The Macabre Masterpiece: Poems of Horror and Gore:

by Justin Bienvenue

50 scary poems. Five chapters, each a different theme within the horror genre. A collection of dark poetry sure to keep you up at night with the lights on...5x #1 most downloaded book for Contemporary Poetry2x #1 most downloaded book for American Poetry1x #1 most downloaded book for Poetry Anthologies

Every poem is a spine-chilling journey and terrifying experience to a horrific place. Reading before bedtime may cause nightmares. A sense of overwhelming dread will take over after every chapter. Poetry was not meant to be so dark...Within this book, Hell is a poetic paradise. Blood is a constant overflowing theme. Some of horror's most notorious monsters lurk within the pages awaiting new readers to scare. Creepiness reigns supreme giving off a sense of suspense right to the last page...

The Macabre Masterpiece is a thrill ride like no other. A collection full of fright that will make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. You’ll grip the edge of your seat with this dark, gory splattering of words that invoke the madness that truly personifies evil...

Grab The Macabre Masterpiece to test your scare tolerance today!

Genres: Poetry, Horror

72 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 9, 2010

About the author

Justin Bienvenue is a horror author and poet of 13 books. He has 26 short stories and poems in over 18 anthologies and magazines. His first book, The Macabre Masterpiece: Poems of Horror and Gore, is a 5x #1 most downloaded book for contemporary poetry, 2x #1 most downloaded book for American Poetry, and 1x most downloaded book for Poetry Anthologies. Aside from horror and poetry, he's also written two crime thrillers and a steampunk novel. He has two other books in the Macabre Masterpiece series and a three-part horror series called The Wax Factory series. His latest novel, Nightshade Station, is now available.
His next novel, High Stakes at the Bonesaw Saloon, will be his third western horror.

He has three YouTube series: Mystery Unsolved, which discusses some of the world's most bizarre unsolved mysteries; Mystery Ghost Stories, which discusses some of the most haunting ghost stories; and Mystery Blue Book, which discusses famous UFO and alien abduction cases.

When he's not doing anything book-related, his interests include spending too much time on Twitter, watching films and sports (Football and Baseball), playing video games and board games, and learning about history and Egyptology. He’s a total football nut and knows a lot of useless knowledge. He is certified in UFO Studies and is currently taking a course to become certified in Cryptozoology.

Want some free books and to be updated on his latest projects? Join his mailing list

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Reviews

[Tricia Kristufek · Rating 1 out of 5]

Let the red run slowly into the stream
In this river your hands will not be washed clean
Guilt will arise and your skin will stain
Plain and drained to the vein from those you've slain

The Macabre Masterpiece is a collection of short poems with a Gothic feel to them, mainly due to the subject matter - blood, vampires, and the like. It attempted to shed new light on this subject matter, using poetry as the medium.

There were various rhyming patterns utilized, and many of the rhymes sounded forced, as if the sentence was purposely convoluted to ensure the rhyme happened at the end of the line. Also of note, there was little to no punctuation, creating a run-on of words with no pauses for breath indicated.

While the blurb promised in-depth poems, most of them were very superficial and could have been giving more depth - more gore, more horror - instead of just simply describing the subject. There was no "showing," simply "telling" the reader - sometimes in creative ways - how blood looks or how death is.

Quick horror poems portraying vampires, murderers, and blood, The Macabre Masterpiece takes a light-to-the-night and the creatures crawling there, but leaves the reader with only a Dr. Seuss headache.

[Lily Vagabond · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I reveal my review, I'll first state that A) I'm a huge fan of Edgar Allan Poe and B) I took a university course in contemporary poetry. So, these are major influences for me.

Imagine my pleasant surprise when I see the book opens with a quote from Edgar Allen Poe. Score one! Then I start reading the poems. I enjoyed them. This book of poetry is small, fun, and a fast read. Themes involve a tour of hell, death, graves, cautionary tales, and all the fun things horror fans love about gore and fright. I especially enjoyed the many ending rhymes. Sometimes the rhymes are deep and sometimes they have sweet dark humor.

I admit it's not a perfect book. There are minor typos here and there. A few lines probably could have been shortened to match the rhythm of other lines. But that's just being picky. Did I also mention I had an overly analytical professor who gave us many assignments to pick apart every poem? Yeah. That, too.

Overall, I think The Macabre Masterpiece is a fun little book.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't normally read poetry, but I did read another of Justin's books which contained poems on various subjects. My favorite poems in that book were the horror poems, so when I saw he had an entire book of horror poems I had to check it out. And I was glad I did.

The book is divided into different sections to indicate the type of poems, such as CREATURES, BLOOD, etc. Really good poems in my opinion. I think I liked the Creatures section best, but really it was all entertaining. Sometimes the rhyme schemes would throw me off and it would take some time to catch on, but that was only with a few poems. The only other minor thing would be some of the pop culture references in the poems. For example, he mentions the tv show Law & Order in one poem and it really felt out of place. To me, poetry should remain "timeless" and try to avoid slang and pop culture references unless that's the basis of the poem, but maybe that's just me.

As a big plus, Poe is on the short list of my favorite poets, and this book did capture the Poe vibe. If you enjoy dark, graphic poetry, then you should enjoy this volume.

[Vincent Hobbes · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll admit, I'm not a huge fan of poetry,but it seemed interesting and I wanted to broaden my horizons. I love horror, so I gave this book a chance.

I felt the author, Justin Bienvenue, did an excellent job in presenting his work. This book is filled with poems of horror, and I quite enjoyed them. They were quick to read, quite vivid, and the author captured me with his work. I'm now interested in reading more poetry, and of course more work from this author. Five stars!!!

[Caedy Eries · Rating 2 out of 5]

After much deliberation and debate, I've decided to put this review back up and WILL NOT be removing it again.

Title: The Macabre Masterpiece: Poems of Horror and Gore
Author:  Justin Bienvenue
Rating: 2/5

Summary:  Have you ever wanted a tour of the infamous underground we know as Hell? To experience different angles of blood? To meet some of horrors most morbid and fearsome creatures? Or maybe you wish to get totally creeped out and be left in utter shock and suspense to the point where your heart is beating so fast but you can’t get enough!?


Review: Okay, I like poetry.  God knows I write enough of it, have written dozens of passages, large and small, but never had the urge to publish them (though that is changing).  However, the genre of horror poetry is something that intrigued me so I decided to give Justin Bienvenue’s book a chance. However, what awaited me in those pages, within those fifty in-depth poems was something that made my skin crawl worse than the horror themes that filled them.  One of my biggest issues with poetry is rhyming, not that I am completely against it, I just simply am not a fan of poems that rhyme each and every line.

If I wanted constant rhyming I would go read Dr. Seuss or something out of Mother Goose’s stories.  That does not mean that this is a bad book, in fact, once I forced myself to get beyond the every line must rhyme thing, I did enjoy some of the imagery that he created in the poems.  I did think some of them were a bit redundant, having four poems concerning the river of blood or vampires was a tad much when there was more that could be done with each of these categories in my opinion without the redundancies.

I think my favorite chapter was the last one where things took a slightly more unsettling turn in so far as things went from being physical representations of horror to being a bit more psychological.  From the Thirteen Stairs to the Inhibitors of Doom these, despite the rhyming had me sucked in because I love mess with your head imagery truth be told.

Is this something I would read again, probably not on the whole no, but I would definitely read bits and pieces of it, those that caught my attention more than others.  I wish I could give it a higher rating than I did, but unfortunately the above issues kinda prohibit me from doing that.  Very well done for a first publication and I look forward to seeing more of your work, perhaps with a little less rhyming.


If you have any questions, comments or recommendations you can contact me at simplicity.kindreth@gmail.com
My reviews can be found here:
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[Shelle Perry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall I would have to say that I found the anthology to be entertaining, in a spooky ghost stories around the campfire kind of way. Many of the poems offer vivid details making the scenes easy to envision. Each chapter offers up several poems that cover a single topic. All are a bit creepy, some venture into the disturbed or even grotesque ranges. Surprisingly, given my seeming aversion to the subject, I felt most of the poems were simply not long enough. They all had a mesmorizing simple rhythm that begged to be continued.

The particular poem I found most apropos to the Halloween theme would be 'Sounds of the Seasons'. There were outstanding poems in each chapter, but I found the final chapter, Suspense, to be my favorite. I have friends who particularly enjoy, creepy, macabre and gore, I would for sure suggest this to them.

[Flora Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I'm not usually a big reader of poetry, but the concept of horror poetry intrigued me. This is a book of poems that ranged from dark and gruesome to evil and creepy with the occasional bit of humor thrown in. The very first poem "Buried Alive" and "Zombies" in chapt 3 were my favorite two poems but I enjoyed nearly all of them in the collection. These are definitely unique and not for the feint of heart as some are a bit gorey. I would definitely recommend this to anyone that enjoys the horror genra. This is a collection that I will definitely re-read!

[Donald Armfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

To hear that a family member has published a book, puts a smile on your face... Indeed it did My cousin wrote this book...

Chapter 5 Suspence overall is my favorite well written poems really gave the feel of things.

The Grim Reaper is great!

Rage of Hades awesome "Why kill two birds with one stone, i go for the whole nest."

And thats what the author did, altho im not a huge poem reader i enjoyed all the poems. A MUST READ!

[Nora aka Diva · Rating 3 out of 5]

I should start by saying that poetry is not typically my thing, flowery sentiment, heartfelt bullshit that makes me want to vomit into my own hands. This is not that kind of poetry. A fun read, I actually giggled in several places. I liked it surprisingly enough.
Although I did spot several spelling errors and one misused homophone these poems are worth reading.

[Emma Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. It's not very long, however I did find the poems both likable-ly disturbing and definitely entertaining. Rarely do I write reviews on other author's works, however I believe this one deserves a mention since it has peaked my interest in the horror genre.

[Xan Rooyen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love poetry, the darker the better. Two of my all time favourite writers are phenomenal poets: Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Baudelaire. So it was with certain expectations that I began reading this anthology.

What I Liked: The structure and divisions. The chapter breaks work well to group the ideas within the poems and also afford the reader a sometimes much needed break between all the gruesomeness. The poems certainly are quite brutal, telling individual tales while contributing to the recurrent theme of death and horror.

What I Didn’t Like: I’m not the biggest fan of rhyming poetry. I found some of the rhyming lines overly contrived to the point where the rhyme became more important than the imagery or story being told. Sometimes this undermined the impact of the poem.

My Rating: This collection is certainly about blood, death and gore: definitive horror. I would’ve preferred more subtle and less explicit writing. There are a few gems in this collection though and those alone make this worth the read. 3/5 stars.

[Michael Benavidez · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

this is a good book. the poems are pretty interesting, and there's some nice imagery here. It can get pretty dark, and there's still a variety of thing. the reason I knocked it down from 4 to 3.5 stars is that the rhyming schemes can bring a top grade poem/story into a sort of hokey feel. It wasn't too bad, and not many suffer from them, but on too many occasions the whole feel was reduced to cheesy because of the need for it to fit the rhyme scheme.
all in all, it was an interesting read, and worth the time.

[David Haynes · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this is stages over the Halloween weekend as I didnt have time to read a whole novel. thought there were some entertaining and atmospheric verses in the book. The subject matter, taken as a whole, is macabre but I liked the way the poems were grouped into various sections.
All in all an enjoyable and entertaining read.

[Louise O'Connell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this book with the intention to read something unique and hoping to be left amazed and I was certainly not disappointed. I loved every poem especially zombies which was my favorite. Excellent read and the author has an awesome imagination. I highly recommend.

[Camden Johnson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've begun to realize that maybe horror poetry isn't my cup of tea as I find that they're usually too edgy or try too hard which is what I have to say about this book. Most of the poems tried hard to rhyme at times and it took me out of the immersion.

[Justin]

Hey Everyone,
I thought I'd use the review space here to share with you the journey this book has taken me on since I first wrote it back in 2010. I was an amateur back in the day and quite naive. After writing this book, I found a publisher for it, a vanity press. I didn't know it at the time, but over the next four years, they made my life and my books' life a living hell. Always trying to get hundreds of dollars out of my pocket to promote, saying they did something for me to market when they didn't, so many false promises, and I've never seen any royalties from them. Finally, I got in touch with someone, and in 2013, a civil suit was filed against the company, and I was free from my contract.

In 2013, I republished the book with a new look and touched it up. With a new lease on life, I am proud to say that The Macabre Masterpiece has triumphed, and its gloomy days are forgotten. Since 2014, it has become my biggest-selling book and still is to this day. It is a 5x #1 most downloaded book on Amazon for Contemporary Poetry when I made it free, a 2x #1 most downloaded book for American Poetry, and a 1-time #1 most downloaded book for Poetry Anthologies. I still get spontaneous sales from it, which always puts a smile on my face.

It has spawned two sequels, Repressed Carnage(2016) and Vile Humanity(2023), and while they haven't had as much success, it is because of the success of this book that I decided to write them. I hope those who discover this book will also discover the other two and enjoy all of the poems I've written on the pages, because it's always been a joy and my goal to educate, enlighten, and entertain readers to the best of my ability.

Who knows, maybe I'll write another book in the series. Maybe, I already have ideas for three more books ;)

Thank you to everyone who has read The Macabre Masterpiece, and to those who will read it I appreciate you more than you know.

Thank you again,
Justin

[Rachael · Rating 4 out of 5]

For more reviews, check out my blog @ Moosubi Reviews!

As I said before, The Macabre Masterpiece isn't the usual type of book I would read. The only other verse books I've read are works of Ellen Hopkins and Samantha Schutz, which were completely different compared to Justin's works. Completely.

Just like the title says, this poetry is preeetty gory. When you open the book, the first chapter is entitled "Hell" - definitely not a happy place. The second is "Blood", so obviously the whole chapter is filled with poems of blood. I suppose it has some Christian references (the devil, Satan, etc.), but what stands out most of all is the creepiness and dark feelings you get when you read it. I feel that the collection of poetry definitely serves it purpose (which, I assume, is to creep people out...) I remember one specific poem titled "The Grim Reaper" - actually one of my favorite poems in the whole book. Although this poem was about the same length as the rest of the poems in the collection, I felt there was an interesting bit of characterization, portraying the reaper as emotionless, but also "grim" when doing his job.

I also enjoyed the fact that it was kind of a refreshing breathe of air after all the boring YA PNR material I've been reading. In "Creatures", vampires are being described, and they're definitely not the sparkly, Edward-Cullen-type vampires you see in movies - they're genuine, lonely but dangerous blood sucking creatures. (Not sure if I should be glad about this - I thought dangerous was bad...?) But anyways, this book is definitely a different read.

My only complaint is that the poetry rhymed. I suppose after my literature class, I'm more used to Shakespeare's half free verse half iambic pentameter talk. Maybe I was expecting it to not rhyme? I'm not sure actually - but sometimes the rhyming got on my nerves.

Hmph. I'm not sure what else to say. Again, the best part of this book is because it's so creepy and spine tingling. But again, this book's probably not for everybody. If you're not the biggest fan of poetry and / or are easily scared, this book's definitely not for you. However, if you're a poetry lover or are looking for something out of the box, The Macabre Masterpiece might be for you.