Burn You the Fuck Alive

by B.R. Yeager

She asks for a light. You reach in your pocket and dig out your Bic, strike the flint, and touch the flame to her cigarette. She inhales. The tip roils cinder. A line of flame draws down the paper, crossing the band, down the filter. It touches her lips and her entire face is a blaze. Engulfing, disappearing her hair, climbing down her throat, down her shoulders and arms and chest and belly, down her pants to her shoes. Washed in pumpkin light. She waves her arms, spinning in circles and howling.

You run.

Collected fiction.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Dark, Fantasy, Weird Fiction, Literature

380 pages, Paperback

First published April 30, 2023

Reviews

[inciminci · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's funny how you feel the need to apologize when a book by an author whose work you previously loved and praised just don't hit the mark. I'll try not to do that but, dayum! I loved Negative Space so much and was actually really psyched about Burn You the Fuck Alive, I mean, that title alone... And it didn't hit that mark, sorry.

Still, I found crumbs here of what mesmerized me in Yeager's former work – vulnerable characters, a menacing atmosphere, beautiful writing. Only, they were just crumbs and if I have to be honest, I didn't know how to place these stories, what to make of them, let alone enjoy them. This whole book feels like a soup, a mushroom soup.

So, not really burnt the fuck alive, but that's OK. Next time maybe.

[Janie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Damaged beyond pain. The sky is white and filmy, nauseating. This is the worst dream you will ever have, waking up to it's reality. There is no looking back. The horizon vanishes into sick, slimy fog, and no-one repents.

[Tyler Barney · Rating 5 out of 5]

it was a pleasure to burn the fuck alive

[Plagued by Visions · Rating 4 out of 5]

B. R. Yeager somehow adds an off-putting weight to everyday words. That has been my personal trajectory with his writing: Bringing the cosmic damage of our imperfect interactions down to the teluric level, where it can reside in a needle, in a photograph, and in the silence and doomed communication of his subjects.

Burn You the Fuck Alive contained varied stories both in theme and form, and admittedly, while some fell flat for me in terms of the execution, nonetheless there is a cohesive rot and windswept quality to his prose that can elevate even the most brief and abstract phrase on a single page to an almost unbearable sense of uncanny and frigid desolation. I honestly feel as lonely and senseless as some of his sentences sometimes.

Though at times they don’t detonate, for me his words are an assortment of gun triggers, and these triggers have launched many bullets through my guts.

[Ghost Dad]

Black bile from our dying empire. Intensely gnarly when narrative but, for my money, pushes into the next level with the more formally experimental pieces. Love Yeager’s wasteoids and losers. None of this hit me as profoundly as ‘Negative Space’ but I will read everything this dude publishes.

[Thomas Kendall · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is Yeager’s gift for portraying the way desire seeps through, undoing the carefully arranged bulwarks of attitude substituting for identity, overwhelming the pragmatic and concretising defence mechanisms of denial, dissolving the past, present, future in a yearning for what cannot be while exposing the vulnerability of what is, that makes him practically unique within writers using fear and terror as the emotional thrust of their work. Very few writers can so beautifully convey the moment in which a character consents to a mistake, the fractional giving inwards that represents a point of no return. Yeager’s vulnerability and rage, his characters heightened ambivalence (they want but what is this want) drives them towards the spectacle of certainty, the mistake of certainty. Think of that famous picture ‘The Creation of Adam.’ What fills the space between those two fingers is everything. Rage, need, mortality, vulnerability, power and its illusion. The space is enraging because it is both infinite and not. Yeager’s character’s exist at various points in that gap, in the desire to be touched and the rage at the thought of it.

This is though a stylistically diverse collection which sees Yeager flexing his talent for narrative experimentation and genre subversion. In the Shadow of Penis House feels as if it has an echo of The Fall of The House of Usher but its formal structure, a kind of collectible card game, creates a dizzyingly complex and original affect. The character card form establishes a kind of object-relation to the text. The characters are things. Everything is a tableux. The characters and objects and places ought to be able to be arranged, solved, as the form essentially renders them as information. Meta. However, what is being revealed, what information given, reveals information itself to be fundamentally inexplicable and in conjunction with this, the layered cacophony of the ‘cards’ presentation and the neo-gothic poetry they contain creates something truly unnerving: A text becoming an object that reveals that objects are utterly mystifying. If you were to find these cards out there in the real world, where they actually are, you’d be terrified and you will/should be.

Personal Favourites: Poison Nurse, In The Shadow of Penis House, The Buried Man, Balloon, The Roman Soldier

Some Underlined sections:

‘Say "I love you" each day until it's only hiss. Barely discernible from wind at the windows, power humming in the walls. Hold him until he feels like humid summer air. It's something that should hurt, that maybe used to but no longer aches. We pretend it doesn't matter but we should be grieving.’

‘It was the only thing he ever wanted to do, and once it was done, he could never do it again’

‘He said I tasted like a swimming pool. Like chlorine and a battery’

[Benoit Lelièvre · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of these books Goodreads' five stars system is ill-suited for. It would require a sixth.

If you're not familiar with B.R Yeager's writing style, it will be really difficult for you to understand why it is so appealing on a visceral level. He has a preternatural talent for expressing in words what otherwise can only be felt. Whether it's with a one liner or a three thousand words story. Among my favorites in this collection were: In the Shadow of Penis House (which I'm still wrapping my head around), Waxing Moon, Poison Nurse and Highway Wars, which portray a world only accessible through your most intimate and disturbing fears.

Yeager has a style and an imaginary like no other. He's in a paradigm of his own and his books should be judged as such.

[Jøhn Wayne Gucci · Rating 5 out of 5]

With this collection of stories, B.R. Yeager proves once again that he is one of the most creative minds in the weird world of indie lit and horror.

The stories all take on a style of their own. The first few stories capture, portray, and magnify the horror and loneliness of the last few years of self isolation and quarantine; while later stories intertwine the lives of fucked up teenagers and young adults with various strains of modern horror.

This collection of stories shows off the versatility of Yeager as an author who will not be bound by conventional style or expectations.

If I had to pick a favriote story amongst this collection, it would have to be The Buired Man. The way this story interweaves graphic cosmic body horror with Yeagers' realistic storytelling that depicts the daily lives of delinquent youths is something I truly odor. The Buired Man feels like a long forgotten creepypasta containing imagery that parallels the horror of the most grotesque Junji Ito manga.

Other favorites include:
The Young People
Poison Nurse
Highway Wars
The Roman Soldier

Overall, this is a collection of stories worth checking out if you're looking to dip your toes into the bloody pool of modern horror. Contained within the pages of Burn You the Fuck Alive, there is something for almost any fan of horror or indie lit.

[Joe Bielecki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yeager strikes again with a group of absolute bangers. Stories like The Buried Man and Poison Nurse play on body horror in new and interesting ways. I love reading his scum my teens in stories like Puppy Milk and The Roman Soldier. Highway Wars feels almost too real. The smaller, more poetic pieces prove he’s more than a genre writer, but a true literary visionary. Each new book of his shifts the indie lit landscape for the better.

[David Peak · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rounding up a bit because honestly I love Yeager. There are some big swings here, and it's a beautifully and artfully designed book. The longer pieces feel a bit more successful, especially "Poison Nurse" and "The Young People," both of which are great. "The Buried Man" is also excellent. Overall, a very exciting and varied collection.

[Tristan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An elemental grimoire whose “quality is proportional to the secrets kept within.” Yeager scries the spume of boiling blood in ghoulish stories that chew you up just to whet their teeth. “The things you can’t stomach become opportunities. New comforts, acquired tastes.” This collection will leave you “convinced you’ve learned a way to end the world just by thinking and obliterate all the past you thought you knew.”

Highlights: The Buried Man, Poison Nurse, Highway Wars, The Roman Soldier

[Bill Hsu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very diverse collection, with some interesting design and graphics. I'm wondering if it might come across better on paper (I read the e-book). My favorites are the longer pieces, with more room for the characters to develop. "Poison Nurse" is an effective piece of dark ambiguity and body horror. "Highway Wars" applies John Waters' Serial Mom idea to road rage, and takes it several steps further. Pretty enjoyable, though not all the pieces worked for me.

[Larry Ggggggggggggggggggggggggg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have really enjoyed everything this guy has written. Poison nurse and highway war stand out but everything is great including the photo/collages between texts. His stories are almost upsettingly brutal at times because yeager is able to make everything feel extremely real in an almost effortless way, by cultivating the kind of self-destructive nihilism and violence simmering just underneath the collective unconscious of small towns in America in our time

[Josh Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

An utterly wretched blast of puerile filth. BR Yeager is a master of making you smell smells or taste tastes through a page. This collection of short stories is at times absolutely stomach churning and though it doesn’t always hit, when it does, it really really does. Highway Wars in particular will stay with me for a long time. Also it’s the coolest looking book I own by some distance.

[Brendan · Rating 5 out of 5]

An entirely unsettling, visceral collection of stories.

[Mia Daly · Rating 5 out of 5]

another great one for the B.R.YLU (b.r Yeager literary universe)

[aden · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very weird collection of stories - weird stories with weird formats. Some are a page long, and some just a sentence long; some read like deranged poetry; some are mostly a collage of pictures; one of them is a collage of pictures about a house called Penis House, pictures of its residences and places with a short description each; some are even quite straightforward.
But all of them are very weird.
(Maybe the most normal story was a really sad little one about a dog that has a tick but can't communicate with the shitty parent owners.)
I expected nothing less from this author; his two novels Negative Space (my favorite horror novel released in some years) and Amygdalatropolis were sick - deranged and awesome.
Before I picked up this collection I read a sample online - three of the really short stories - and I didn't really know what to think of them, they felt pretty out there and incomprehensible - though one of them I actually really enjoyed after reading it again and thinking about it; it was kind of a gut-punch. And that describes a lot of the stories in this collection I think: pretty out there and difficult to understand, but it feel like there's an underpinning to most of them and one or two lines will really grab you and then make you think about the whole again.
I ended up enjoying the longer stories in this collection the most. They were still highly weird but they were also actually more sensible. I really loved the story with the kid who drinks the voodoo water and starts transforming, it felt like a nightmare. Same with one with the milk and cum and bones and teeth - cool, nightmarish story, the perfect length.
Some I even wish were longer, like He Just Takes It (though maybe length would ruin the imagery), which is just such a visual and cool concept.

I don't think anyone who doesn't already enjoy unconventional and very weird horror will like this collection - will probably find most of the stories incomprehensible - but for those who do, I think you will enjoy this book as I did or even more.
It also helps the physical book itself is really fucking cool; props to the publisher Apocalypse Party (Negative Space also has a really nice feel to it and cover; I'm sure their other published books do as well). I loved the art in and on the book, and the cover itself has a nice feel. (One thing I am confused on though is why the table of contents appears 60 pages in, after three stories. Is the book supposed to be like this?)

[Frederick Maheux]

Despite, or because of the extreme body and psychological horror of all short stories, I felt vicariously targeted by all the situations and characters, even the non-human ones.

[Richard Bankey · Rating 2 out of 5]

A collection of short stories that I only found a few to be okay. Very close to a 1 star for me.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

"It's like a toothache. It takes over everything. A patch of rot grasps a nerve and the world falls away. Your body disappears, your pasts and futures dissolve into a single intolerable present and all you are is a throbbing sweaty toothache."

Review updated as of my re-read (17.2.25-19.2.25 ) love love love this book.

4.5

Death. Decay. Corrosion. The apocalypse. It's impossible not to think of these words when tackling this novel. Burn You the Fuck Alive is best described as a kaleidoscopic collection of devastation. Much like his previous work, there's this very distinct, almost overwhelming, but, entirely brilliant brand of nihilism in these writings. Yes, the expected hopelessness persists. But, just about anyone can put to paper some nihilistic musings, what makes Yeager's work so unique, so utterly crushing is that he manages to capture something that almost no one else can, he has a gift, it's the way he speaks of isolation, the way he writes about desire, the way he gives life to something that before his novels, could only be felt. Yeager doesn't simply just state that the world is shit, he carefully pulls apart the stitches that were keeping our souls tethered.

Appealing on the most sickening of levels, the stories within Burn You the Fuck Alive may vary in their theme and narrative styles, but, an uncontrollable, yet, strangely poetic sense of bleakness ties them all together. Perhaps one of the loneliest novels to exist. When plunging into this one, the reader is forced to confront unending psychological torment, grotesque body horror, and the most devastating portrayals of isolation. It's a novel that forces us to grapple with both the mundane and bizarre, the horror, so seamlessly woven into the normalcy of every day life, makes even the most simplistic of thoughts and feelings unpleasant. The population of this novel seem to be wasters, underachievers, they're drowning in apathy, smothered by their inability to care - they do not exist to be adored, rather, overlooked, fading into the spaces between, soaked in their own abandonment.

"She asks for a light. You reach in your pocket and dig out your Bic, strike the flint, and touch the flame to her cigarette. She inhales. The tip roils cinder. A line of flame draws down the paper, crossing the band, down the filter. It touches her lips and her entire face is ablaze. Engulfing, disappearing her hair, climbing down her throat, down her shoulders and arms and chest and belly, down her pants to her shoes. Washed in pumpkin light. She waves her arms, spinning in circles and howling."

No matter the story, these tales are designed to attack, to viciously assault. This isn't a novel you simply read, it's a novel that's felt. It's a vulnerable thing, this book, with beautifully terrifying writing. It's so horrific, based in a reality that's actually kind of terrifying to think about. Like experiencing the worst acid trip of your life, only, it never seems to end, and then the crushing realization that this is your every day. Burn You the Fuck Alive gifted me the chance to reminisce on what it was to feel as lonely as these stories do, and so I must say thank you, to The Young People, Burn You The Fuck Alive, A Favor, Puppy Milk, and Highway Ways for allowing me to experience the rapture, for it has been beautiful to burn the fuck alive.

"Tracing the black skids to the flattened guardrail, I peer down the ravine. It's a miniature tornado's wake-leveled trees and brush, a path carved down to the Volkswagen. It rests on its side, nuzzled between ancient firs and the ravine's incline. Coolant spitting. Billowing dense miasma."

[Cleo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Liked this much more than Negative Space. Maybe the fragmentary nature & obliqueness just works better here, or maybe I just like horror in short story form more than in novel form, idk. Some really good bleak images in here in any case

[Ben Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once Again, Yeager delivers a vicious and mesmerizing world. He is a master at bringing a sense of normalcy to the vile and violent. This collection of poetic, stomach churning stories had me lost in surreal and mundane hellscapes. Puppy Milk, along with Arcade and Where We Breathe are a few of my favorite stories.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can’t remember the last time I read a book I literally could not put down. Yeager is quickly becoming my favorite contemporary author. Strongly strongly recommend you go out and get this book immediately. Gonna go order Amygdalatropolis now.

[Barry Paul Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

You’re either already in or you’ve said “no thanks” and if you’re eating then this is a feast. Ring the bell because order is the fuck up. 🛎️

[Ryan Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Immolation never felt so good. Burned through this collection in two days. Pun intended.

[AN R · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is holding hands with Serious Weakness by Porpentine and spinning in circles together in my brain

[lark · Rating 5 out of 5]

i never read the same author back to back but i just devoured three of Yeager’s books in the span of a few weeks. no regrets. impeccable short fiction here, full of stories that still manage to shock and twist even when one may think they’ve played their entire hand.

[Curtis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I hope the serial killer who only targets aggresive drivers visits my town soon, because I'm one bad commute away from filling his job position.

[Ramsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

BRY has done it again; gotten completely under my skin.

He has a knack for creating absolute human waste, and then manages to make them (mostly) relatable.

[MJ · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first B.R. Yeager and I really enjoyed the darkness and tension within some stories as well as the disturbing nature. Not sure if I should have started with this one - but so did & I enjoyed it!