirth. There are plenty of laugh out loud moments, and strange-ness but this short novel has several truly uncomfortable moments of effective horror.
This is one of the best novels to come out of the young literary movement bizarro. This is the first one from the growing movement where I could really see a series and lots of follow sequels coming naturally. The further investigates of the dog faced private dick are something I look forward. If you take my advice and make this book a hit!

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