Heqet

by Brendan Connell

In the terrifying confession that makes up Heqet, the new and hypnotic novel by Brendan Connell, an author whose name has become synonymous with contemporary Decadent literature, the reader is treated to pages of anguish and extravagance as they follow the delirium-strewn path of the protagonist Félix, a fatal and failed anti-hero like few others. Poisoning himself with designer drugs and alchemical wishes, he traverses Swiss and other European territories, tracing out tessellations of evil in his deliberations and visions.

Also included in this book is a selection of a dozen short, spectacular vignettes and tales under the heading “Ghosts”, nine of which have never before appeared elsewhere.

The table of contents is as follows:

HEQET
GHOSTS
Queen of the Iceni
Moonlight Hidden Behind Clouds
A Duologue
The Abbey of the Heart
Transmission to a Pelican
The Sweet Princess Prized
The Horse Shrine
Record from a Magnetic Line
The Organist
Another Duologue
Vision Seldom Penetrates Substance
Monologue of a Maniac

The book is a lithographically printed, 160 page hardback with printed endpapers; limited to just 275 copies.

160 pages, Hardcover

First published March 19, 2022

Reviews

[Forrest · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've discovered over the last few years that my favorite forms to read and to write are the novella and the prose poem. Here, Brendan Connell hits some crisp notes on these two scales. Or, rather, he hits some dirges tinged with sparkling beauty, like the silver edges of a black, malicious storm. I couldn't be more pleased. Now, I should note that I co-authored a story with Brendan many years ago, so I am not without bias. But I didn't write a story with him because I wasn't already a fan of his writing. On the contrary . . . I've had a glimpse of his creativity in media res, as it were, and I was, and remain impressed. In the intervening years, I've seen Brendan's fiction published in the same boutique small presses I love to read (and am sometimes lucky enough to be published in). I'm never far from his fiction, and there are strong reasons for that.

The title novella, Heqet, is a plunge into decadence - not the wealthy, indulgent decadence of Huysmans, et al., but a journey beneath the scabs of degeneracy and self-loathing. There is really nothing to love about the main character, who speaks like a more eloquent and even more socially-depraved shadow of Beckett's low-lifes. It's a relentless eternal round of depravity and disgust with oneself, a portrait in hopeless and well-deserved self-loathing. And it's beautiful.

Imagine Huysmans and von Grimmelshausen running full speed at each other, arms thrown behind them, jaws thrust forward, then smashing their faces into a bloody, co-mingled pulp and you'll begin to find a tenuous grasp on the voice of Hequet; painful, bloody, messy, erudite, and exquisite. But in this story, the antihero finds no redemption whatsoever.

There are several shorter pieces (and by shorter I mean poetry, prose poetry, and microfiction). Of the shorts, I liked "The Abbey of the Heart" and "The Organist" the best. "Abbey" is a nasty little macabre piece, a piece of the heart, so to speak. To say much more would give it away.

"The Organist" is like a fine medieval woodcut in tone and in subject. Dürer couldn't have done it better. This sinister little tale has just enough experimental "bite" to keep the reader on their toes, but isn't over-indulgent. If I could read nothing but stories like this the rest of my life, I would be quite content.

There are several others, all of them good, most of them great. But these two, in particular, are the cream of the crop, as they say. There are moments (very few) when Brendan's experimental side gets just a touch too surreal (I mean this in the original sense, not the more recent sense - these aren't just weird, they are a very particular brand of abruptly weird). I think he's at his best when he toys at the edge of classical surrealism, but only teases, usually by means of synesthesia, expanding our view of the possible, while not overwhelming our sense of what we perceive. That liminal space is the perfect space for my reading tastes, and for the most part, Heqet not only treads that space, it patrols it, dominates it, looming.

[Claus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, easily one of Mr Connell's best books in my opinion. And that says a lot looking at his bibliography. A future decadent classic.

[Vultural · Rating 3 out of 5]

Connell, Brendan - Heqet

Diary, journal, jottings of our narrator: visionary, artiste, street bum.
The repeating arc follows our narrator’s encounters with a timeless enchantress. While these break him from his lethargy, afterward he seems in ruins. Maybe.
He uses, abuses copious amounts of drugs and stimulants, opening his eyes to hitherto invisible dangers, yet blinding him to readily apparent perils.
Throughout, there are a flash of fevered words, concentrated prose poems, leavened with the odd prattle of the deranged street person.
I found our narrator to be unsympathetic and unreliable.
For every stray insight, there are pages where I think his mind is a nest of moldy cobwebs.
Following the novella are stories, fragments, exercises.
“The Sweet Princess Prized” would have made a ripe conte cruel, a hundred years earlier. Spoiled aristocrat sisters, jealousy, envy.
“The Organist” could have come from Huysmans. Holy cathedrals are the battlefields where performers of darkness and light duel in thunderous crescendos.

One of the reasons I bought Heqet was because this collection was hailed as modern decadence.
Curious, I thought. I reside in a time where electorates routinely install liars as representatives and judges.
Where children are massacred weekly in classrooms and citizens no nothing.
What fictions will be transgressive and taboo in an ethically bankrupt society?
Invention pales next to our ugly daily realities. Vitam vivere.