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Haunter
From the crumbling ruins of a Cambodian jungle temple to the arid canyons of west Texas, exotic demons of the ancient past collide with more modern devils. Crippled residents in a small Cambodian village are trying to rebuild their lives in a shattered country. Just as it seems they cannot go on their god returns to them, providing hope and a dream of survival.
But their god has returned in the body of a former American GI, and their hope for peace comes in a drug that opens the door to untold horrors. Their beautiful nirvana waits only at the end of a road traveled by nightmares. It is a world peopled by the bizarre and the unearthly, in which damnation- and redemption-can come in the most terrifying forms.
But their god has returned in the body of a former American GI, and their hope for peace comes in a drug that opens the door to untold horrors. Their beautiful nirvana waits only at the end of a road traveled by nightmares. It is a world peopled by the bizarre and the unearthly, in which damnation- and redemption-can come in the most terrifying forms.
- GenresHorrorFictionLiterature
384 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 2003
3 people are currently reading
501 people want to read
About the author
Charlee Jacob
66 books79 followersCharlee Jacob has been a digger for dinosaur bones, a seller of designer rags, and a cook - to mention only a few things. With more than 950 publishing credits, Charlee has been writing dark poetry and prose for more than 25 years. Some of her recent publishing events include the novel STILL (Necro), the poetry collection HERESY (Necro), and the novel DARK MOODS. She is a three-time Bram Stoker Award winner, two of those awards for her novel DREAD IN THE BEAST and the poetry collection SINEATER; the third award for collaborative poetry collection, VECTORS, with Marge Simon. Permanently disabled, she has begun to paint as one of her forms of phsycial therapy. She lives in Irving, Texas with her husband Jim and a plethora of felines.
Courtesy: http://www.williamcookwriter.com
Courtesy: http://www.williamcookwriter.com
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
November 17, 2025
“Apart from a sudden rush, not unlike the most intense from a really large dose of LSD.”
It’s hard for me to sum this book up, it read very different than any horror novel I have experienced. More like poetry from a drug fueled nightmare where everything smells like blood and shit.
It’s hard for me to sum this book up, it read very different than any horror novel I have experienced. More like poetry from a drug fueled nightmare where everything smells like blood and shit.
August 11, 2023
4.5/5, rounded down.
I think the only thing that kept me from giving this a full 5/5 is that it took me awhile to attach myself to any of the characters. In fairness, this is largely due to Jacob's purposeful structuring, which is both a strength and a flaw - in my eyes at least. That said, this is a wildly original piece of extreme horror, and contains some of the most exquisite prose, used to describe such horrific debasement and debauchery. It's startlingly brutal and demented, and yet not without hope in the face of all encompassing depravity and gore. Brilliant stuff, undoubtedly.
I think the only thing that kept me from giving this a full 5/5 is that it took me awhile to attach myself to any of the characters. In fairness, this is largely due to Jacob's purposeful structuring, which is both a strength and a flaw - in my eyes at least. That said, this is a wildly original piece of extreme horror, and contains some of the most exquisite prose, used to describe such horrific debasement and debauchery. It's startlingly brutal and demented, and yet not without hope in the face of all encompassing depravity and gore. Brilliant stuff, undoubtedly.
June 29, 2023
During a time in the horror fandom when extreme horror is being met with derision, Charlee Jacob answers with a beautiful relentlessness that proves blood and gore on the page CAN be enough—if you’re a good writer!
January 21, 2008
Charlee Jacob, Haunter (Leisure, 2003)
For years I have been searching for the book that would compete with Robert Devereaux's debut novel, Deadweight, out on the bleeding edge of Most Extreme Horror Novel. No one has been willing to tread the same path of degradation, misery, and despair. What anguish must it cause a writer (because, as we all know, to convey emotions effectively the writer must feel them twice as strongly) to write a novel of such unremitting, relentless brutality?
Well, I finally found it. Charlee Jacob has written such a viscerally disturbing book in Haunter that even I had to put it down a few times simply because what was going on was so disgusting. And that, folks, takes some nasty material to achieve.
Haunter is a sequel of sorts to Jacob's first novel, This Symbiotic Fascination. Where that novel dealt with the depredations of baby brother Arcan Tyler, in Haunter Jacob focuses on the two big brothers, Vietnam vets Harry and Elliot Tyler. Elliot, after the war, joined a ragtag band of mercenaries led by the brutally perverse Saab Gestetner; Harry, after a quick trip home (related in This Symbiotic Fascination), simply vanished into the jungle, never to be seen again. Or so everyone thinks.
There's a new drug on the Cambodian streets called Soma. One dose will do you. After you take it, you spend a while in screaming hysterics, seeing the very bowels of hell. But after that, you become a being of radiant happiness, one whose contentment literally shines. And you stay that way for the rest of your natural life. The only problem is, it's really annoying the rest of Cambodia's drug lords. So, armed with only a supplier's name, the biggest of them hires Gestetner and his mercs to find the source of the Soma and either appropriate it or stamp it out. They find, however, a lot more than just a drug operation...
A plot (however thin) and really nasty-sounding events are not, however, enough to make a book a good novel. What really causes Haunter to rise above the masses is Jacob's use of the Cambodian landscape and the Hindu mythology in which it is steeped to address (and inventively answer) all those existential questions literature is "supposed" to address. You know, why are we here, what are we doing, etc. Between that and Jacob's willingness to spend time building her characters (in order, mostly, just to make you feel that little bit worse when the inevitable other shoe drops), this book comes out a winner. Better than This Symbiotic Fascination, but if you want to get more of a grip on Harry Tyler, you'll want to read that one first anyway. ****
For years I have been searching for the book that would compete with Robert Devereaux's debut novel, Deadweight, out on the bleeding edge of Most Extreme Horror Novel. No one has been willing to tread the same path of degradation, misery, and despair. What anguish must it cause a writer (because, as we all know, to convey emotions effectively the writer must feel them twice as strongly) to write a novel of such unremitting, relentless brutality?
Well, I finally found it. Charlee Jacob has written such a viscerally disturbing book in Haunter that even I had to put it down a few times simply because what was going on was so disgusting. And that, folks, takes some nasty material to achieve.
Haunter is a sequel of sorts to Jacob's first novel, This Symbiotic Fascination. Where that novel dealt with the depredations of baby brother Arcan Tyler, in Haunter Jacob focuses on the two big brothers, Vietnam vets Harry and Elliot Tyler. Elliot, after the war, joined a ragtag band of mercenaries led by the brutally perverse Saab Gestetner; Harry, after a quick trip home (related in This Symbiotic Fascination), simply vanished into the jungle, never to be seen again. Or so everyone thinks.
There's a new drug on the Cambodian streets called Soma. One dose will do you. After you take it, you spend a while in screaming hysterics, seeing the very bowels of hell. But after that, you become a being of radiant happiness, one whose contentment literally shines. And you stay that way for the rest of your natural life. The only problem is, it's really annoying the rest of Cambodia's drug lords. So, armed with only a supplier's name, the biggest of them hires Gestetner and his mercs to find the source of the Soma and either appropriate it or stamp it out. They find, however, a lot more than just a drug operation...
A plot (however thin) and really nasty-sounding events are not, however, enough to make a book a good novel. What really causes Haunter to rise above the masses is Jacob's use of the Cambodian landscape and the Hindu mythology in which it is steeped to address (and inventively answer) all those existential questions literature is "supposed" to address. You know, why are we here, what are we doing, etc. Between that and Jacob's willingness to spend time building her characters (in order, mostly, just to make you feel that little bit worse when the inevitable other shoe drops), this book comes out a winner. Better than This Symbiotic Fascination, but if you want to get more of a grip on Harry Tyler, you'll want to read that one first anyway. ****
April 25, 2023
A team of mercenaries are hired to kill a god, living in the Cambodian jungle. The god, Shiva, is connected to one of the soldiers, as it inhabits the body of his long-lost-and sexually depraved-brother. What follows is a surreal and cerebral festival of gore, perversion, and Nirvana!
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Charlee Jacob's Haunter is a cerebral collision between William S. Burroughs style lyricism and Clive Barker's beautiful-grotesque. It's Hellraiser and Naked Lunch, fist-fucking each other in the middle of Cambodia. It's literary horror, yes... but it is also the foulest shit you will ever read. And I'm not overhyping it. Even MY books aren't half as disturbing, as disgusting, or as relentlessly depraved as Haunter. I mean that.
.
.
If you are sensitive to child abuse, bestiality, intense torture, necrophilia, and AN ARMY OF FLAYED SKIN SUITS COMING TO LIFE AND RAPING SOLDIERS TO DEATH... then maybe Haunter isn't the book for you. But for fans of the extreme and hardcore... this is it. This book will test your nerves, stomach, and heart in many gruesome ways.
.
.
Fairly early in a book, a man is tortured. He has maggot eggs injected into several surgical slits, and he's left to "ferment" for days before he's questioned again. The result is something so squirmy it would even put Fulci off his lunch. And that scene is relatively tame compared to everything that comes after it.
.
.
But unlike the events playing out in the book's narrative... the prose is GORGEOUS. Charlee Jacob was an accomplished poet, and you can tell just by reading Haunter. Each word is a delicately chosen treat, and she spins her yarn in an anxious, tumbling manner that propels the reader from one Hell to another. This book is not written in a cinematic tone... it's more like a stream of cosmic consciousness, which deliberately takes itself down a least expected path.
.
.
Haunter is one of my absolute favorite books, and it is THE book that defines extreme horror for me. You won't be the same after you finish reading it, and if you go through it unfazed... then maybe you weren't paying close enough attention.
.
.
Charlee Jacob's Haunter is a cerebral collision between William S. Burroughs style lyricism and Clive Barker's beautiful-grotesque. It's Hellraiser and Naked Lunch, fist-fucking each other in the middle of Cambodia. It's literary horror, yes... but it is also the foulest shit you will ever read. And I'm not overhyping it. Even MY books aren't half as disturbing, as disgusting, or as relentlessly depraved as Haunter. I mean that.
.
.
If you are sensitive to child abuse, bestiality, intense torture, necrophilia, and AN ARMY OF FLAYED SKIN SUITS COMING TO LIFE AND RAPING SOLDIERS TO DEATH... then maybe Haunter isn't the book for you. But for fans of the extreme and hardcore... this is it. This book will test your nerves, stomach, and heart in many gruesome ways.
.
.
Fairly early in a book, a man is tortured. He has maggot eggs injected into several surgical slits, and he's left to "ferment" for days before he's questioned again. The result is something so squirmy it would even put Fulci off his lunch. And that scene is relatively tame compared to everything that comes after it.
.
.
But unlike the events playing out in the book's narrative... the prose is GORGEOUS. Charlee Jacob was an accomplished poet, and you can tell just by reading Haunter. Each word is a delicately chosen treat, and she spins her yarn in an anxious, tumbling manner that propels the reader from one Hell to another. This book is not written in a cinematic tone... it's more like a stream of cosmic consciousness, which deliberately takes itself down a least expected path.
.
.
Haunter is one of my absolute favorite books, and it is THE book that defines extreme horror for me. You won't be the same after you finish reading it, and if you go through it unfazed... then maybe you weren't paying close enough attention.
April 9, 2025
Haunter is a beautifully written, transgressive story and an excellent example of the splatterpunk genre. Charlie Jacob weaves a bloody tale with themes of life and death, karma, gender, family trauma and war. Most of the story takes place in cities and countryside of south east Asia. Highly recommend for fans of horror, both extreme and splatterpunk.
July 15, 2023
Another relentless assault on the senses from ‘Queen of Hardcore Horror’ Charlee Jacob. The perfect combination of beautiful writing and grotesque content. This is a trippy and very messed up story but absolutely mesmerising.
Haunter makes an excellent companion piece to This Symbiotic Fascination. You don’t have to have read that one first but I did really enjoy reading another book from that particular world and following the stories of characters mentioned in TSF.
Haunter makes an excellent companion piece to This Symbiotic Fascination. You don’t have to have read that one first but I did really enjoy reading another book from that particular world and following the stories of characters mentioned in TSF.
February 19, 2010
Wow...what can I say about this book? I can basically begin with saying that just about every single one of my most horrifying, gruesome nightmares were discussed in this book in excruciating but fascinating detail. This book was so gruesome and vile, that even I found myself skipping certain parts. However, Charlee Jacob pulls off all the nightmarish grue and gore very well with her exquisite, poetic prose, sometimes so enthralling that no matter how gory or horrific a scene was, you couldn't stop reading it. One of the most horrific scenes, I can warn you, is the scene involving an electric wood saw, and a group of psychotic Aztec wannabees. On the downside, this book was quite hard to understand and follow at some points. It went on and on like a series of broken vignettes, but fortunately Jacob managed to expertly tie them all together at the end. Overall, this was one of the most frightening, original, and one of the goriest, most disturbing novels I've ever read, if not THE most disturbing. Bravo to Charlee Jacob for such a good show! I look forward to reading This Symbiotic Fascination!
Word of Warning: This book is NOT for the faint of heart. Even the strongest of stomachs, such as mine, will become sour from the grotesque imagery that Jacob throws in your face. And the horror doesn't just go up and down in succession from better to worse, it gets worse, and worse, and WORSE, and just when you think it can't get anymore horrible, IT DOES. However, the interesting and captivating story(ies) in this book make the ghastly journey well worth it. So, if you think you can handle all the splatter, definitely give this novel a go!
Word of Warning: This book is NOT for the faint of heart. Even the strongest of stomachs, such as mine, will become sour from the grotesque imagery that Jacob throws in your face. And the horror doesn't just go up and down in succession from better to worse, it gets worse, and worse, and WORSE, and just when you think it can't get anymore horrible, IT DOES. However, the interesting and captivating story(ies) in this book make the ghastly journey well worth it. So, if you think you can handle all the splatter, definitely give this novel a go!
November 17, 2023
Full Review
4.5 Stars
If there’s any book that deserves to come back into print, it’s this one. It pushes the extremes of an already extreme genre, but it also displays some of the best writing I’ve seen in modern horror. Jacob’s horrific images are vivid and beautifully rendered. She takes a real, deep interest in the lives of people who’ve lived among the worst violence on Earth, which elevates it far beyond a simple work of shock art.
4.5 Stars
If there’s any book that deserves to come back into print, it’s this one. It pushes the extremes of an already extreme genre, but it also displays some of the best writing I’ve seen in modern horror. Jacob’s horrific images are vivid and beautifully rendered. She takes a real, deep interest in the lives of people who’ve lived among the worst violence on Earth, which elevates it far beyond a simple work of shock art.
July 19, 2023
This book is all kinds of messed up, drugged up, hallucinogenic fuckery. I think I can actually smell some of the scenes. It is both beautifully poetic and brutally horrific. Unlike anything I've read before. Incredible!
Read
December 23, 2024DNF at page 260 of 374.
I really enjoyed the beginning and the brutality of it, but it was also very confusing to me. It's literary prose and poetic descriptions were just not for me at the moment. I was struggling to pick it up, and when I did, I had forgotten parts.
Will give it another try in a few years.
I really enjoyed the beginning and the brutality of it, but it was also very confusing to me. It's literary prose and poetic descriptions were just not for me at the moment. I was struggling to pick it up, and when I did, I had forgotten parts.
Will give it another try in a few years.
April 21, 2009
The "extreme horror" tag gets stapled to pretty much any horror fiction with a high gore quotient. Most of the time, it's just a sign that the book you're reading is going to feature body parts being disassembled and messed with in ways far more creative, and lovingly detailed, than in your typical John Saul book. Which is why most extreme horror is extremely dull -- after the fourth or fifth book featuring some psychopath treating human beings the way most of us might treat a delicious locally-sourced, cage-free organic roast chicken, the shock value tends to fade, and there's not much else going on. It's not so much horror as a bucket of raw chicken guts being gleefully shoved into your face. There's no dread, no penetrating insight into the depths of the human soul. Just several hundred pages of "whoaaa, dude, check this sick shit out!"
That's why Charlee Jacob's Haunter gets the four-star treatment from this reviewer. It's what extreme horror should be. Yeah, it's got the requisite rivers of blood and all kinds of lovingly detailed death and bodily desecration, but Jacob doesn't just want to gross you out. She wants to pull you into the nightmarish hellscape smoldering between her ears. Jacob creates a world that exists beneath the skin of our everyday reality. She goes into those dark places that we know exist somewhere in the world, but prefer not to think too much about, or when we do think about them, we cloak the truth in half-suggestions and decorous euphemisms. Child sex slavery. Wartime atrocities. Sexual sadism. Genocide.
This is brutal stuff, no question. Not an easy read. Jacob plumbs the depths of human anguish and misery. She puts her characters, literally, through hell.
None of it is presented in a moralistic or judgmental way. I don't think Jacob is interested in making us feel any particular way about her subject matter, other than sympathizing with the victims of violence. But her eye and voice are undeniably human -- and humane. Her narrative touch is cold and hard, but not without soul or feeling. Which is critical, because otherwise the horrors she plunges the reader into would be unbearable rather than merely horrific.
Haunter isn't an especially cerebral or literary book -- the writing is a little too clunky and ornate -- but it's extremely serious, and more than a little smart. It's one of the few books in this subgenre that don't make me feel embarrassed to be reading it.
(Note: Haunter is a sort-of sequel to This Symbiotic Fascination , another worthy read. It's not a true sequel -- the story stands perfectly well by itself -- but does continue the stories of a couple of characters from the earlier book.)
That's why Charlee Jacob's Haunter gets the four-star treatment from this reviewer. It's what extreme horror should be. Yeah, it's got the requisite rivers of blood and all kinds of lovingly detailed death and bodily desecration, but Jacob doesn't just want to gross you out. She wants to pull you into the nightmarish hellscape smoldering between her ears. Jacob creates a world that exists beneath the skin of our everyday reality. She goes into those dark places that we know exist somewhere in the world, but prefer not to think too much about, or when we do think about them, we cloak the truth in half-suggestions and decorous euphemisms. Child sex slavery. Wartime atrocities. Sexual sadism. Genocide.
This is brutal stuff, no question. Not an easy read. Jacob plumbs the depths of human anguish and misery. She puts her characters, literally, through hell.
None of it is presented in a moralistic or judgmental way. I don't think Jacob is interested in making us feel any particular way about her subject matter, other than sympathizing with the victims of violence. But her eye and voice are undeniably human -- and humane. Her narrative touch is cold and hard, but not without soul or feeling. Which is critical, because otherwise the horrors she plunges the reader into would be unbearable rather than merely horrific.
Haunter isn't an especially cerebral or literary book -- the writing is a little too clunky and ornate -- but it's extremely serious, and more than a little smart. It's one of the few books in this subgenre that don't make me feel embarrassed to be reading it.
(Note: Haunter is a sort-of sequel to This Symbiotic Fascination , another worthy read. It's not a true sequel -- the story stands perfectly well by itself -- but does continue the stories of a couple of characters from the earlier book.)
July 31, 2023
Just finished this. I am envious of all who had the privilege of knowing Charlee Jacob while she was still alive … to interact with such a mind is to interact with the fountain of grotesque creativity itself. this is a masterpiece & i will treasure this book forever (and probably re-read it several more times). I’ve never read a book like this before, and I know I probably never will again. Her mind truly was one of a kind. 🫶
September 13, 2024
i hate this stupid book
August 19, 2019
Really intense read presented by Jacob. The first I've ever read of hers, defiantly not the last. Saddened to hear she passed away this year. I didn't realize it was loosely a sequel to This Symbiotic Fascination though after researching, it seems it's still a stand alone.
This book was challenging to keep straight at first. She often trails off into heavy esoteric rants, plus on top of that all the different characters memories, illusions, and hallucinations that happen within the plot. Extreme in every way and mind opening at the same time "Failure is an illusion. All the emotions we struggle with - the things we seek and what we run away from - an illusion. And that is Maya, which is what binds us to the painful wheel of birth." I really enjoyed the challenge of this book and I found the use of Hindu gods in a 'horror' setting to be such a great idea. Very unique read if you can push yourself through it!
This book was challenging to keep straight at first. She often trails off into heavy esoteric rants, plus on top of that all the different characters memories, illusions, and hallucinations that happen within the plot. Extreme in every way and mind opening at the same time "Failure is an illusion. All the emotions we struggle with - the things we seek and what we run away from - an illusion. And that is Maya, which is what binds us to the painful wheel of birth." I really enjoyed the challenge of this book and I found the use of Hindu gods in a 'horror' setting to be such a great idea. Very unique read if you can push yourself through it!
May 25, 2007
Charlee Jacob's books have interesting themes told in extremely grotesque ways. This one involves Khmer Rouge atrocities, war, duality, Hindu gods, and some crazy violence. I have a pretty strong stomach for gore and the twisted, and this was almost too much. There's one scene involving maggots that I almost couldn't read. That said, she adds a new vision to the genre - very inventive horror.
January 25, 2012
I give very few one-stars, and to be honest, I'm only giving this because I just didn't enjoy reading the book. I understand what the author was trying to do, but the constant barrage of esoteric pseudo-vedic babble made it unenjoyable to follow the plot. Every time the plot would crescendo, it fizzled because the events led not to conclusive events, but rather into a psychotic sort melange of Hindu-Tantra babble.
I don't generally write bad reviews, because I am afraid the author might see them, but I must qualify a one-star. I greatly respect her style and originality. There are precious few new ideas out there in horror, and this one of them. In short, It's me, not you, Haunter - I think I just don't like the Eastern thought Samsara-to-Nirvana rambling. Perhaps it is my dharma. The author does deftly set the desired mood, and I intend to give her another chance!
I don't generally write bad reviews, because I am afraid the author might see them, but I must qualify a one-star. I greatly respect her style and originality. There are precious few new ideas out there in horror, and this one of them. In short, It's me, not you, Haunter - I think I just don't like the Eastern thought Samsara-to-Nirvana rambling. Perhaps it is my dharma. The author does deftly set the desired mood, and I intend to give her another chance!
May 1, 2008
Every bit as depraved, dark, and inspired as Charlee Jacob's This Symbiotic Fascination. While I picked up this novel's predecessor simply because the title appealed to me, I actively sought out this novel to complete the pair, if not the story in its entire. Oddly enough, for a reader who hates having random quotes from poetry thrown in at the beginning of each chapter, I was actually very pleased and/or moved or influenced by the "otherworldly" quotations the authoress chose to include at the start of each chapter in this novel.
Any review of the novel's content I will leave to other readers. Suffice to say that I was repulsed, pleased, and grinning and gritting my teeth at the same time throughout this horrific excursion.
Any review of the novel's content I will leave to other readers. Suffice to say that I was repulsed, pleased, and grinning and gritting my teeth at the same time throughout this horrific excursion.
July 25, 2022
Charlee Jacob had some of the best most extreme prose I've read. Haunter (Soma) is a sequel of sorts to her first novel. I liked this book way more. This is a very trippy story with just about every trigger out there. Just when you think Haunter has hit it's peak with shock it gets far more extreme. I really enjoyed the ending.
July 23, 2008
This is one of the goriest books I've ever read. And that's saying something.
May 25, 2023
Im still reeling from finishing this book. My immediate thought about closing this book five minutes ago was that I wish I could go back to three days ago and read it again for the first time. There is nothing like reading a book for the first time. I will forever be chasing the high this book gave me when I return to read it again in the future. This novel has quickly became one of my all time favorite books. It is so beautifully written and so horrid at the same time. If horror could ever be beautiful this book shows that perfectly.
Read
January 12, 2024Reading some of the reviews and tbh I can barely remember half of the gorey scenes because I was so confused what was happening the whole book I couldn't even comprehend that there was something gross going on
March 9, 2024
People kept telling me to read this, like, 'It's the most disturbing thing you'll ever read!' And I even had to buy it secondhand because it's out of print. I thought I was buying this secret tome of nastiness that I would cherish forever.
No, it was actually pretty boring, and kinda racist.
No, it was actually pretty boring, and kinda racist.
November 27, 2023
The quality of writing here will ruin all other extreme horror for me.
June 10, 2025
in world always filled
with hideous violence
atonement painful
with hideous violence
atonement painful
December 31, 2016
4-4.5.
I read Charlee Jacob's first novel, "This Symbiotic Fascination" about two years ago and I loved it. This semi-sequel (perhaps it could be termed a sidequel?) mines much of the same territory as that incredible book, only this one goes to places even more dark and depraved than before, ripping apart the human body in so many different ways, physically, spiritually, emotionally. Admittedly, the story kind of got away from me at times; it's a jumbled epic of Shiva reincarnated, of a mysterious drug that bestows nirvana, of the demented sexual appetites of various men and women, of the horrors of the Vietnam War, and of the depravities of Pol Pot. It's messy and hard to follow, but it's never boring. Line by line, Jacob is one of the strongest horror stylists out there, evoking fear, disgust, beauty and spiritual/cosmic ecstasy, sometimes within the same sentence. Her cacophony of corrugated flesh, of divine redemption through terror, of the appetites that we all keep hidden from the outside world, was immaculate. Not to mention that the violence is a step up from the previous novel. I'm not one to be disgusted easily, but some of the things that are done to the human body in this book are so well-written, so vividly described and felt, that my stomach rolled and shivers went up my spine. So even though I can't say I fully understood everything, Jacob's chaotic symbiosis of sex, violence and spirituality was something that I couldn't get enough of. Recommended.
I read Charlee Jacob's first novel, "This Symbiotic Fascination" about two years ago and I loved it. This semi-sequel (perhaps it could be termed a sidequel?) mines much of the same territory as that incredible book, only this one goes to places even more dark and depraved than before, ripping apart the human body in so many different ways, physically, spiritually, emotionally. Admittedly, the story kind of got away from me at times; it's a jumbled epic of Shiva reincarnated, of a mysterious drug that bestows nirvana, of the demented sexual appetites of various men and women, of the horrors of the Vietnam War, and of the depravities of Pol Pot. It's messy and hard to follow, but it's never boring. Line by line, Jacob is one of the strongest horror stylists out there, evoking fear, disgust, beauty and spiritual/cosmic ecstasy, sometimes within the same sentence. Her cacophony of corrugated flesh, of divine redemption through terror, of the appetites that we all keep hidden from the outside world, was immaculate. Not to mention that the violence is a step up from the previous novel. I'm not one to be disgusted easily, but some of the things that are done to the human body in this book are so well-written, so vividly described and felt, that my stomach rolled and shivers went up my spine. So even though I can't say I fully understood everything, Jacob's chaotic symbiosis of sex, violence and spirituality was something that I couldn't get enough of. Recommended.
July 12, 2013
The Tyler family is a pretty strange one. We learned about Arcan in Jacob's previous book, THIS SYMBIOTIC FASCINATION, and now it's time to learn more about Harry and El. HAUNTER is a trippy journey into a post-Vietnam Cambodia jungle. Jacob is really good at describing grotesque things in new and interesting ways. You will cringe a lot if you read this book. Harry's birth is particularly vicious, and the hermaphrodite rape is rather unsettling. The problem is, there is a lot of padding, and the structure is a mess. On the other hand, she does something that ordinarily I find a cheap shot, but she does it well. I'm not a big fan of hurting kids in fiction, not for any moral reason, but because it's so lazy it's almost a cheat. Who isn't going to respond negatively to a 10-year-old girl getting raped? However, this happens in HAUNTER, but the way Jacob does it is very unusual, and it actually works.
By the way, you will never forget Harry Tyler. There isn't a fictional character like him in all of horror.
By the way, you will never forget Harry Tyler. There isn't a fictional character like him in all of horror.
November 28, 2010
Possibly one of the goriest books I have ever read.
Entertaining, imaginitive and moving at a fast pace I can only highly recommend it for readers who like a good horror story. The violence can lose its impact after a time, but there's more to the book than that. The prose is lyrical and you get pulled into the twisted world of Haunter from the get go.
Charlee Jacob succesfully blends nightmarish and creative scenes into a novel of extreme hardcore horror. The vision of 'hell' in this book is really one of the best I have ever read. Add to that the disgusting evolution of a guy into a Hindu god, a really sadistic gangster, a band of soldiers constantly delving into genocide...and you will find one disturbing book.
My pick ? Modern classic of hardcore horror.
Entertaining, imaginitive and moving at a fast pace I can only highly recommend it for readers who like a good horror story. The violence can lose its impact after a time, but there's more to the book than that. The prose is lyrical and you get pulled into the twisted world of Haunter from the get go.
Charlee Jacob succesfully blends nightmarish and creative scenes into a novel of extreme hardcore horror. The vision of 'hell' in this book is really one of the best I have ever read. Add to that the disgusting evolution of a guy into a Hindu god, a really sadistic gangster, a band of soldiers constantly delving into genocide...and you will find one disturbing book.
My pick ? Modern classic of hardcore horror.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 9, 2012
I bought this strange book at a Dollar General and brought it with me to read during my visit to Austin, Texas in December 2005. It held my interest and then, for whatever reason, I stopped reading it.
Fast-forward to 2012, where I requested the book through Interlibrary Loan, and still managed to put off reading it, finding myself in a rush to finish it!
In summary, this book was OK, but I had to force myself to finish reading it. I don't think I'll be reading any more of this author's books, although they are quite talented.
Fast-forward to 2012, where I requested the book through Interlibrary Loan, and still managed to put off reading it, finding myself in a rush to finish it!
In summary, this book was OK, but I had to force myself to finish reading it. I don't think I'll be reading any more of this author's books, although they are quite talented.
June 3, 2010
Well I found it abandoned on the bus so I grabbed it and brought it home....didn't know books like this existed (well I always thought they probably did, but didn't think I'd ever come across one so easily.) It's terribly gruesome! So if you're into that kind of thing then this is a great read!
Caution: not for the faint-hearted, easily offended, or folks who get the jitters at the thought of blood.
Caution: not for the faint-hearted, easily offended, or folks who get the jitters at the thought of blood.
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