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Fatso: A Splatterpunk Novella of Female Rage
Priscilla Dobbs is 400 pounds of invisible rage. Until she decides to become inescapable.
For decades, Priscilla’s world has been a cycle of frozen dinners, graveyard shifts, and the casual cruelty of a society that treats her like a walking punchline. She is the woman people film for social media mockery, the "problem" social workers try to solve, and the invisible shadow caring for her schizophrenic aunt.
But a routine trip to the grocery store changes everything. When a teenage cashier’s smirk lasts a second too long, the dam finally breaks.
Priscilla discovers that violence is the only language the world truly hears—and that revenge is a dish best served raw. As she carves a path of carnage through those who mocked her, Priscilla doesn't just find her voice; she finds an appetite that can never be sated.
FATSO is an unflinching odyssey into the "unpalatable feminine." It is a splatterpunk nightmare that transforms the marginalized body into an instrument of terror.
Part social satire, part cannibalistic revenge fantasy, this is a story for those who like their horror messy, mean, and disturbing.
Not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach. Contains graphic violence, cannibalism, and scenes that will make you think twice about every cruel word you've ever spoken.
Author’s The current version has been slightly edited to remove an inconsistency and correct a few typos. FATSO is a story I’ve been carrying around in my head for decades and finally wrote over three long days, and I deeply appreciate the generally positive reactions from those who’ve read it.
For decades, Priscilla’s world has been a cycle of frozen dinners, graveyard shifts, and the casual cruelty of a society that treats her like a walking punchline. She is the woman people film for social media mockery, the "problem" social workers try to solve, and the invisible shadow caring for her schizophrenic aunt.
But a routine trip to the grocery store changes everything. When a teenage cashier’s smirk lasts a second too long, the dam finally breaks.
Priscilla discovers that violence is the only language the world truly hears—and that revenge is a dish best served raw. As she carves a path of carnage through those who mocked her, Priscilla doesn't just find her voice; she finds an appetite that can never be sated.
FATSO is an unflinching odyssey into the "unpalatable feminine." It is a splatterpunk nightmare that transforms the marginalized body into an instrument of terror.
Part social satire, part cannibalistic revenge fantasy, this is a story for those who like their horror messy, mean, and disturbing.
Not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach. Contains graphic violence, cannibalism, and scenes that will make you think twice about every cruel word you've ever spoken.
Author’s The current version has been slightly edited to remove an inconsistency and correct a few typos. FATSO is a story I’ve been carrying around in my head for decades and finally wrote over three long days, and I deeply appreciate the generally positive reactions from those who’ve read it.
104 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 14, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
April 14, 2026
This book looks like it’s going to be cruel.
Like, everything about it's set up for that. The title. The premise. It’s basically holding up a neon sign that says: LAUGH NOW. This is where the main character becomes the “walking cautionary tale.” The “visual punchline to every TikTok trend about obesity.”
It would be so, so easy.
But it doesn’t do that. Ever.
Instead, it insists, repeatedly and stubbornly, that Priscilla's not a joke. She's not something to be pointed at from a distance. She’s not there to be laughed at, even though the entire world around her keeps trying to make that happen.
She’s a person. A full, contradictory, controlled, quietly unraveling person who's very deliberately trying to hold herself together using routines and rituals, anything that might keep things from slipping.
The book never laughs at Priscilla. And neither do we.
Priscilla's very clear that she doesn’t live in a shithole. She corrects that immediately. But her apartment's still "a monument to survival at the lowest settings." Which tells you everything's held together with emotional duct tape and stubbornness. Everything's just barely holding because she's actively holding it there. She’s a clean freak, but not in a cute, quirky Pinterest organising way. More in a “we're absolutely not repeating what happened last time” way. She washes her dishes immediately after use, "like her therapist recommended, after the incident with the maggots last April."
And everything clicks.
This isn’t a preference, this is the aftermath.
This is some semblance of control in a world of chaos and judgement.
She keeps constant lists. “Things to Buy.” “Things to Watch.” And most importantly, “ People Who’ve Been On Wheel Of Fortune More Than Once .” (It happened twice, and she wrote the producers an angry email both times). It's funny but also there's that control again. My girl's categorising the world so it feels manageable.
She even structures her day through lists. Checking off breakfast, shows, errands. It’s less productivity and more survival, because patterns and rituals make her life easier to endure.
She’s contradictory in a way that feels human. Hyper-controlled, but only because things have spiralled before. Her entire existence is giving if I do this one small thing right, maybe nothing else collapses. Every habit feels like it’s built on top of a past failure she refuses to revisit. And that's too real for a book I thought was going to be mostly horror and violence on top of more horror.
Then there’s this line that just wrecked me: “She’d learned a long time ago that there was no such thing as eating “delicately” at her size, so she’d stopped trying.”
Okay. Cool. Great. Love that. Emotional devastation in one sentence. Stop performing gentleness for people who've already decided what you are.
Priscilla's also weirdly relatable in a way that should concern me. Because we’re maybe not 600lbs but we are all performing normalcy in public and going feral in private. When“she was alone, she went full beast-mode.” And who among us hasn’t? Who hasn’t said, “Go ahead and double-fist those Chicken Fries, babe” like it’s a coping mechanism? Who hasn’t watched reality TV and gone full judgemental Gordon Ramsey? “'Amateur… Idiot,' she mutters." Same, babe, same.
But then you get pulled back into the reality of her world.
Going outside's “ranked somewhere between dental surgery and public tarring and feathering.” She drives everywhere, not because she’s lazy, but because she doesn’t want to see herself. “Not reflected in every glass storefront, not captured in the sidelong glances of passing drivers.” And when she does go out? Cameras snapping. Giggles. "Did you see that?!"
She’s described as a “pro at occupying negative space,” which is just devastating? Hyper-visible and invisible at the same time. Seen, but never understood. And she handles it, sometimes with humour. Someone stares and she shrugs, “I’m a medical marvel.” Icon behaviour. But you can still feel it getting to her. The constant observation and reduction builds and grinds her down.
At home, things aren’t stable either.
Priscilla lives with her aunt Meredith, who she cares for. Checking bottle caps for "tracking devices", monitoring TV for “embedded code words,” inspecting bananas for “toxins,” chasing off imaginary men.
Everything in her life's either unstable or hostile. Or both.
And then there’s food.
The more people judge her, the more Priscilla eats. And who can blame her? Who doesn’t need something comforting after dealing with the worst of humanity? The smells of fast food “fill the space where humiliation had nested" which is such a painfully accurate way of describing coping.
So everything becomes a loop: she's seen, she's reduced, she copes, she's judged for coping, repeat.
The real horror is all the shit she has to put up with.
Ignore the blood and the gore and the escalation for a second, and the true horror's the pressure and repetition. The constant erosion of being seen as less than human.
The writing's so vivid and emotionally precise. It's sharp and pulls you in then just leaves you there like, okay, now feel all of this.
Which is why my reading experience devolved into:
Oh this is well written
Oh this is actually sad
Wait I care about her
Oh no
oh
OH NO
I came here for blood and guts why am I having feelings???
I wanted horror and disgust. I wanted stare at the wall and reconsider everything vibes. But I got an empathy spiral where I kept thinking, 'girl I so get it. I understand you. I'm you in a different font and I don’t like that.'
So the splatterpunk edge gets softened by how grounded everything is. The horror becomes less shock and more recognition. Which is arguably worse. It slowly mutates into a dark character study, and by the time you realise it, you’re already too emotionally involved to back out. But I'm so glad it didn't take the easy route.
Priscilla did nothing wrong!
Like, everything about it's set up for that. The title. The premise. It’s basically holding up a neon sign that says: LAUGH NOW. This is where the main character becomes the “walking cautionary tale.” The “visual punchline to every TikTok trend about obesity.”
It would be so, so easy.
But it doesn’t do that. Ever.
Instead, it insists, repeatedly and stubbornly, that Priscilla's not a joke. She's not something to be pointed at from a distance. She’s not there to be laughed at, even though the entire world around her keeps trying to make that happen.
She’s a person. A full, contradictory, controlled, quietly unraveling person who's very deliberately trying to hold herself together using routines and rituals, anything that might keep things from slipping.
The book never laughs at Priscilla. And neither do we.
Priscilla's very clear that she doesn’t live in a shithole. She corrects that immediately. But her apartment's still "a monument to survival at the lowest settings." Which tells you everything's held together with emotional duct tape and stubbornness. Everything's just barely holding because she's actively holding it there. She’s a clean freak, but not in a cute, quirky Pinterest organising way. More in a “we're absolutely not repeating what happened last time” way. She washes her dishes immediately after use, "like her therapist recommended, after the incident with the maggots last April."
And everything clicks.
This isn’t a preference, this is the aftermath.
This is some semblance of control in a world of chaos and judgement.
She keeps constant lists. “Things to Buy.” “Things to Watch.” And most importantly, “ People Who’ve Been On Wheel Of Fortune More Than Once .” (It happened twice, and she wrote the producers an angry email both times). It's funny but also there's that control again. My girl's categorising the world so it feels manageable.
She even structures her day through lists. Checking off breakfast, shows, errands. It’s less productivity and more survival, because patterns and rituals make her life easier to endure.
She’s contradictory in a way that feels human. Hyper-controlled, but only because things have spiralled before. Her entire existence is giving if I do this one small thing right, maybe nothing else collapses. Every habit feels like it’s built on top of a past failure she refuses to revisit. And that's too real for a book I thought was going to be mostly horror and violence on top of more horror.
Then there’s this line that just wrecked me: “She’d learned a long time ago that there was no such thing as eating “delicately” at her size, so she’d stopped trying.”
Okay. Cool. Great. Love that. Emotional devastation in one sentence. Stop performing gentleness for people who've already decided what you are.
Priscilla's also weirdly relatable in a way that should concern me. Because we’re maybe not 600lbs but we are all performing normalcy in public and going feral in private. When“she was alone, she went full beast-mode.” And who among us hasn’t? Who hasn’t said, “Go ahead and double-fist those Chicken Fries, babe” like it’s a coping mechanism? Who hasn’t watched reality TV and gone full judgemental Gordon Ramsey? “'Amateur… Idiot,' she mutters." Same, babe, same.
But then you get pulled back into the reality of her world.
Going outside's “ranked somewhere between dental surgery and public tarring and feathering.” She drives everywhere, not because she’s lazy, but because she doesn’t want to see herself. “Not reflected in every glass storefront, not captured in the sidelong glances of passing drivers.” And when she does go out? Cameras snapping. Giggles. "Did you see that?!"
She’s described as a “pro at occupying negative space,” which is just devastating? Hyper-visible and invisible at the same time. Seen, but never understood. And she handles it, sometimes with humour. Someone stares and she shrugs, “I’m a medical marvel.” Icon behaviour. But you can still feel it getting to her. The constant observation and reduction builds and grinds her down.
At home, things aren’t stable either.
Priscilla lives with her aunt Meredith, who she cares for. Checking bottle caps for "tracking devices", monitoring TV for “embedded code words,” inspecting bananas for “toxins,” chasing off imaginary men.
Everything in her life's either unstable or hostile. Or both.
And then there’s food.
The more people judge her, the more Priscilla eats. And who can blame her? Who doesn’t need something comforting after dealing with the worst of humanity? The smells of fast food “fill the space where humiliation had nested" which is such a painfully accurate way of describing coping.
So everything becomes a loop: she's seen, she's reduced, she copes, she's judged for coping, repeat.
The real horror is all the shit she has to put up with.
Ignore the blood and the gore and the escalation for a second, and the true horror's the pressure and repetition. The constant erosion of being seen as less than human.
The writing's so vivid and emotionally precise. It's sharp and pulls you in then just leaves you there like, okay, now feel all of this.
Which is why my reading experience devolved into:
Oh this is well written
Oh this is actually sad
Wait I care about her
Oh no
oh
OH NO
I came here for blood and guts why am I having feelings???
I wanted horror and disgust. I wanted stare at the wall and reconsider everything vibes. But I got an empathy spiral where I kept thinking, 'girl I so get it. I understand you. I'm you in a different font and I don’t like that.'
So the splatterpunk edge gets softened by how grounded everything is. The horror becomes less shock and more recognition. Which is arguably worse. It slowly mutates into a dark character study, and by the time you realise it, you’re already too emotionally involved to back out. But I'm so glad it didn't take the easy route.
Priscilla did nothing wrong!
January 31, 2026
3.5 stars. I liked Priscilla and I very much liked the premise, however, this was not splatterpunk. Yes, there were a few sorta messy instances, but nothing that I would classify under that particular subgenre of horror. And it really took until the ending sequence for all that to come into play, too. A lot of build up and sinister foreshadowing, but it dragged at times, leading to the abrupt conclusion. This needed to take a stance and not waver so much with its focus. Was it Priscilla being an uncontrolled, obese monster? Or someone jaded and out for revenge? Or just someone who just liked eating people? It tried to tackle too many plot points without really fulfilling any of them. I think a more narrow focus and better pacing would have done wonders here. Still a good outing, but it just needed a lot of tweaking to be something more.
December 31, 2025
This book made me want to gag and/or vomit but also hug the FMC. Priscilla is the FMC, and at first, I wasn't a fan. As the book progressed, I began to root for Priscilla and love her character!
Moral of the story: don't bully people - you may end up BEING dinner. :)
This is splatterpunk. Read at your own risk.
Moral of the story: don't bully people - you may end up BEING dinner. :)
This is splatterpunk. Read at your own risk.
April 26, 2026
Pretty sad. Pretty gross. Why do I read gore?
October 13, 2025
I was somewhat shocked at how much I enjoyed this read. I’m no newbie when it comes to the genre, but this writing style was so refreshing. It checks all the boxes for what a good splatterpunk read should have (in my opinion), but what shocked me was how fast I grew to love Priscilla! If you have ever been bullied for your weight, then the little nuances that our main character goes through in the first half hits a little too close to home. You go from wanting to hug her, to gagging LOL! This was a great little quick read for me, and the first read from the author. I’m running to find more of his books now! Well done 👏🏻👏🏻
January 17, 2026
One of the best books I have read. Seriously. I thought the writing style was very descriptive. I visualized every word I read. My mind typically wanders when I’m reading something. Not with this book. I couldn’t put it down. It was a real page turner. Excellent writing. Excellent read. There should be a sequel!
April 2, 2026
I’m going to be generous and give it 3 stars because i did enjoy the premise of the book.
There’s only 6 chapters and I read it in one sitting.
I didn’t find it slow, but nothing really happened to warrant a big reaction from me.
Minus the obvious m*rder and gore, this kind of healed the fat girl in me. Because no fat girl wants to hear everyone else’s opinion on what they should or shouldn’t be doing with their life.
With that being said, I feel like there wasn’t a strong plot for the short read. The ending was abrupt, and I feel like we didn’t get anything more. Dare I say it needed to either be longer, or have a more dramatic ending.
I also wouldn’t say it’s splatter punk, the book barely began. It was good, we just needed more for it to have the effect of “ew gross!”
I wanted to see the intimate gore of Priscilla and all her deviously fat gorey ways. The revenge should’ve been a motivator and not the entire plot.
There’s only 6 chapters and I read it in one sitting.
I didn’t find it slow, but nothing really happened to warrant a big reaction from me.
Minus the obvious m*rder and gore, this kind of healed the fat girl in me. Because no fat girl wants to hear everyone else’s opinion on what they should or shouldn’t be doing with their life.
With that being said, I feel like there wasn’t a strong plot for the short read. The ending was abrupt, and I feel like we didn’t get anything more. Dare I say it needed to either be longer, or have a more dramatic ending.
I also wouldn’t say it’s splatter punk, the book barely began. It was good, we just needed more for it to have the effect of “ew gross!”
I wanted to see the intimate gore of Priscilla and all her deviously fat gorey ways. The revenge should’ve been a motivator and not the entire plot.
January 17, 2026
Fatso is a brutal, fearless splatterpunk novella that blends extreme horror with sharp social commentary. John Monsees delivers an unflinching exploration of invisibility, cruelty, and rage, transforming everyday humiliation into a horrifying revenge narrative that is as disturbing as it is thought-provoking. The violence is graphic and relentless, but it serves a deeper purpose forcing readers to confront the consequences of dehumanization. Dark, shocking, and unapologetically intense, Fatso is a standout read for fans of boundary-pushing horror.
October 13, 2025
Such a dark disturbing read if you think about it. Prissy has a weight issue except that’s she’s not so invisible. People make comments and take pics while she’s put in public. She lives to take care of her aunt who has paranoid visions. What happens when you push an overweight lady too far? Cannibalism that’s what
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 14, 2025
This book was good. It wasn't great and tbh wasn't splatterpunk? I kept expecting more and more from this book. It had a good story and Priscilla was relatable af. At some point, you stop caring and say f*ck it all. But I kept expecting more to happen. Thank you, John, for the early release copy I'm definitely recommending it to people(:
October 15, 2025
This book makes you want to keep reading. The action level isn't high, but there is plenty of gruesomeness and what it lacks in action it makes up in character building and story telling. Well worth a read!
October 14, 2025
great read, gory and gruesome, Priscilla is looking to fill her never ending hunger and she doesn't find it in the bottom of a bag of Doritos.
October 16, 2025
Enjoyed this short read, the storyline kept me wanting to read it!
October 26, 2025
Book started off slow me but then it was a nice background of Priscilla! Once the book got going it was more enjoyable for me!
But overall quite enjoyed!
But overall quite enjoyed!
October 28, 2025
Much better than I thought it was going to be. Poor Prissy, I didn't expect that ending. The start is very slow though I nearly dnf but persevere it does get better
December 27, 2025
It was a good little horror but that was it Iv read splatterpunk horrors before and this absolutely isn’t one of them, sick and twisted yes but nothing more. Definitely need to stop trusting tiktok
January 5, 2026
Quick read. Nice and gory. Yuck!
February 16, 2026
Excellent
Very splatterppunk made me think of the first book I ever read in this genre called The Slob by Aron Beauregard gripping until the end finished jn 2 sittings
Very splatterppunk made me think of the first book I ever read in this genre called The Slob by Aron Beauregard gripping until the end finished jn 2 sittings
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews