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The Bong-Ripping Brides of Count Drogado
The Brides have chosen you to attend Count Drogado's endless bacchanal. You are broken, homeless, maimed. Why did they chose you? What power do they hold? Can you escape the Count, escape the Brides, escape the endless fate that follows, collecting coins from the dead one at a time? The madness of the Bong-Ripping Brides lies within.
254 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published November 18, 2017
1 person is currently reading
247 people want to read
About the author
Dave K.
8 books13 followersDave K.'s work has been published in Front Porch Journal, Battered Suitcase, The Light Ekphrastic, Welter, Cobalt, [PANK], and on the LED billboard in Baltimore's Station North Arts District.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
December 2, 2017
I really enjoyed this book! Gothic fiction meets Refer Madness. It reads like an existential fever dream with enough campy violence and humor to keep you from completely spiraling into a black hole of depression and apathy; i.e. it was amazing! The main story follows a one-armed man who without much to live for besides living itself falls into the clutches of the three darkly twisted yet very enigmatic brides of Count Drogado. The main story is punctuated by two interludes that add depth to the world of the novel but also stand alone as wonderfully strange short stories. This book went by so quickly, but at the same time I felt that so much could be read into this novel and its characters that I continued to think about this book long after I had put it down. All-in-all, this book is equal parts fun and morbid, while also being thought provoking and rampantly silly. 10/10 will read again!
November 2, 2021
So much fun—for a book about a desperate one-armed man in coal country who is kidnapped and forced into a deranged never ending party in a decrepit mansion and tormented by three stoned sisters with too many eyes in their faces.
December 5, 2017
The Bong Ripping Brides of Count Drogado by Dave K is a dark, depraved Dickensian tale. What's it all about? It's about getting away from the party, but the party always follows you. One of the blurbs on the back of the book likens it to a fucked up Hotel California. That pretty much sums it up. Yeah. Can't say it better. What can I say? A lot.
There are three things that immediately jump out when you read Bong Ripping Brides. First is the perspective. The use of second person perspective in the segments with the main character is a rare and bold choice. As a cis male, it wasn't too hard to let go and be the character. I do wonder if the same holds for non cis males though.
Second, Dave K has a way with words. He is neither as unbridled with his language as someone like Carlton Mellick III in Satan Burger, nor as thorough with his use of language as narrative device as Camus in The Stranger. The way he uses words is brilliant, refreshing and immersive though. He does play around with the narrative and story structure in places. It's refreshing in a time when that's not the norm.
Third, the white space. It might sound minor, but there is a decent amount of white space. This makes the book a quicker read and easier to digest. This consideration comes from a history of script writing, where whitespace is gold.
Once you get beyond those things, this book reads like a deep dive into the mind of the author. Thrusted behind his eyes as he stumbles through the world, handicapped and destitute. You wake up in the perpetual motion machine of depravity that is Count Drogado's mansion. It's as alive as the maggots coursing through the food rotting on the banquet plates. The mansion writhes with other characters, for which you understand and feel. After all, you're all in the same drunken party boat. And that boat is on fire. Steering the flaming boat of doom are the Count's three brides. Stoned, psychotic forces of wanton chaos.
You also switch to 3rd person. Follow an old woman as she gathers coins from the dead throughout a grimy Victorian city. Like the mansion, the city is a living, breathing entity. With fleshed out side streets and odd villagers. You can feel the soot on your skin and smell the shit in your nose.
There are a couple more side plots that pop up here and there. They also help build the setting and give a bigger sense of the machine at work.
Bong Ripping Brides of Count Drogado's one main shortcoming is the editing. There are certain parts with GLARING editorial problems. In one part, the font changes. New sections made mid sentence, and other straight n00b editorial mistakes. They aren't deal breaking issues. They do detract from the book and look pretty unprofessional.
That said, Dave K lays down a great foundation here as a first full novel (My Name Is Hate fits in the change pocket of your jeans. It doesn't count). I can't wait to see what comes next. He's one to watch.
There are three things that immediately jump out when you read Bong Ripping Brides. First is the perspective. The use of second person perspective in the segments with the main character is a rare and bold choice. As a cis male, it wasn't too hard to let go and be the character. I do wonder if the same holds for non cis males though.
Second, Dave K has a way with words. He is neither as unbridled with his language as someone like Carlton Mellick III in Satan Burger, nor as thorough with his use of language as narrative device as Camus in The Stranger. The way he uses words is brilliant, refreshing and immersive though. He does play around with the narrative and story structure in places. It's refreshing in a time when that's not the norm.
Third, the white space. It might sound minor, but there is a decent amount of white space. This makes the book a quicker read and easier to digest. This consideration comes from a history of script writing, where whitespace is gold.
Once you get beyond those things, this book reads like a deep dive into the mind of the author. Thrusted behind his eyes as he stumbles through the world, handicapped and destitute. You wake up in the perpetual motion machine of depravity that is Count Drogado's mansion. It's as alive as the maggots coursing through the food rotting on the banquet plates. The mansion writhes with other characters, for which you understand and feel. After all, you're all in the same drunken party boat. And that boat is on fire. Steering the flaming boat of doom are the Count's three brides. Stoned, psychotic forces of wanton chaos.
You also switch to 3rd person. Follow an old woman as she gathers coins from the dead throughout a grimy Victorian city. Like the mansion, the city is a living, breathing entity. With fleshed out side streets and odd villagers. You can feel the soot on your skin and smell the shit in your nose.
There are a couple more side plots that pop up here and there. They also help build the setting and give a bigger sense of the machine at work.
Bong Ripping Brides of Count Drogado's one main shortcoming is the editing. There are certain parts with GLARING editorial problems. In one part, the font changes. New sections made mid sentence, and other straight n00b editorial mistakes. They aren't deal breaking issues. They do detract from the book and look pretty unprofessional.
That said, Dave K lays down a great foundation here as a first full novel (My Name Is Hate fits in the change pocket of your jeans. It doesn't count). I can't wait to see what comes next. He's one to watch.
December 12, 2017
This book reminds me of a world in some 90s adventure game, full of eccentric details and mysteries and clues. The plot is mysterious and surreal, reminiscent of weird, turn of the century Russian literature. And while there's probably a tendency to judge the book (by its cover) as stoner fiction, I wouldn't really call it that. The storytelling and writing style is too grounded. Anyway, it's cool to read weird, Baltimore-grown fiction like this. Recommended for other weirdos, and all people curious about weirdness.
February 21, 2020
The Bong-Ripping Brides of Count Drogado is a crumbling gothic cornucopia of violence and delight. Dave K writes Daedelus in his escape from the Labyrinth if those twisting passages were a derelict mansion filled with degenerates and vagabonds, the wings on which he made his escape were cobbled together from shards of broken glass held together with coagulated bodily fluids and grime, and Icarus, the one fated for death, were his own sense of self-worth and respect. It’s a fucking trip.
August 1, 2017
I published this book, so of course I think it's exceptional!
June 24, 2019
This fantastic book reads like a Giallo movie about depression.
June 5, 2021
An absurdist adventure through a decaying mansion and the underbelly of a quasi-steampunk city. The story manages to highlight the emptiness of excess and the emptiness of having nothing, culminating in a fairly bleak view of existence overall that still somehow manages to be kind of fun. I enjoyed it quite a bit! I have some mixed feelings about a few things, but overall, it was good!
The biggest word of caution is that the main section of this book is written in second person. It took me a lot of time and effort to warm up to that choice. But I admire the decision to write in such an unusual way. It's a fresh and surprising approach, but maybe it's one of those things that works better as an idea than in practice. For example, I love House of Leaves because of its experimentalism, but I haven't quite been able to make it all the way through because that book is so distracting and difficult to read.
Another thing that was a bit distracting was the handful of typos sprinkled throughout the book, mostly in the form of hard returns where there shouldn't have been. I feel like this is one of those things that you shouldn't complain too much about, as these things happen. And ultimately, these errors are a small price to pay to support an independent book publisher ran by a small staff. But I'd be lying if I said that these things didn't dampen my reading experience a little. (I imagine that these get resolved in future editions.)
Despite those charming little hurdles, it was still pretty breezy to read. (Although, I ended up reading it on and off again over several days. I have a feeling that if I read it in one or two sittings, my rating would be a bit more concrete.) The story is solid throughout, but does get a little directionless in the middle. This feels like very intentional and appropriate commentary, so it's not a negative — just something that happens. The asides and interludes provide a break from the second-person writing and may even be more interesting than the main plot. And the few illustrations throughout are excellent and really snap the visuals and settings into place. (I'd love a fully-illustrated, hardcover version of this book in the future.)
And lastly, to address what may be the elephant in the room, I also have some mixed feelings about the title. On one hand, I may not have heard of it if it was named something less provocative. But on the other, it also feels like it sells the story short, a bit? Not that stoner-centric media can't have depth or be serious, but it's hard to recommend this to anyone without causing them to chuckle. Which, I guess isn't a bad thing? I dunno, mixed feelings. Maybe it's a tactic to get the reader to lower their expectations and pleasantly surprise them with depth and sincerity? Or maybe it's just a badass title that does fit the story pretty well? Whatever the case, I guess it worked on me. Would recommend.
——— EDIT ———
I just suddenly remembered that they play hacky sack in this book and that's honestly my least favorite part and makes this a 3-star book for me, personally.
The biggest word of caution is that the main section of this book is written in second person. It took me a lot of time and effort to warm up to that choice. But I admire the decision to write in such an unusual way. It's a fresh and surprising approach, but maybe it's one of those things that works better as an idea than in practice. For example, I love House of Leaves because of its experimentalism, but I haven't quite been able to make it all the way through because that book is so distracting and difficult to read.
Another thing that was a bit distracting was the handful of typos sprinkled throughout the book, mostly in the form of hard returns where there shouldn't have been. I feel like this is one of those things that you shouldn't complain too much about, as these things happen. And ultimately, these errors are a small price to pay to support an independent book publisher ran by a small staff. But I'd be lying if I said that these things didn't dampen my reading experience a little. (I imagine that these get resolved in future editions.)
Despite those charming little hurdles, it was still pretty breezy to read. (Although, I ended up reading it on and off again over several days. I have a feeling that if I read it in one or two sittings, my rating would be a bit more concrete.) The story is solid throughout, but does get a little directionless in the middle. This feels like very intentional and appropriate commentary, so it's not a negative — just something that happens. The asides and interludes provide a break from the second-person writing and may even be more interesting than the main plot. And the few illustrations throughout are excellent and really snap the visuals and settings into place. (I'd love a fully-illustrated, hardcover version of this book in the future.)
And lastly, to address what may be the elephant in the room, I also have some mixed feelings about the title. On one hand, I may not have heard of it if it was named something less provocative. But on the other, it also feels like it sells the story short, a bit? Not that stoner-centric media can't have depth or be serious, but it's hard to recommend this to anyone without causing them to chuckle. Which, I guess isn't a bad thing? I dunno, mixed feelings. Maybe it's a tactic to get the reader to lower their expectations and pleasantly surprise them with depth and sincerity? Or maybe it's just a badass title that does fit the story pretty well? Whatever the case, I guess it worked on me. Would recommend.
——— EDIT ———
I just suddenly remembered that they play hacky sack in this book and that's honestly my least favorite part and makes this a 3-star book for me, personally.
February 11, 2018
What a dark and memorable journey this book was. It's not like anything else I've ever read, and I've read a LOT. I found myself devouring it. The author did a great job of evoking sensory and emotional impressions. I didn't expect to think nearly so much about the crushing oppression of society while reading The Bong-Ripping Brides, but man did I. Highly recommend, it will stick with you.
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December 29, 2020bizarre, and very good
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews