This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances

by Eric LaRocca

A brand-new collection of four intense, claustrophobic and terrifying horror tales from the Bram Stoker Award®-nominated and Splatterpunk Award-winning author of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke.
Four devastating tales from a master of modern horror…
This Skin Was Once Mine
When her father dies under mysterious circumstances, Jillian Finch finds herself grieving the man she idolized while struggling to feel comfortable in the childhood home she was sent away from nearly twenty years ago by her venomous mother. Then Jillian discovers a dark secret in her family's past--a secret that will threaten to undo everything she has ever known to be true about her beloved father and, more importantly, herself. It's only natural to hurt the things we love the most...
Seedling
A young man's father calls him early in the morning to say that his mother has passed away. He arrives home to find his mother's body still in the house. Struggling to process what has happened he notices a small black wound appear on his wrist—the inside of the wound as black as onyx and as seemingly limitless as the cosmos. He is even more unsettled when he discovers his father is cursed with the same affliction. The young man becomes obsessed with his father's new wounds, exploring the boundless insides and tethering himself to the black threads that curl from inside his poor father...
Prickle
Two old men revive a cruel game with devastating consequences...
All the Parts of You That Won't Easily Burn
Enoch Leadbetter goes to buy a knife for his husband to use at a forthcoming dinner party. He encounters a strange shopkeeper who draws him into an intoxicating new obsession and sets him on a path towards mutilation and destruction...

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Adult, Audiobook

240 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 2, 2024

About the author

Eric LaRocca (he/they) is a 3x Bram Stoker Award® finalist, a Shirley Jackson Award nominee, and a 2x Splatterpunk Award winner. He was named by Esquire as one of the “Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age” and praised by Locus as “one of the strongest and most unique voices in contemporary horror fiction.” LaRocca’s notable works include Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, Everything the Darkness Eats, and At Dark, I Become Loathsome. He currently resides in Boston, Massachusetts, with his partner.

Reviews

[emma · Rating 1 out of 5]

i was actually scared to read this.

and i should've been. but for other reasons.

i enjoyed — although maybe enjoyed is the wrong word — this author's first book, because while it didn't have much going on besides shock value and gore it at least did those two things in kind of an interesting way.

reading this was completely unpleasant from start to finish, and not because of the gross-out content. the writing is actively bad, full of clichés and adjectives, and somehow even though all of these stories (?) are very short, they drag on, not ending at the moment they'd be effective or shocking. characterizations are inconsistent, and in fact characters seem almost beside the point — none of these figures feel comprehensible, let alone human or real.

there's repetition here of whole details or lines of dialogue. favorite words are used to the in point of incomprehension — play a drinking game with covet, sense, decidedly, merely, perhaps with 911 on speed dial. this is teeming with repeated images (we get it, wounds have lips), adverbs, em dash breaks for more synonyms and more adverbs.

it's overwritten to the point that words have no meaning, which makes for a wildly frustrating read.

terrifying.

bottom line: i was anticipating this as a book that would make me truly scared, and i am: for the future of publishing.

(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)

[Sadie Hartmann · Rating 3 out of 5]

THIS SKIN WAS ONCE MINE And Other Disturbances by Eric LaRocca
Other Books I Enjoyed by This Author: Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke And Other Misfortunes, You’ve Lost A Lot of Blood, The Trees Grew Because I Bled There

Affiliate Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7576/978180336...

Release Date: April 2, 2024

General Genre: Horror, LBGTQ-Gay, Single Author, Short Stories

Sub-Genre/Themes: Death, dying, grief, love, toxic relationships, secrets, lies, fathers, parents, self-harm, body horror, obsession, mutilation, cruelty, games, emotional abuse

Writing Style: Gruesome, Transgressive, Raw

What You Need to Know: A collection of four stories, similar to LaRocca’s first collection. One titular tale stands out as the clear favorite with a few other tales to anchor it as a “collection”

My Reading Experience:
THE SKIN WAS ONCE MINE- a woman tortured by her self-image as a ‘monster’ returns to her childhood home after the unexpected death of her father. Her emotionally unavailable mother is being cared for by a mysterious man who seems like more than just a caretaker. This story is insidiously dark and disturbing. So much going on in the sub-text–that readers are left wondering about what truly happened. Triggers for child abuse
SEEDLING- A young man’s father calls to tell his son that his mother has passed away and to come and pay respects. When he gets to his parents’ home, he realizes that his mother’s dead body is still in the house. This story, clearly, was symbolic of shared trauma and grief between father and son expressed through these strange wounds that opened up on their bodies. But then it takes a dark turn and I’m not entirely sure what to make of the ending–pretty gruesome!


ALL THE PARTS OF YOU THAT WON’T EASILY BURN-I don’t know exactly what it is about the writing style of this story but it reads almost like a long parable? It has this whole, “One day there was a man named Enoch and he goes to a shop to buy an expensive knife for his husband. The shopkeeper was a strange man who convinces Enoch to pay for the expensive knife with an expereince instead of money. He wants to cut Enoch and put a tiny piece of glass in the wound.” Do you know what I mean? And this one trigged my trypophobia, BAD. So be aware of that…(holes!)

PRICKLE- I honestly didn’t finish this one.

Final Recommendation: Horror readers who enjoy sampling a variety of speculative, grotesque, gruesome, body horror/emotional trauma, short stories you can finish in one sitting will enjoy this book. The first story is worth the price of admission–not every story will stick the landing for every reader.

Comps: Nineteen Claws and A Blackbird by Augustina Bazterrica, Full Throttle by Joe Hill, Spin a Black Yarn by Josh Malerman

[Krysta ꕤ · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances was a wild ride that i enjoyed every second of. there’s something so captivating about using unspeakable horrors to convey more base level human emotion and experiences. my fav short story was the third one.. it went in a direction that had my jaw 10 feet underground. i will read anything Eric Larocca writes, their talent for writing the disturbing and uncomfortable is everything i look for in horror.

➾ this skin was once mine - 4 ★

when the father Jillian idolized passes away, she’s forced to reunite with her mother and uncovers some disturbing secrets about her father in the process of returning to her childhood home.

➾ seedling - 3.5 ★

a man dealing with the loss of his mother, confronts his more absent father while discovering a black wound festering on his body that continues to grow.

➾ all the parts of you that won’t easily burn - 4.5 ★

Enoch buys a knife from this shopkeeper and becomes infatuated with him and the darker impulses they both share for pain and self inflicted suffering.

➾ prickle - 4 ★

when two old men: Mr. Spirro and Mr. Chessler meet up again after years of not seeing eachother, they revive their game of “prickle” they used to play. the game involves doing cruel things to unsuspecting people.

⇝ many thanks to NetGalley and Titan Books for the arc, all opinions are my own.

[Dr. Cat in the Brain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Evil despises boundaries.

Not its boundaries (which must always be respected). Yours, of course.

It's just a part of its quirk, really.  

If evil sees a line it cannot cross it feels compelled to cross it, demolish it. Not because it's particularly invested in your feelings or discomfort (either good or bad) but because you have given it a rule it cannot break, and evil can't have that.

I once saw a person online get bullied by internet trolls to the point where they suffered a complete mental breakdown.  

After this happened some people who took part in the bullying felt remorse. But the most vocal of the bullies tried to rationalise what they had done. They were full of righteous indignation. They were just criticising. Just making jokes. Is it wrong to criticise? Is it wrong to make fun? In fact the person who had been bullied was the clear villain. Why they had done embarrassing and stupid things and so deserved to be punished. Actions have consequences, after-all. But of course not all consequences are valid. Are they? Not all consequences are moral. And justification is not the same as justice. Nature can be cruel, but that doesn't mean all cruelty is natural.

But evil seeks a way to normalise evil. To cross those boundaries. And to take you with them. To accept their norm.

And that's how you know if you're in the presence of something truly monstrous. It tries to push through, past your defences. Steal your consent. It's not enough that they do something awful. They have to make you complicit. They must not be judged. And you must wallow in their pit. You see something wrong that has happened to somebody, and you get this sick feeling. This twisting in your stomach. A churn. And evil offers up a way to alleviate the guilt. It offers you a price to pay to enjoy all these violent delights. And it's nothing really. Why it's just a tip. It's just a cut. Just a seed. Just 'consequences'. Just accept the normal, natural world. Just let it step in the door.  

And often when people concede, they soon realise they've let something horrible inside of them. And it grows and devours. And there's no coming back.  

This utter violation and corruption of boundaries is at the heart of every horror story in Eric LaRocca's most recent collection: This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances. 

I was offered a free copy to review, which for me is living the dream. Reading books for free! It's like the library, only I'm at the front of the line.

But there's always a price to pay when you read Eric LaRocca's fiction.  His work is full of beautifully mutant, flesh-eating concepts and that's why he's so beloved in certain dark and extremely well-red corners of the written world. 

Eric's got a talent for pricking your brain.

I knew I was in for something particularly disturbing when there was a warning before the collection started. I don't remember seeing a warning before his previous books Everything The Darkness Eats and They Were Here Before Us and those were exceptionally disturbing slabs of worm-riddled trauma. 

So seeing this disclaimer reminded me of the time I once went to the doctor and he produced a particularly intimidating needle. I asked "is this going to hurt" and the doctor looked at me grimly and said "oh yeah." And considering most of the time doctors are trying to convince you stuff won't hurt? Well. I knew I was in trouble.

So does this collection hurt?  

OH YEAH.

And we're all in deep trouble now.

The first story in the collection is Eric LaRocca's best work so far. It is called This Skin Was Once Mine, which is also the title of the book.  It's the feature presentation, the main event and it deserves that status. Because it is a gorgeous monstrosity. The writing is polished and the pacing and plotting are pitch-perfect. LaRocca's always been extremely talented at developing and unravelling characters quickly and effectively, but this is something on a totally different level.

The story deals with a young woman estranged from her parents finally returning home after her father passes away. She comes back to a place brimming with strange memories. It seems her childhood house has gotten bigger, instead of smaller. Not just physically, but emotionally, mentally. Like Shirley Jackson with Hill House and Dario Argento with Suspiria, the setting and the mood become characters. Even the furniture in this story takes on a life of its own. All of this builds to a shocking revelation where the story evolves from a Gothic horror full of guilt and paranoia and family politics to a surreal character-driven nightmare.

The narrator finds something hidden in the house and the plot opens up like a flower. It blooms. It blossoms. Like one of those intricate pop-up books. Where pictures unfold into a far more elaborate design.  What was once flat, now springs up, it has more dimensions. 

I compare this work to Dario Argento because that's what it reminded me of the most. Argento's elegant philosophy of horror.  The visuals LaRocca strives to create with his prose are a deliberate aesthetic choice. Every sequence brims with a sort of poetic evil. The hidden spaces, the animal symbology, the gorgeous descriptions and turns of dream logic and broken flowery prose. It gives an unnatural glamour to content that is ruthlessly obscene. Which is actually more horrible than if it was simply presented straight. 

There is an intent under the flesh that is more grotesque than the surface level atrocity. There is a seduction to it. The narrative wants you to take part in it, the story dares you to feel complicit. To empathise with the horrors. One particular line where the narrator admits they are jealous is like a sliver of ice being shoved through the heart.

The plot moves wonderfully between what the narrator tells you and shows you and what is truly happening.  So the characters exist in many more dimensions than just one and the plot weaves between those dimensions.

So underneath the glamours and the soft-focus blur of surreal dreams are the long and rusted chains of abuse.

We see how abuse grows like vines between people. How it is passed down family lines like a terrible responsibility, an heirloom, a corruption infecting everything around it. Evil creating mirrors of itself. Using guilt and shame and love, spreading itself across a family like butter on bread.

I give this one a 10/10.

The second story SEEDLING combines the internet's favourite past-time hypochondria with Lovecraftian horror and a broken family dynamic.  

Where another child learns about her parent dying and travels to console her grieving father. And like all people suddenly confronted with their mortality, the protagonist begins to feel that creeping paranoia of disease. Where we obsess over wounds that don't look right, moles that are strange shapes, marks, ageing and all the colours of the body that are so terribly mutant and toxic as we age.  

When we begin to realise the urgency of our life we become involved in a sort of murder mystery. Only the killer is our own flesh, planning to betray us and secretly hatching plots against us.

But with Eric LaRocca, it is never simply enough to have an unhealthy obsession, so as the protagonist investigates the mysteries of a strange new wound, she finds to her wonder that the mystery begins to reach back. The mutant body communicates as tendrils spool out of black tumorous gaps to wrap probing fingers.

And soon we learn that the seeds of this particular corruption might have been planted long ago. A flower of neglect and rejection, slowly blossoming into new connections, not through life, but through death.

The sheer audacity of this work and how it effortlessly shifts from dream logic to cosmic horror to a sort of Eraserhead style psychodrama is wondrous to behold.  8/10

The third story All The Parts of You That Won't Easily Burn is quite the deformed nightmare.

It isn't as strong as the first tale, but it stuck with me the most after reading it.

And you know you're in trouble because Eric's broken out one of his trademark titles.  I mean, you're always in trouble with Eric LaRocca's writing, you're never quite safe, but when he rolls out those Giallo "My Deviance Is a Broken Promise Locked in Your Fruit Cellar" titles, it's his way of slowly snapping on the rubber gloves.

Things are gonna get upsetting.  And dirty.  And wet. In many ways more than just one.  

What begins as a man paying a very peculiar price in exchange for an expensive ornate knife turns into well... I would describe it in a blur as Robert Shearman's Thumbsucker meets Miike's Audition meets Castle Freak. Where kink is attracted to kink, consent is pushed to a breaking point and where weird desires involving cutting and glass attract something altogether entirely more grotesque.  This story creates a horrible web of escalation that culminates in one of the best dinner parties in the history of horror fiction.

As Titus Andronicus pointed out, there's a party and then there's a Centaur's Feast. 9/10

The final story PRICKLE is the most simple and straight-forward of the fiction here, but it is also one of the cruellest.

It involves two elderly gentlemen, who are not as gentle as they first seem, who enjoy a good light-hearted game of ruining other people's afternoons. They call it Prickle. 
This is a story that you expect to build to an escalation that instead develops so quickly and effectively in the final third that the big pay-off is both something you see coming and something you can never predict.  

I won't spoil it, but my jaw was hanging open and my stomach was in knots.

8/10

This particular piece of disgusting debauchery completes the collection but it also continues the first story's line of themes involving evil creating cultures of complicity and the erasure of boundaries. 

Through ritual, through shared trauma, shared kinks, shared neglect and misunderstanding and through playful, childish glee and friendship.

Remember kids, it's all fun and games until somebody loses an eye.  

And even when that happens, for some people, it's still all fun and games.  

In fact, for some, it becomes even more entertaining.

Be careful out there.

Overall I give this quaint collection of cruel cuties a nifty 9/10. 

[Brandon Baker · Rating 3 out of 5]

I mostly listened to the audio, and unfortunately, the last two narrators were kinda grating 😅 and the stories themselves were kind of a mixed bag for me. It was a quick read though!!

[Char · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weird, wild and brilliant, this collection blew me away!

Here, Eric pushes the boundaries of...nearly everything. Body horror abounds and his style and content is immediately recognizable as Eric's. In exactly the way early Clive Barker works are easily recognizable. I was thinking about Barker a lot as I was reading this book. Is Eric the next Clive? Maybe. He might even be better.

There are 4 stories in this collection, each one more bizarre than the last. All of them engaging, all of them fascinating, all of them creepy as hell. Stories about relationships...some with parents, some with lovers, some with old friends. All of them, fully developed and like little tidbits of horrific bliss.

I'm not going to go into each story, if you've read Eric LaRocca's books before, you know what you're getting. If you haven't, they should be a complete surprise for you, and this book is a great way to introduce yourself to his work. Pay attention to Eric's foreword and be sure you want to tackle this before you begin.

If you do, you're in for a real treat. Eric's imagination has no limits and his stories are all over the place. Weird as his characters and tales sometimes are, I always find a way to relate to them. They feel real. Their thoughts are recognizable as thoughts that you, yourself, might have. Well, some of them anyway.

I've been reading Eric LaRocca since he first arrived on the horror scene. This man's words speak to me, and I am so eager to have more of them. I feel like maybe I got in on the ground floor of what is sure to be a long and successful career, and I couldn't be more pleased.

"All this for a knife?" That is the final question from ALL THE PARTS OF YOU THAT WON'T EASILY BURN, the last story in this splendid collection. My answer is "YES!"

My highest recommendation!

*ARC from publisher and author, via NetGalley.*

[Jan Agaton · Rating 4 out of 5]

that was fucking WILD lmaaaooo I freakin love Eric LaRocca so damn much.

"Seedling" was my least fave story but all the other ones kept my eyes glued to the pages!

[Mallory · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sometimes a book takes you by surprise and this one definitely did that to me. The stories in this book will definitely stick with me. I listened to the audiobook and really thought the narrators did a great job. The voices added to the characters narrating which I think greatly added to the creep factor. I think what was creepiest about these stories is that they each started out so normal with a person dealing with something related to relationships and then when I wasn’t braced it turned horrific. I also really liked that these stories all had at least an element of queer and if there is one genre that I see little to no queer representation it is horror so that was excellent. I think the first story was my favorite but also the one that will stick with me in horror. The characters in these stories are normal at first glance: an heiress returning home after 20 years, a family experiencing grief, a young man who meets some new people who introduce him to new experiences, and two old friends reconnecting most likely for the last time. I have not read anything by Eric LaRocca before but I will definitely be looking for more of his.

[Mique Watson · Rating 5 out of 5]

That last scene in that last story BITCH 🤯

[STEPH · Rating 4 out of 5]

So so excited when I got the notification from Netgalley! I've been waiting for Larocca's new book and I'll only say one thing—totally freaking worth it!

Four tales from a master of modern horror.

THIS SKIN WAS ONCE MINE:

The first story was the perfect way to start a chapter. A peek of what a reader like me should expect from an Anthology book. Creepy and terrifying. The characters were unpredictable and the setting was eerily uncomfortable. I couldn't stop thinking about the music box or the snakes. Ugh.

SEEDLING:

Ugh! That was gross. I could never look at an innocent black hole the same way ever again.

ALL THE PARTS OF YOU THAT WON'T EASILY BURN:

Imagine buying a knife from a mystery seller and suddenly become obsessed with mutilation and broken glasses. Like, how could something so mundane escalate to something destructive? Well, ask LaRocca.

PRICKLE:

And that's how you end a book. Nicely done.

I loved it. Thank you Netgalley and Titan Books!

[Willow Heath]

Eric LaRocca is the king of the horror short story, and of the horror title. This collection is no exception in both regards. Four twisted tales, prominently featuring queer protagonists, each deliver a nauseating gut-punch of horror. The title story—and longest in the collection—tells the tale of a woman whose mother sent her off to a boarding school when she was nine. She hasn't been home since, but the death of her once-beloved father has lured her back.

My full thoughts: https://booksandbao.com/terrifying-qu...

[Leo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved every story for diffrent reason, the horror and plot was awesome in those and had great plot twist kind of endings. But the one didn't quite make me invested.

[destiny ♡ howling libraries · Rating 3 out of 5]

Devastated that this didn't work for me. I adored Eric's first few releases, but this marks two LaRocca releases in a row that left me wanting more. I kept feeling like potentially fascinating threads would appear, only to be left alone in favor of pursuing a different story arc. It's one thing to speak in riddles and make your reader work for those hidden meanings, but it's another thing when that turns into continuity errors and loose ends.

I also have to admit that I really struggled with Jillian's character in the titular story and her adoration for her abuser/father. This also marks two LaRocca titles in a row that left a very sour taste in my mouth with their depictions of assault survivors idolizing their abusers.

It's possible that Eric's writing is moving in a direction that simply isn't for me anymore, and that's okay if it is! As long as they are happy with their art, that will always matter most. I'm just a little sad about it. 💔

✨ Representation: queer characters

✨ Content warnings for: violence, gore, murder, death, incest, pedophilia, infidelity, sexual assault, imprisonment, abuse, starvation, terminal illness, cancer, grief, child abuse, infant abuse, infant death, self-harm

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bookstagram | booktok | blog | storygraph | twitter/x

[⊹ Amy ⊹ · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances is a collection of four dark and twisted stories that explore grief, trauma, depravity and desperation. All four stories are quite interesting and grotesque in a way that kept me engaged the entire time, making for a super quick read.

The prose is also quite nice, which is to be expected from Eric LaRocca. But that also brings me to why I couldn’t give it more than 3 stars. The more I read from this author, the more all his stories start to blend together in my mind as they all follow the same formula.

They’re all elegantly written stories with disturbing and grotesque content, mainly focusing on abuse and trauma. And while I do like the exploration of such themes, I would like to see something a bit different. Maybe something more subtle and purposeful, where certain things don’t feel like they’re merely used for shock value, especially if it’s present in every story.

[Reilly Zimbric · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Fuck them kids” -Mr. Chessler

[Trashique · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Sometimes to heal, you must hurt something."

This is my first Eric LaRocca experience. All I can say at this point is, I want more.

[daph pink ♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story that went by the title was a little disappointing; I got the background, but it felt a little lacking and a lot like the stories I've read before. And it makes perfect sense why I always rated all of his stories similarly because they had a consistent style and format. They are undoubtedly amazing on their own, yet when read as a whole, they seem same.

These stories are undoubtedly very well written and explore themes of the macabre and strange, and I appreciate that about them.

My personal favorite was the second story, "Seedling". This one line in particular has stayed with me. With his skillful use of body horror, LaRocca illustrates this point by saying, "seedlings are planted deep within us when we're very young... and take from us until they can finally bloom and fully reveal themselves to us."

This is a good anthology that includes a good amount of the unsettling, macabre information about Eric LaRocca that weave together the facets of mankind that we've all encountered. Although the first two stories don't personally have the same impact as the second half, I think they are quite comparable to one another. Nevertheless, by the time you finish the book, the collection of the dark sides of humanity has stayed with you.

[Stay Fetters · Rating 4 out of 5]

"You are the most beautiful monster I've ever seen."

Grotesque and it sent shivers of pleasure through my body. Loved this creepy collection.

[✮ osanna aoki ✮ · Rating 5 out of 5]

First, I'd like to thank Eric LaRocca for sending an ARC of This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances. I'm honored to read this wonderfully macabre work early.

"Notice how it always moves forward, Jay bird? A snake doesn't glance back and think to itself, This skin was once mine. A snake always moves forward. Keeps changing. No matter what."

This is a book of subtle depravity, but depravity nonetheless. Eric LaRocca seems to find his lane more accurately with every book release. I always have feelings when I read his books— melancholy, despair, depression, and somberness. They are always drenched within the sister-feeling of unshakeable dread. LaRocca will do that to you. His eloquence and prose are undeniable, and his unique tales will make you wonder about the deepest parts of his mind.

This short story collection consists of four stories of unresolved trauma and corrupt minds. Life will drag you through the mud, sometimes at the hand of other people. People you thought you knew. But in this book, even those closest to you are questionable. A major and resounding theme lives behind the words— "the worst thing a person can do to you after they've hurt you is let you live." That gave me chills. Let that statement sink in. It comes up time and time again.

Here are small synopses of each story:

This Skin Was Once Mine: A story that follows a young woman down a surprising and melancholic rabbit hole. This rabbit hole leads to a shocking and upending discovery. Representative of the snakes that are hidden in peoples' lives.

Seedling: Seeds. They are planted deep within us. Taking from us until they can fully bloom. Is it merely perception or reality? A tale with a deadly end.

All the Parts of You That Won't Easily Burn: A man becomes obsessed and aroused by mutilating himself with glass after a deal gone awry.

Prickle: A pair of elderly friends play a game of cruelty, indecency, and depravity, targeting random victims— and one of the two takes it much too far.

Eric LaRocca's mind is absolutely bonkers, and I am utterly enamored by his skill and poetic prowess in the horror genre. Anyone can take away a message from one of these stories— maybe even a bit of self recognition.

He's got me in a chokehold once again. Every time.

[Krystal · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Skin Was Once Mine: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Narrated by Natalie Naudus

I should have known.

It started like a pretty standard story, but damn did it twist! I thought I knew where it was going but of course I had no idea.

Which just made me love it more. It was so tangled and messed up and it kept going. The downside to audio is you can't flick through and work out how many pages left, so you're just swept up and forced to suffer for as long as the story chooses to go. And I mean that as a compliment - after all, we horror lovers to enjoy suffering.

Narration was perfect - interesting and easy to follow characters, with believable performance when it was crucial.

An early standout.

Seedling: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Narrated by Andre Santana

Holy wow this was creepy. I got ICK.

A short but definitely not sweet story about things under the skin. The delivery here was perfect and had my skin crawling. Perfectly awful.

Narrator did a great job of conveying the horror of this one.

All the Parts of You That Won't Easily Burn: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Narrated by Michael Crouch

This took so many turns and I had no idea where it was going. It was twisted and odd and yet completely captivating. I spoke a few 'eww!'s out loud, and felt all kinds of uncomfortable sensations listening to this one. Another brilliant job by the narrator.

Prickle: ⭐⭐⭐
Narrated by Steven Crossley

WOW what a banger of a way to finish this collection. It's horrific but it also made me laugh out loud. Nice.

I really enjoyed the way it escalated. Nasty, nasty lil piece, this one.

Decent narrator, adding believable voices to the characters.

Overall Thoughts
I liked this collection so much more than the author's last. Everything twisted so beautifully, but never so much as to reveal the end destination. Atmosphere was built exceptionally well and I became quickly invested in each story.

Fantastic writing with some excellent, disturbing ideas.

Also appreciated that there was a different narrator for each story - and each one did such a brilliant job bringing these disturbing characters to life.

With thanks to NetGalley for an audio ARC

[Irene Well Worth A Read · Rating 5 out of 5]

The dark side of human nature mixes with the bizarre and uncanny in these disturbing stories.
A beloved father passes away and a neglected daughter returns home to the mother who hasn't bothered with her in decades.
The death of his mother leads a young man to a strange new connection with his father.
A one-upmanship of cruelty goes way too far.
A cutlery purchase turns into a shocking tale of body horror.

Heed the trigger warnings at the beginning of this book.
If I were a writer I might have the skill to describe for you the depravity and suffering you will find in these tales. Every story begins with what seems to be a normal situation but don't be lulled into a false sense of security because there is much ugliness festering below the surface waiting to appear. Sometimes the worst monsters are just people.
Eric LaRocca has created some spectacularly revolting characters for this book. The stories are unique and sickening. I couldn't look away if I tried.

My thanks to Titan Books.

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

My experience in reading Eric LaRocca's short fiction has been a bit of a mixed bag. The title story of his first collection, Things Have Gotten Worse Since Last We Spoke, is a delightfully disturbing tale that includes obsession, body horror, and complex, toxic queer relationships. That story was a viral sensation, and rightly so, but I found the other stories a bit lackluster by comparison.

Similarly, You've Lost a Lot of Blood, was a book containing a couple of quite interesting stories that were hampered by a cumbersome framing structure, and none of those stories quite panned out.

So my experiences have mostly been characterized by a feeling of almost. These are stories that skirt around the edges of greatness, but tend to collapse under some unseen weight.

Reading This Skin Was Once Mine, I once again felt that the title story was carrying the book but it also left me with decidedly less positive feelings. There's a lot less almost in this new collection, and a lot more chaff.

The title story is pretty well delightful, bearing the rough structure of an old EC comics morality tale, where people behave in horrible ways but eventually pay the price. There's a kind of cosmic justice at play that's enjoyable to watch, and it's all filtered through a sensibility that's so surreal, so sinister, that it's genuinely fun, just like the old horror comics. I'd have delighted in a collection of such stories.

Unfortunately, the following stories have none of the first one's assurance, fun, or clarity.

"Seedling" bears all the marks of a great idea, with a chillingly imagined objective correlative for the certainty of death that our protagonist feels growing inside of him, and while it doesn't have much of a story structure, it operates more in the manner of a prose poem. The trouble is that it bears none of the specificity of language required for that task. In many of these stories, the prose seems to actually be getting in the way of the narrative, drawing the reader's attention away, rather than clarifying. No one walks in these stories. Nor do they look. Instead, every verb feels as if it's been mined up from thesaurus with little attention to its meaning and instead for its sound. Often, the diction is simply incorrect, leading to not only frustration but an inability to attend to the story at hand.

"All the Parts of You That Won't Easily Burn" gives us a more familiar narrative structure, as well as LaRocca's trademark body horror that becomes indistinguishable from sexual fetish, but it feels a bit forced, with the question of why our protagonist would even begin his dark descent simply abandoned, so it feels more like an exercise in shock than any character-driven exploration. And once again, the language is so strange, so imprecise, so often simply "wrong," that it sometimes had the ring of prose clumsily translated from another language.

I had high hopes for "Prickle," the closing story, as it once again felt much more assured, and the language much clearer, with an almost nineteenth century stateliness about it, but the end of the story dashed my hopes, as any kind of development that had been made was simply tossed aside like the proverbial baby in the bloody bathwater.

I don't know what to make of This Skin Was Once Mine, because it feels as if its many parts might have been written by as many different authors, or perhaps at as many different stages in one writer's development, but I do know that it did not deliver either scares or deep discomfort, which is a shame, because I think there is a unique and interesting voice lurking back there somewhere, if only it could push through the language and assert itself.

[Denise · Rating 3 out of 5]

All the triggers...yeah.

I'm just gonna put it out there that listening to this collection from Eric LaRocca was like reading a Junji Ito graphic novel. The first story involving a daughter and the death of her father and all the shit she didn't know about him was jarring and just wrong on so many levels. The next one about a son losing his mother after illness and the discourse he has with his dad later was like next level deviantly strange. Then we have the gay couple where a submissive partner ventures into weirdly cultish cutting behavior that ends not so well. And finally the two old guys that meet in the park and play some bizarre game of ruining someone's day which just amounts to bullying but gets taken too far...like way too far. What must it be like to live in Eric LaRocca's mind. These stories are very much love gone badly deviant themed and that's parent/child, romantic love, friendship love. I cringed so many times and used the phrase "that's f*cked up" so many times it's ludicrous. So yep, body horror, sexual abuse, cutting with underlying penetration connotations, bullying and child abuse. It's all there so just be aware if you're wanting to take this collection on. I mean it was interesting?-ish but it was like a really bad wreck on the highway where you slow down to get a look. Morbid curiosity and you won't unsee the stories in your head because the audiobook has different voice actors for each story and they did a good job of exacerbating the cringe whilst sounding completely normal.

[Phrique · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another LaRocca, another 5 star review from me. I was lucky enough to snag an ARC for my hands-down favorite cover of his to date. 🖤 Idk how he does it, but he is somehow able to tap into my marrow with his words every time. This was a collection of 4 stories, the namesake being the largest & most compelling of the stories to me. One story is simply a man who one day acquires an addiction for putting little pieces of glass beneath his skin, another is a game between old friends that goes incredibly wrong. Both stories were horribly intense, I was mentally white-knuckling the whole time. That glass under the skin one, phew. 😮‍💨 The other two stories have to deal with the loss of a parent that leads to anguish, forlornness, and existential horror. Both stories felt similar, gave me the same gut-wrenching feels but had very different “monsters” manifested from their circumstances. When I read LaRocca, I know I’m going to need to gird my loins, prepare for gut punches, & then cry in the car afterwards. The tempestuous/repulsion/depravity keeps me coming back & recommending him to anyone who enjoy some very UN-cozy horror.

[Paul Preston · Rating 5 out of 5]

You know what to expect with an Eric LaRocca book, and that is that the book will be nothing like what you expected.
Unique. Uncomfortable. This is Eric’s specialty…his bread and butter, and he wonderfully executes it time and time again. I truly believe Eric has no equal.
This is a collection of four short stories and each one will have you stumbling, queasy, and questioning your life choices that brought you here and reading LaRocca. Just be thankful that you made all those dubious decisions or else you would be one of those sad LaRocca-less humans that don’t have such fucked-up stories to experience.
I’m not even going to discuss these four tales because I don’t want to ruin your upcoming disgust. You want it. You deserve it. What have you done today to deserve your eyes? -whoops, sorry, wrong book.

[Lexi · Rating 5 out of 5]

The question to this book is "How much do you like Eric LaRocca"? because if you are like me and you do, this book is absolutely phenomenal. These stories stayed with me for days.

The book features four short stories that focus on broken relationships and "coming home".

An heiress to a fortune visits home after 20 years. A man finds a new obsession that draws him into a secret world. A family experiences grief after a great loss. Two old friends connect for one last time.

On their surface, each story seems innocent, until the dark begins to swallow them.

This collection features pretty standard Eric Larocca themes, so if you really didn't enjoy their other work, you may want to skip this one.

[Curtis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Time to call the cops and report this book for sexually assaulting my sensibilities.

[Catlin · Rating 1 out of 5]

There are a lot of amazing queer authors of color in this world. Unfortunately, Eric LaRocca is not one of them. This is the first book of his that I've read and I don't plan on reading any further. I really shouldn't have finished this book, but I needed it to complete a book challenge prompt.

Eric LaRocca's "This Skin Was Once Mine" is a perfect example of how people aren't automatically good writers just because they're from a marginalized community. It is also a good example of someone word-vomiting every adverb and adjective they know to reach word count, and trying to use disgusting imagery for shock value rather than to truly set the tone for the novel. It also seems that LaRocca has deep-seated mommy and daddy issues stemming from the fact that he is queer, since that's what ALL THE STORIES IN THIS COLLECTION ARE ABOUT. Not to mention all the weird sexual undertones between children and their fathers. Is this author projecting? Is this a cry for help? There's such a thing as therapy.

Now, before anyone says, "Oh, you just don't like scary stories! You don't get body horror and psychological horror and cosmic horror!", I read and watch a lot of horror. While everyone has their own preferences, I know the difference between good horror and bad horror. This book is just bad.

This collection of short stories begins with the titular "This Skin Was Once Mine," which follows Jay, a closeted lesbian who gets a call that her father died. She has to return to the family home in order to meet with her mother who kicked her out of the house 20 years prior. As she spends time in the house, Jay learns the dark secrets of her family's past and the truth hiding in the house. It sounds like an interesting premise, but the execution is truly botched. If you want a better story written by a gay man about a girl returning to her childhood home and questioning the secrets of her dead dad, read "Home Before Dark" by Riley Sager. It really felt like LaRocca read Sager's book and said, "I can write this, but worse." And then he did.

"This Skin Was Once Mine" is poorly written and it doesn't make sense. Jay spends the entire story talking about how she's a "monster," but we're never told why. I thought at first it was because her mom kicked her out of the house for being a lesbian, but we learn pretty quickly that Jay's mom has no idea that Jay is a lesbian. So why was Jay placed in a boarding school and cut off from her mother? Well, apparently it's because her mom had a late-term miscarriage/stillbirth and she didn't want Jay to be traumatized by it, so she sent her away. But she was also sent away because her father is a "monster." And then her mom tried to kill herself and is now permanently disabled. Why did she attempt suicide? Is it because she lost the baby? Or because her husband is a monster? The world may never know.

Jay refutes this by saying that if her dad was a monster, then she herself is a monster. But she's spent the entire story saying she IS a monster, so doesn't that mean her dad is? And how is HE a monster? The flashbacks we get from Jay make it seem like her father was an incestuous pedophile who was grooming his daughter, especially the scene where they sit in the garden and "share their secrets." The way she describes his breath on her ear while he whispers to her is creepily intimate, especially considering she's a literal child and her dad is, well ... her dad.

Then we find out that this dead baby DIDN'T actually die, and that her dad kept the baby in a box and raised her in secret in the attic. (Or is it the basement? Because there is conflicting info about that.) Oh, and he named her "Jay", I guess to make up for the daughter who was sent to boarding school. And he keeps her locked in the box, only feeds her sometimes, forces her to use a hole cut in the floor as a toilet, and then SLEEPS ON THE BED ABOVE THE BOX every night. At least, he did until he died, because Jay Two wanted to show him a rattlesnake and it killed him, and then the mother's male nurse (Ambrose) placed the body elsewhere so no one could find Jay Two. But wouldn't it be obvious he was killed by a snake bite? But Jay Two tells Jay that she has been in the house since before she got "the red flower" (aka her period) at 12. Doesn't Jay Two know that she was born in the house and has lived there her whole life? Why would she say it was before she got her period? She's never been anywhere else, so there's no reason for her to say that she's been there since before she was 12. She should've just said she's ALWAYS been in the house.

So, now we know that Jay's dad IS a monster because he maybe sorta kinda groomed his first daughter, and is keeping his second daughter in the box and is abusing her physically (the box is too small and Jay is covered in sores, old blood, and waste). But Jay refuses to believe her dad could do such a thing because SHE LOVES HIM. But when it becomes obvious it's the truth, she has no choice to accept the facts. So what does Jay "I'm Not a Monster Unless My Dad Is, But I Am A Monster And Have Always Been" do? She decides that the best way to honor her father's memory is to KEEP JAY TWO IN THE BOX. So she does. And she enjoys it. But then through a series of stupid events, Jay Two (who is so small and fragile and weak, according to Jay) is strong enough to force Jay into the box and keep her there. So now Jay is captive and Jay Two takes care of her. Okay ... but won't people be wondering where Jay Two came from and who she is? How do they explain this to the mom, who is depending on Jay to be her caregiver?

Aside from the nonsensical plot and lack of consistent characterization, LaRocca also uses an excess of adverbs, adjectives, similies, and metaphors. And he chooses the WORST ones. When Jay is nearly caught after having discovered Jay Two, she is breathing hard from anxiety. So please explain why LaRocca describes it as Jay "panting like a cat in heat"? Wtf? I never in my life would have been like, "This girl is so scared and is breathing so hard. What does it remind me of? Oh, yes, a feral cat who wants to mate."

Some other media about dark family secrets that are far better than this story are "Mr. Brooks" (2007 film), "Get Out" (2017 film), "Us" (2019 film), "Crimson Peak" (2015), and the X-Files episode "Home" (season 4, episode 2).

The second story, "Seedling," isn't much better. It's about a gay man with daddy issues who returns to his childhood home because his mom died of cancer. Gee, that totally isn't like the first story at all! This story was creepy but not in a good way. The narrator (does he even have a name? all he does is talk about his "poor dead mother's rotting corpse" and his gay lover who is the "only man in the world who understands him") has a terrible relationship with his dad, who spends the entire story trying to get the narrator to say goodbye to his dead mom's body. Then as Narrator is trying to leave the house, both he and his father experience weird festering wounds that appear as black voids filled with crystals. Okay, kind of a cool concept ... Except Narrator immediately becomes obsessed with them and goes digging through them. The descriptions are borderline sexual and it all revolves around his father. Narrator won't stop sticking his fingers, fists, and whole arms into the wounds on his dad's body. He talks about how warm and comforting the wounds are, and that he needs to be inside of them, and that he and his dad have never been this close. Then he forces his dad to put his hands into Narrator's wounds, so they can "understand each other." Again, wtf? And then at the end, we find out -- they weren't REALLY cosmic gaping wounds into a spiritual realm of understanding! They were literal wounds caused by Narrator using a butcher knife to kill his dad, and then he actually used his bare hands to rip open the wounds! And that he had a fugue state and was in the house for several days before his gay lover called the cops to find him! But Narrator refuses to believe that he killed his dad (and maybe his mom? because they were holding each other when they died? and she also had wounds?) because "omg they finally understand each other!!", and maybe the cosmic wounds WERE real and he and his parents are actually living on another plane of existence where they just "get" each other.

Idk, watch "Annhilation" (2018) instead.

"All the Parts of You That Won't Burn Easily" is about Enoch, who wants to buy a knife for his husband and pays for it by letting the shopkeeper cut open Enoch's arm and put glass into it. Enoch discovers that he's into sadism/masochism and dreams of having an affair with the shopkeeper. Okay, whatever, if Enoch realizes he's into pain then that's his business, but LaRocca depicts this community as a weird religious cult that encourages having affairs (since the shopkeeper knows Enoch is married) and sends out members to recruit people in order to be "truly accepted" into the group, like they're a freaking MLM.

Also, Enoch is so paranoid about accidentally exposing this secret society, but when he tries to recruit some rando, he cuts open his arm and puts more glass into it IN A PUBLIC PARK. There are tons of people around (including children, businessmen, and parents), but apparently THOSE people don't count. And then Enoch does the same thing to the rando, cutting open his arm and putting glass into it. In public. On a park bench. Around other people. But, yeah, you're scared of accidentally outing your secret society. Sure, Jan.

But, then, surprise! The guy Enoch recruits has his OWN secret, where he keeps a man as a pet and tortures him with fire. The man then tries to keep Enoch as a new pet since he'll "last longer" because "glass doesn't burn." (Hoe, Enoch isn't MADE of glass. He has, like, 3 small pieces of glass in his arm.)

Once again, this feels like LaRocca wanted to rewrite a more successful piece of media but in a far worse way. This time, he wanted to rewrite "Infinity Pool" (2023), right down to the "dog" scene. (If you know, you know.)

LaRocca uses the same descriptions he used in the other stories, repeating that wounds have "lips" and are always "black" with blood. If you're looking for a film about body horror, body mods, and sadism/masochism, don't bother with this story. Watch the film "American Mary" by the Soska Sisters. It's a feminist revenge film and explores the underground movement of extreme body modification. Or, if you're looking for far better pieces of media that include self-flagellation, religious themes, and/or the use of glass and fire, check out "Saint Maud" (2019), "The VVitch" (2015), "Red State" (2011), "Mandy" (2018), the short film "Portrait of God" (2022), the novel "Wise Blood" by Flannery O'Connor, and "Sirens of Titan" by Kurt Vonnegut. A comedic version of these themes is "This Is the End" (2013). For music, listen to the "Dance Fever" album by Florence + the Machine, the "Preacher's Daughter" album by Ethel Cain, or any Hozier album.

"Prickle" is the final story. Idk what happened in this except two old gay guys meet up and one of them thinks they could be more and the other thinks they couldn't be. They play a game called "prickle," which is their form of piquerism. They flirt with ladies so that they can poke them with sharp things like needles, and then lie about it being things like bee stings. Then they escalate their game to breaking people's mobility aids. But they spend most of the time complaining about being old, I think? They just like causing pain to other people.

Honestly, this story was boring and there were too many characters and I couldn't tell them apart. And then the story ends with one of the old men trying to force a stranger's baby to eat a rock. When the baby starts crying, what does the man do? Leave the baby alone? Run away? Nope. He picks up the baby and throws it into the river, where it drowns. Then he laughs like a madman because, surprise!, he's actually ~CRAZY~ and not even his best friend knew! But I guess he won their game of "prickle," so there's that.

Just watch the Law & Order: SVU episode "Pique" (season 2, episode 20) and, I dunno, those stupid prank channels on YouTube. As for "games that require hurting people", watch any of the SAW films, "Escape Room" (2019), "The Hunt" (2020), "Ready or Not" (2019), or even freaking "Spy Kids 3: Game Over" (2003). And for movies where babies die because of Weird Bad People, watch "The VVitch" (2015) or "mother!" (2017).

Anyway, please don't read this book. Just find something else. It's not worth it, not even for the PopSugar Reading Challenge.

[Ashley Daviau · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m really just hitting the literal jackpot with short story collections this month. This is the third one that just blows my freaking mind, five stars to every story with each one better than the last. LaRocca is just an absolute powerhouse when it comes to spinning tales that get under my skin and make me feel physically uncomfortable. There’s nothing I love more when reading than actually FEELING physical reactions to what I’m taking in.

[Carm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Creepy and suffocating. The titular story was my favorite.