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A Choir of Ill Children

by Tom Piccirilli (Goodreads Author)

3.84 of 5 stars 3.84 · rating details · 557 ratings · 63 reviews

BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Tom Piccirilli's The Last Kind Words.

This lyrical tale of evil, loss, and redemption is a stunning addition to the Southern gothic tradition of Flannery O’Connor and Harry Crews.

A Choir of Ill Children is the startling story of Kingdom Come, a decaying, swamp backwater that draws the lost, ill-fated, and damned.

Since his mothe...more

ebook, 0 pages

Published June 1st 2004 by Bantam

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Oct 12, 2012 karen rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: october-is-spooky

**review amended to include deborah's thoughts, because even though we gave it the same amount of stars, i did not do a good enough job reviewing.

"...listen to me - things are different down here. This is the deep South. There are laws that don't apply."
"You're an ugly, disgusting people."
"No worse than most I'd guess."

krok zero hated this book.

and i understand his problems with it - when something is compared to faulkner and flannery o'connor, you have certain expectations as a reader, and wh...more

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Oct 11, 2012 Gavin rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: horror-thriller

I’m sure that your reading list is plenty long, but this book needs to be moved to the top of the pile. This book is not for the faint of heart, for it is quite challenging. Think William Faulkner mixed with Flannery O’Connor and you’ll get a pretty good picture at Piccirilli’s writing-style. The language of the novel is both horrifying and beautiful, and if you can keep from reading the same passages over and over, because of how he constructed and mixed seemingly disconnected words and images,...more

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Feb 04, 2012 K.Z. Snow added it · review of another edition

Gotta say, the author's an impressive prose stylist, but I'm already getting the brain jits reading this. There's "bizarre," and then there's "OMFGWTF!" . . . with spoiled cherries on top.

I'm certainly intrigued enough to keep reading, though.

Okay, still reading. Murder and mayhem within kudzu vines of prose. It's slow going. I have to keep stopping because this book makes me queasy. In addition, I have little idea what's going on. Or if anything's going on.

This has been an odd reading experienc...more

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Apr 02, 2013 Rebecca rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: depressing, fiction, melodrama, silly-soap-opera-hysteria, strange, unlikable-characters-doing-horrible

I like Southern gothic novels as much as the next person, but "A Choir of Ill Children" was too strange and disturbing to be enjoyable. And what was it supposed to be anyway? I'm not sure Southern Gothic fits. Paranormal might work but the thing with paranormal is that, in the end, it needs to make sense.

This is the story of Thomas, the son of the only wealthy person in a small deep south town. Thomas's parents are dead, his grandmother was killed on the roof of a church with a reaping blade (ne...more

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Nov 05, 2012 Shanna Germain rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nanolomo-books

The first time I read "A Choir of Ill Children," I couldn't breathe whenever I had the book open. I would read as much as I could, the pulse thrumming hard in my head, the words beating their otherwordly chorus against my brain and then, when my lungs couldn't take any more, I would close the book and take huge, gulping, tear-stained breaths. This is the kind of reaction that Piccirilli's words and characters invoked in me when I first read this novel six years ago, and it's the kind of reaction...more

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Oct 15, 2012 Tim Niland rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is one of Tom Piccirilli's earlier novels, when he was still concentrating on horror fiction and gradually moving toward noir. They both have elements in this story, which is set in a sleepy small southern town wracked by poverty and superstition. Thomas is the scion of the towns wealthy family, owner of the mill and a large house outside of town. He has three brothers who are conjoined triplets all connected to an enormous brain shared by the three of them. The spooky atmospherics of the t...more

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Jan 07, 2012 Charles Dee Mitchell rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: horror

The town of Kingdom Come is located in Potts County. I don't think a state is ever mentioned, but I believe then whole territory exists somewhere in the swampy backwaters of Tom Piccirilli's brain. Reviewer's mention Southern Gothic and Flannery O'Connor. This could be a lost O'Connor work assuming she one day found psilocybin mushrooms growing in the peacock shit on the farm.

Tom is the scion of the family that founded Kingdom Come. His family history includes murder, suicide, disappearances, an...more The town of Kingdom Come is located in Potts County. I don't think a state is ever mentioned, but I believe then whole territory exists somewhere in the swampy backwaters of Tom Piccirilli's brain. Reviewer's mention Southern Gothic and Flannery O'Connor. This could be a lost O'Connor work assuming she one day found psilocybin mushrooms growing in the peacock shit on the farm.

Tom is the scion of the family that founded Kingdom Come. His family history includes murder, suicide, disappearances, and a gradual loss of fortune that has still left him with an enormous Southern mansion; the operation of the mill, Kingdom Come's only industry: and, apparently no shortage of cash. He can drink with the locals at Leadbetters, but they don't really trust him. He is friends with the conjure women who live deep in the swamp, but he can also chat with the NYU film students down to make a documentary.

The documentary is to be about Tom's brothers, triplets conjoined at the frontal lobe, stunted by fully matured, three boys who have spent their lives sharing one brain and staring constantly into one another's eyes. They have a girlfriend named Dodie. She cleans them, sleeps with them, and smells of bourbon and chocolate. Tom's best friend is Drabs, son of a local African American preacher, who speaks in tongues and wanders the county naked. There is the Monastery of Flying Walendas; a dead boy who wanders the property, his mouth filled with worms; and there is Maggie, Tom's true love whom he married when he was eight, and may be either a fantasy, a ghost, and just Maggie.

There is a lot more in Piccirilli's novel, but what there is not much if any of is a plot. Which is fine, because he is all about atmosphere and piling up of incident. The Deceased, his most plot-driven horror novel, is also his most mechanical. With Piccirilli it is best to just settle back, to the extent that is possible, and see what happens next. Some things to keep in mind --

The carnival is coming.

The ham is in the house.

And you might want to think twice before ordering oil and vinegar dressing ever again.(less)

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Nov 18, 2010 Artur Coelho rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Big Fish, o apaixonante filme de Tim Burton às voltas com lendas familiares, contos improváveis, feitos estrondosos, estranhos indivíduos e cidadezinhas tradicionais perdidas nos pântanos do sul da américa do norte, foi uma boa introdução ao estilo conhecido como southern gothic. Misturando fantasia e realismo com mundos imaginários, mundos nostálgicos e personagens exóticas, o southern gothic mergulha fundo no mundo de tradições rurais do sul, nas raízes de uma terra ensopada pelos rios serpent...more Big Fish, o apaixonante filme de Tim Burton às voltas com lendas familiares, contos improváveis, feitos estrondosos, estranhos indivíduos e cidadezinhas tradicionais perdidas nos pântanos do sul da américa do norte, foi uma boa introdução ao estilo conhecido como southern gothic. Misturando fantasia e realismo com mundos imaginários, mundos nostálgicos e personagens exóticas, o southern gothic mergulha fundo no mundo de tradições rurais do sul, nas raízes de uma terra ensopada pelos rios serpenteantes, onde as tradições resistem ao passar do tempo. Este estilo vai buscar às paisagens quase surreais do sul dos estados unidos a inspiração para a estranheza. Este é o mundo dos bayous, pântanos verdejantes onde a vegetação esconde estranhos mistérios, onde a àgua se intersecta com a terra e onde os espíritos se manifestam, onde as lendas ganham corpo e onde a triste realidade de pobreza e isolamento se transforma em exotismo indivualista. A grande raíz do género está na obra de William Faulkner, passada num condado imaginário do sul onde Faulkner conseguia reunir a magia das paisagens, os vícios da história e a intemporalidade dos modos de vida.

A Choir of Ill Children assume-se como um livro que faz uso de todos os elementos que caracterizam o southern gothic. O autor, que eu francamente até agora desconhecia, pega nos elementos e mistura-os com uma boa dose de maquiavelismo tenebroso, criando um mundo obscuro e decadente, oculto no meio dos pantanais, onde a vida não corre pelos caminhos habituais.

Tom é o principal personagem deste conto fantasmagórico. É o homem mais rico de Kingdom Come, cidade perdida no meio dos pântanos, e está constantemente a lutar contra a herança de pesadelos e segredos. Tom toma conta dos seus irmãos, trigémeos unidos que partilham a mesma cabeça, bizarria da natureza, e vai fugindo das conspirações das velhas bruxas da terra enquanto se deixa levar por uma maré de sonhos e estranhos acontecimentos que culminará num muito literal choque electrificante com o seu passado. Tom passa os dias a navegar por entre as bruxas que conjuram estranhos encantamentos para manterem as tempestades longe da cidade, tentando salvar o seu melhor amigo, o filho do pastor da igreja local que fala como se possuído pelos espíritos, tentando manter alguma dignidade a um detective que se auto-destroi enquanto investiga o aparecimento misterioso de uma sensual menina que acaba por revelar rugas por detrás dos vestidos infantis. No meio disto temos os momentos de paz de Tom enquanto faz pão para os monges da ordem dos Walendas Voadores, um grupo de homens e mulheres por vezes angustiados, por vezes enlouquecidos, por vezes alucinados, por vezes desesperados, que se reúne num hospital abandonado que faz as vezes de mosteiro. E não podemos esquecer o cameraman viciado em cocaína que filma um documentário sobre os trigémeos de Tom, que nos momentos mais alucinados chega mesmo a propor a realização de filmes pornográficos com a estranha criatura, da investigadora do documentário que se apaixona por uma das cabeças dos trigémeos, de um motoqueiro amante das artes da esgrima e de todo um coro de personagens bizarras que confluem no mundo esquecido da cidade do reino prometido.

Omnipresente é a paisagem opressiva do pântano, a sublinhar o facto da cidade, como o nome indica, ser literalmente um fim do mundo, um buraco negro que prende os homens à terra e que leva inevitávelmente ao falhanço aqueles que tentam mudar o que está arreigado no interior daquela terra - seja a paisagem, seja a mente de quem lá vive.

A Choir of Ill Children não é um livro excepcional, ou particularmente fascinante. Se reúne uma galeria de personagens, locais e situações bizarras quanto baste, por vezes a roçar o macabro e o inquietante, acaba por ser traído pela prosa do autor, muitas vezes pouco clara. A Choir of Ill Children torna-se mais um relato desconexo, com se de um sonho se tratasse, do que um romance de fio condutor visível, que o é, pois enterrado na prosa por vezes obscura está um fio condutor que leva à inevitável conclusão. A Choir of Ill Children fica no entremeio entre a clareza do romance e o poder onírico da literatura surreal, mas ao manter o pé nos dois campos acaba por se desiquilibrar. Não deixa de ser uma leitura interessante, mais pelo exotismo do género em que se enquadra e pela óbvia bizarria do que pelas suas qualidades literárias.

De qualquer forma, deixo aqui o meu conselho: este é um livro a ler acompanhado por um Southern Comfort, um líquido meio bourboun meio liquor que explode no palato com a potência do whisky e com o exotismo da menta. Talvez seja esse o segredo para se entrar no espírito deste coro doentio.(less)

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Feb 02, 2012 Randall Wood rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'd come across an "unpublished preview" edition that didn't betray its genre, and I was better off for it. I doubt I'll read a more memorable book in 2012: Piccirilli's prose is hauntingly detached, betrayed, bewitched. He juxtaposes sex with misery, life with afterlife, reality with dreams, and he scrambles past and present. Nothing is real; nothing is unreal. My edition's cover had a black stamped dragonfly silhouette over the orange glow of Louisiana swamp: how much more enticing - and how m...more

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Mar 22, 2013 Juan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: scary-stuff, undiscovered-gems

I'm an international bastard.. Or a third culture kid, whichever one you wanna call it. Out of all the places I've been, and all the things I've seen, stories about the Deep South fascinate me most. The things these people experience, their dialects, their culture and way of life- it's too much for me to comprehend and fully appreciate, but I still love it madly. I find that any character who speaks in a southern slang, whose grown up tussling with alligators and never heard a foreign tongue- is...more I'm an international bastard.. Or a third culture kid, whichever one you wanna call it. Out of all the places I've been, and all the things I've seen, stories about the Deep South fascinate me most. The things these people experience, their dialects, their culture and way of life- it's too much for me to comprehend and fully appreciate, but I still love it madly. I find that any character who speaks in a southern slang, whose grown up tussling with alligators and never heard a foreign tongue- is extremely interesting to me. For that reason, I'm biased when I say that Tom Piccirilli is THE MAN.

He spins a yarn of characters so deeply disturbed, so heinous to the eyes of the earth, that you come to love them. Thomas, the protagonist
, lives with a somewhat nihilistic attitude. Although he accepts that Kingdom Come and it's mire sucks everything into the depths of the bayou, he doesn't accept it without a reason. And that is what sets him apart from everybody else. As deformed as he is (mentally and physically) we come to see through his eyes. This story isn't some bizarro mix of a bunch of geeks thrown together for randomness, but rather an exploration of the mundaneness in the lives of the bizarre.

The prose is loaded with imagery throughout, and reads more like a novel deep fried in poem batter than anything else. Here are some examples that fascinated me:

"Dragging his past behind him like a millstone.."
"They walk the wire across the chasms of their own souls, looking down into the great depths as, step by step, they cross to the distant side."
"Rising swamp gas ignites and flames spring and dance across the stagnant water, flailing and sinuous, writhing and red like dying men unwilling to let go of a hated life."
"No human names can cling to her anymore-- they slip from her dusty shriveled flesh like a young girl's whimsies."

And, my favorite of all:

"He loved her because he loved me and yet hated what I, like every son, represented... Not his death or destruction, but his slow substitution and eventual erasure. His evil has a new face now. Mine."

Thank you, Tom!!!! *the crowd erupts in applause*(less)

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Mar 18, 2013 Nicole Wolverton rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

So, I picked this up because it was on a list of the best horror fiction. Here's the thing: I really don't think this is horror fiction, not in the classic sense. It seems more of a gothic suspense novel to me. It doesn't make it any less good--it just wasn't what I expected to read.

Here's the thing: Piccirilli is clearly an excellent writer. His prose is gorgeous, and he can create a mood. I loved the town of Kingdom Come and the characterizations. That's where my four stars come from.

That sai...more

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Oct 15, 2012 Jas rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'll stop short of calling this one brilliant. I ate it up. Solid, 4.6. Better than a four and a half but not a five. The ending ached for more, and some portion skated the thin line between poor character development and adequate levels. The story line is complex, filled with memorable lines and delicious prose that extends keep within your soul. It's one of those books that ultimately demands a slow pace read and requires the readers full attention. Metaphors abound. Imagery Pours from its pag...more

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Dec 10, 2011 Alejandro rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: horror

Lyrical, in a word. Piccirilli raises more questions than he answers, but that's a good thing. Thomas is the richest man in the southern burg of Kingdom Come. He runs his father's mill and takes care of his brothers, who are Siamese triplets conjoined at the frontal lobe, each with a different name and dominant mood. Thomas has a lot to answer for and murders to solve, but we end not really knowing if things are over or just about to get that much worse. All in all, "A Choir of Ill Children" is...more

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Jan 13, 2011 Trent rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

#4. Grade: A ... Piccirilli has dipped his mug in the moonshine tub and followed it with a cherry mash concoction of Southern swamp-land succulence. Atmosphere aplenty in this gothic tale of small town characters with big time secrets. Nothing is as it seems, especially when the crones and granny witches start hacking off pinkies to stave off the storm of souls that's coming for Kingdom Come. Proof that there's powerful literature to be found in the cast-off paperback racks. Your basal ganglia w...more

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Sep 25, 2011 Nora Peevy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The book is riveting. I read it so fast I couldn't believe it. This is a southern gothic novel -- very twisted. In the town of Kingdom Come, a backwards southern swampland with a habit towards floods of biblical proportions, live Thomas and his brothers, three conjoined triplets fond of deviant behavior with no qualms about hiding a dark family secret from Thomas. The cast of characters is as bizarre as the ones from the 90s hit T.V. drama, Twin Peaks. If you love weird, this one is for you. Sup...more

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Mar 03, 2012 Anthony Chavez rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is definitely not for the faint of heart or one who shys away from horror. There are a lot of elements for a great book, but in my opinion the story doesn't really go anywhere, the first half was a trial, the second half got better but there was a lot left unresolved and it left me saying, "ugh..." and scratching my head. Maybe I should have started my Piccirilli journey with "The Night Class," or "The Dead Letters" as they were both Bram Stoker Award winners.

=Begin my attempt at a plo...more This book is definitely not for the faint of heart or one who shys away from horror. There are a lot of elements for a great book, but in my opinion the story doesn't really go anywhere, the first half was a trial, the second half got better but there was a lot left unresolved and it left me saying, "ugh..." and scratching my head. Maybe I should have started my Piccirilli journey with "The Night Class," or "The Dead Letters" as they were both Bram Stoker Award winners.

=Begin my attempt at a plot summary= "A Choir of Ill Children" is set in a small southern town called "Kingdom Come." It is a disgusting swamp backwater that seems to attract the worst of the worst form of life around. Violent bikers, nymphs, prostitutes, old granny witches, and drug addicts constitute the bulk of its charming population. With special characters such as conjoined psychic triplets, hipster documentarians, a geek (not the type of geek your thinking), and the Holy Order of the Flying Wallendas. The novel's central character and narrator, Thomas, is one of the richest men in town due to an inheritance he earned when his parents passed on. He lives in a large mansion with his freakish 3 brothers, the conjoined psychic triplets I mentioned earlier, who have three bodies but share a single brain. One day with the arrival in town of a strange young mute girl who seems abandoned Thomas hires a private detective to uncover the mysteries behind her arrival AND the identity of an infamous dog kicker who is pissing off the locals and leaving behind some wicked shoe prints on said dogs. Along with the uncovering of those mysteries, Thomas discovers that there is way more going on in Kingdom Come and it's murky swamp then he had ever thought. =End my attempt at a plot summary=

Trying to write a plot summary for this novel was rough and hurt my brain. Piccirilli is literally all over the map with this novel. There's little to no narrative or plot structure. Instead of focusing on creating a story, Piccirilli seems content in just throwing together hallucinatory scenes about the everyday lives of the town's populace and odd memories, or should I say nightmares, that his mother and father had. Even at a mere 225 pages, reading this felt like a chore. Piccirilli's writing style is one that I found very difficult to absorb, not to mention trying to keep up with all the characters. There's so many that I would often find myself forgetting where I'd first read of this character and Piccirilli never makes any attempt to refresh the reader's memory once a minor character who hasn't appeared for dozens pages suddenly makes an appearance. It took me almost half the book to nail down who was who, something that should never happen in a novel.

It's too bad because Piccirilli really is a fantastic writer in the technical sense. His prose can be beautiful and poetic. I was impressed with the uniqueness of the town and of some of the characters he created in this book; Moreover, his ability to make us feel like a part of the southern swamp setting is impressive. But for a novel (especially horror) to be entertaining it needs more than creative writing, and it definitely needs a coherent plot, and in this I believe he fails miserably. I am baffled by all the praise thrown this novel's way, I don't understand it, but to each his/her own.

Bottom line, the language is poetic, he paints some beautiful scenes and the characters are well-developed and very interesting/unique; however, the story doesn't seem to go anywhere and leaves something to be desired.(less)

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Jan 21, 2011 Airiz C rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: horror, surreal

When you say the word Kingdom Come, anyone will think we are talking about heaven, a paradise, or an everlasting life. But not everybody has the same perspective. Gothic writer Tom Piccirilli has another definition of Kingdom Come: a decaying swamp backwater that imprisons the lost, the ill-fated, and the damned. It is a place where violence is normal, where frogs and bats are leashed with ribbons and toyed by young children, where doctors are degraded and witches are admired. A total opposite o...more

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Oct 26, 2011 Krok Zero rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fall-2011

Oy.

So it's October, and that's when you're supposed to read horror fiction, right? And I always feel like I should be reading horror, should be unearthing the good stuff, because I like horror movies and in theory the genre appeals to me, but in practice I have never really come across a horror novel that has served my particular literary needs. Unless you count Shirley Jackson, which I guess I don't, because the only genre she belongs to is the genre of the fucking sublime.

But I sometimes give...more Oy.

So it's October, and that's when you're supposed to read horror fiction, right? And I always feel like I should be reading horror, should be unearthing the good stuff, because I like horror movies and in theory the genre appeals to me, but in practice I have never really come across a horror novel that has served my particular literary needs. Unless you count Shirley Jackson, which I guess I don't, because the only genre she belongs to is the genre of the fucking sublime.

But I sometimes give it a go this time of year. My 2011 attempt began with the '70s voodoo-curse thingy All Heads Turn When the Hunt Goes By (which my fingers almost just typed as All Hands on the Bad One, a Sleater-Kinney album that would be a better use of your time than reading that John Farris book). It wasn't really actively bad, just pretty dumb and unsatisfying, so I didn't/don't have much to say about it. Undeterred, I moved on to what turned out to be a much worse piece of shit, namely this book. 0 for 2.

"Piece of shit" is unfair, I guess. It's fairly ambitious, certainly not hackwork, but it is a spectacular failure. I was intrigued by the Southern Gothic comparisons, the weird title, the conjoined-twins hook, even the text of the first page. But Piccirilli simply does not have the prose skill to support this kind of book, a plotless mood-piece about a bizarre backwater swamp town where everyone is various shades of fucked-up/violent/sex-crazed/insane/scarred/depraved/etc. There are a bunch of different plot threads involving the protagonist's affairs with different crazies, but there is absolutely no narrative engine to the book, no tension, no stakes — and the "mood" being cultivated is totally ersatz and transparent and ineffective, and Piccirilli just isn't capable of style at the level he reaches for, so there is really no reason to turn the pages at any time, no matter how much fucked up shit happens (ultimately not even that much; the creepy conjoined triplets with a single brain don't even do anything, they're just in the background for the first few chapters and then pretty much disappear). It's all just a pretentious mess, and certainly nothing remotely close to "scary" (though I'd have settled for "readable"). As for the publisher and reviewers who dropped Queen Flannery O'Connor's name in conjunction with this book, I hope they have trouble sleeping at night.

Horror and I will one day have a blissful union, but it didn't happen this time.(less)

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Jul 01, 2007 Greg Fisher rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: readingjournal, horror

This is one of my absolute favorite novels of all time. It's a Southern gothic novel.

Years ago when Tom's father committed suicide, Tom inherited the Mill, making him the town patriarch, filling a role his family has always held since Kingdom Come was founded. It also puts him in charge of his brothers, conjoined triplets joined at the frontal lobe and constantly facing each other. Now dire portents of strife have appeared and Velma Coots calls upon him to do his duty to the town by providing s...more

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Jun 28, 2011 William M. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: horror

Never has a book by Tom Piccirilli come together more beautifully. His characters, his prose, and his story are captivating from beginning to end. Tom definitely deserves a Bram Stoker award for this, or at the very least, a nomination. I can't tell you how great a writer Tom is and I urge you to give A Choir Of Ill Children a try. Disturbing and beautiful at the same time, this novel pushes open the bountries of modern horror fiction and gives the genre more legitimacy than ever.

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Apr 22, 2012 Matt rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have never read anything that could possibly be compared to this book. It was downright strange, but beautiful at the same time. This is the first Piccirilli book I have read, but he writes so poetically and really paints a picture in your head.

This book definitely isn't going to be for everyone. I was really confused at times as to what was going on, but the way it was so intricately written added to its appeal. I'd definitely need to read this a second time to pick up on everything, and I'm...more

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Jan 05, 2010 Fatma rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The best word to describe this book is bizarre but that doesnt mean that it is bad. It is the first Southern Gothic I have ever read and to my surprise I enjoyed it and I couldn't but it down until I finished it. It showed me a side of America I didn't know much about.

I admit that the end was a bit disappointing and there were many events that were not related to the main story line. Which makes you wonder why are they even there. I also admit that I felt lost sometimes and I didn't understand s...more

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Jul 15, 2010 Garrett Cook rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A Choir of Ill Children is one of the best, most unique crime novels that I have ever had the pleasure of reading. A story of corruption, perversity and despair set in the Deep South featuring psychic triplets, hipster documentarians drawn into the heart of darkness, hedge magic, bikers and the Holy Order of the Flying Wallendas, this book never ceases to surprise. Highly recommended.

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Jan 07, 2013 Erin rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Piccirilli is a good writer, but this was just a little too kitchen-sink Southern gothic for my taste. Everyone in Kingdom Come is a horribly damaged or deranged freak and nothing makes much sense. Definitely Flannery O'Connor mixed with Twin Peaks territory here, but perhaps what bothered me most was the ending....I honestly have no idea why anything in the final chapter came to pass, while I get the climax, what was the purpose? Perhaps it's just supposed to be experienced without looking too...more

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Oct 17, 2011 Paula Hartman-Carlo rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The language is poetic and the characters are well-developed but the story doesn't seem to go anywhere. I'll admit that I couldn't finish the book; I got about half-way through it and said to hell with it. It just meandered too much.

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Jul 30, 2011 Deathraceking rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Amazing book. Definitely has a Faulkner feel to it; the fall of the southern family, but mixed with a more superstitious and spiritual feel. Very entertaining and amusing within the confusion.

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Feb 13, 2009 Jenn added it · review of another edition

This book was very tough to read and I gave up part way through. The idea of Triplet Siamese Twins intrigued me but the writing was very difficult and hard to follow. There were too many characters and the story line just became stranger and more unbelievable.

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Apr 12, 2013 Al rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Since his mother’s disappearance and his father’s suicide, Thomas has cared for his three brothers—conjoined triplets with separate bodies but one shared brain—and the town’s only industry, the Mill.

Because of his family’s prominence, Thomas is feared and respected by the superstitious swamp folk. Granny witches cast hexes while Thomas’s childhood sweetheart drifts through his life like a vengeful ghost and his best friend, a reverend suffering from the power of tongues, is overcome with this

...more

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Jun 08, 2011 Cwl rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Oh, that preposterous South of ours. This would be profitable for people who like Charlaine Harris, Bill Faulkner, carnivals, swamp witches, deformities, or mill accidents.

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Oct 12, 2010 Martha rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Fans of more literary-style horror

Shelves: horror, favorites

Wow! This book is crazy! Beautifully written, powerful read with a heavy impact, but still a nice, short book. It starts out like a punch to the face and doesn't let up. Piccirilli writes in a lyrical, blunt style that doesn't go for shock value exactly, the narrator is just telling you about his life with no sugar-coating. He's not trying to garner sympathy or horrify you, this is just what happened as he sees it. It just is. To see if you'd like this book's style, read the first 4 or 5 pages o...more

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Horror

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Gothic > Southern Gothic

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Novels

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Gothic

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“The Crone tires quickly and reaches out for the velvet draperies, sits on the divan, breathing heavily. She's too ancient to have a name any longer. When she coughs you can hear the ages rattling inside her shrunken frame. No human names can cling to her any more- they slip from her dusty shriveled flesh like a young girl's whimsies.” — 4 people liked it

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