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Liquid Soul
This story is more than just writing about some mass murderer killing innocent lives. In the end the narrator wants to be become them. There are situations in which people say they would do anything to be in another's shoes and do things a bit differently than they would, but nobody ever gets the chance. So I wondered what would happen if for a moment we were all able to become someone else and the moment was so fulfilling that we had to have it again and again and would only be stopped either by ourselves or by an outside force. At that point being ourselves would be on par with being someone else. There would be no difference whatsoever.
Throughout this story not only does he learn about other people around him, but about himself and who he really is, along with the father who killed his mother and abandoned him when he was younger. Through the blade, he is finally able to forgive his father, learn his why, learn from the mistakes his father made, and move on with the rest of his killings.
Despite being completely involved in who he kills and taking care of them after death, as well as talking to them on a daily basis, he doesn't even know their names. In the end his obsession with trying to become a part of their world pushes him to finding a way to join their world and become one of them. But he realizes he can't kill himself and through much time understands that it is his destiny to, as he likes to call it, "free people from this life, so they can enter the next." He takes his "job" seriously and does whatever it takes to make improvements to it.
About halfway into the story there is a part in which the narrator takes over an old man who supposedly had been doing the same thing as the narrator and in a passing of the torch, allows the narrator to kill him the way he would any other, with a knife to the throat. Even as the narrator tries to fight the killing, it is of no use as he no longer can control his arm. Instantly, snippets of experiences the old man had flash into his mind and one after another he relives lives he never knew about, through a tunnel of life that felt alien to him.
In a critical part of the story there is a person he kills but becomes himself afterwards, nothing else. Usually, the instant blood touches him, he becomes another person and for a short time at least, lives a moment in their past. But, for whatever reason he doesn't this time and it hits him harder than he could have thought possible. Depression strikes him down hard and he contemplates quitting the thing all together. During this time, unbeknownst to him, he actually thinks clearly for the first time since before Liquid Soul took its hold on him. He fights the urge at sanity and goes after the next person which, of course is a success. Throughout the story he has fought constant bouts of depression that limit him and his so called "freeing".
He doesn't realize his so-called "greater purpose" comes with a large price of separation from family and friends. But since he hasn't had either in such a long time, his making up for it, is burying them together and every now and then talking to them. The blood has some sort of hallucinogenic effect on him because he actually believes that they are happy being dead and in spite of their condition they are able to have short conversations with him.
In the end, all the narrator wanted was to be loved by as many people as possible and to live the life he never knew could exist.
Throughout this story not only does he learn about other people around him, but about himself and who he really is, along with the father who killed his mother and abandoned him when he was younger. Through the blade, he is finally able to forgive his father, learn his why, learn from the mistakes his father made, and move on with the rest of his killings.
Despite being completely involved in who he kills and taking care of them after death, as well as talking to them on a daily basis, he doesn't even know their names. In the end his obsession with trying to become a part of their world pushes him to finding a way to join their world and become one of them. But he realizes he can't kill himself and through much time understands that it is his destiny to, as he likes to call it, "free people from this life, so they can enter the next." He takes his "job" seriously and does whatever it takes to make improvements to it.
About halfway into the story there is a part in which the narrator takes over an old man who supposedly had been doing the same thing as the narrator and in a passing of the torch, allows the narrator to kill him the way he would any other, with a knife to the throat. Even as the narrator tries to fight the killing, it is of no use as he no longer can control his arm. Instantly, snippets of experiences the old man had flash into his mind and one after another he relives lives he never knew about, through a tunnel of life that felt alien to him.
In a critical part of the story there is a person he kills but becomes himself afterwards, nothing else. Usually, the instant blood touches him, he becomes another person and for a short time at least, lives a moment in their past. But, for whatever reason he doesn't this time and it hits him harder than he could have thought possible. Depression strikes him down hard and he contemplates quitting the thing all together. During this time, unbeknownst to him, he actually thinks clearly for the first time since before Liquid Soul took its hold on him. He fights the urge at sanity and goes after the next person which, of course is a success. Throughout the story he has fought constant bouts of depression that limit him and his so called "freeing".
He doesn't realize his so-called "greater purpose" comes with a large price of separation from family and friends. But since he hasn't had either in such a long time, his making up for it, is burying them together and every now and then talking to them. The blood has some sort of hallucinogenic effect on him because he actually believes that they are happy being dead and in spite of their condition they are able to have short conversations with him.
In the end, all the narrator wanted was to be loved by as many people as possible and to live the life he never knew could exist.
200 pages, Paperback
First published June 28, 2009
1 person is currently reading
4 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 20, 2009
Mr. Carter's first novel not only is an impressive offering to the Psychological Thriller genre but is so well written and believable that you almost feel you are reading a nonfiction recounting of events by the actual perpetrator. Very few authors I have read actually succeeded in getting inside the psyche of a serial killer with any amount of believability.
Meet the man with no discernible name, with no discernible features, in no discernible location. He is any man that you may see walk down the street and merely glance over without a second thought. This man however is special, he is addicted to something he calls Liquid Soul.
He starting getting addicted to Liquid Soul when he was mugged and in self defense pulled his pocket knife and cut the man. The moment his blood reached his hands he felt the man's soul leave his body and join with his giving him not only a glimpse into moments in the man's life, but the feeling of becoming the man during the experience.
He knew then he couldn't stop. He had to find others. He had to see what man people tic.
Then came the celebrity, the mother, the boxer, the bodybuilder, the CEO, the child, the old man, the policeman, the psychopath, the homeless man, among a few others. He decided to build his own family, make them apart of something since they shared themselves with him, he had to give something back.
After all, they were still kind enough to talk to him after they died and be apart of this glorious new world he was building with his new found gift.
This book will make your skin crawl and disturb you in ways I can guarantee you that you haven't been before no matter how many other authors you had read in this genre. The only question I have after closing the back cover is when will Mr. Carter thrill me with another offering?
Meet the man with no discernible name, with no discernible features, in no discernible location. He is any man that you may see walk down the street and merely glance over without a second thought. This man however is special, he is addicted to something he calls Liquid Soul.
He starting getting addicted to Liquid Soul when he was mugged and in self defense pulled his pocket knife and cut the man. The moment his blood reached his hands he felt the man's soul leave his body and join with his giving him not only a glimpse into moments in the man's life, but the feeling of becoming the man during the experience.
He knew then he couldn't stop. He had to find others. He had to see what man people tic.
Then came the celebrity, the mother, the boxer, the bodybuilder, the CEO, the child, the old man, the policeman, the psychopath, the homeless man, among a few others. He decided to build his own family, make them apart of something since they shared themselves with him, he had to give something back.
After all, they were still kind enough to talk to him after they died and be apart of this glorious new world he was building with his new found gift.
This book will make your skin crawl and disturb you in ways I can guarantee you that you haven't been before no matter how many other authors you had read in this genre. The only question I have after closing the back cover is when will Mr. Carter thrill me with another offering?
August 3, 2009
As you all know, I'm a sucker for scariness. I'm not sure why but I'm attracted to the darkness. I'm always looking for books that will creep me out. I guess because I've been reading supposedly "scary" books for as long as I can remember, so they don't affect me the way they used to. This book creeped me out. Thank you Matt! You've done your job:)
Liquid Soul is about a killer who gets his thrills from seeing a piece of his victims souls. In order to accomplish this, the blood of his victims has to touch him. Once the high has worn off, this killer is filled with sadness. He can never recreate that moment, so if he saw something he really liked, he is haunted by the memory of what he will never again experience. He doesn't know until the blood is shed what the victims soul will show. His experiences are a complete surprise. If he begins feeling something horrible, he cannot escape it until he is thrown back into himself.
If you are addicted to freaky books, I suggest you pick this one up. You can follow this killer's and victims lives and if you have a vivid imagination, you can feel what he feels.
Interview & giveaway on my blog - http://bridget3420.blogspot.com/2009/... (ends 8/10)
Liquid Soul is about a killer who gets his thrills from seeing a piece of his victims souls. In order to accomplish this, the blood of his victims has to touch him. Once the high has worn off, this killer is filled with sadness. He can never recreate that moment, so if he saw something he really liked, he is haunted by the memory of what he will never again experience. He doesn't know until the blood is shed what the victims soul will show. His experiences are a complete surprise. If he begins feeling something horrible, he cannot escape it until he is thrown back into himself.
If you are addicted to freaky books, I suggest you pick this one up. You can follow this killer's and victims lives and if you have a vivid imagination, you can feel what he feels.
Interview & giveaway on my blog - http://bridget3420.blogspot.com/2009/... (ends 8/10)
January 25, 2010
I've often wondered went on in the mind of people overall but especially those that commit crimes. Mr. Carter allowed me to glimpse inside this world, if only for a while, in his first novel, Liquid Soul. From the first taste of the mugger's blood to the height of the addiction, one can truly envision the thoughts, feelings and desires of those he kills as if they are experiencing it personally. Mr. Carter's psychological thriller, takes you through the addiction process, allowing you to experience a range of emotions-- joy, sadness, and fear-- thus, my only regret was that the journey had to end. It was a well written page turner which forces me to wait anxiously for Mr. Carter's next thriller.
August 11, 2016
The premise involves a nameless protagonist with an ability to relive parts of peoples' lives if he gets enough of their blood on his hands. He discovered it through an accidental encounter with a mugger, but now he's addicted to what he calls "liquid soul" (because it's like part of their soul releases into him through his hands). To feed his addiction, he kills people to experience it again and again. Yeah, kind of Sylar-esque, but with blood instead of brains. And, y'know, life experiences instead of superpowers.
The issue here, though, is that there are no other characters and no conflict. The protagonist makes bland comparisons between the memories he relives and his own life, commenting that the memories are richer (and often nicer) than anything he'd experienced in his own life, but since I don't know anything about him, I can't justify or even pity his claims. He has no friends, no acquaintances, and not much of a past. Every chapter involves him killing someone new and stealing their memories, with no clue as to what he does in his spare time or how he lived before he discovered liquid soul.
I did like the poke into mental instablity that grows over the course of the story. Our murderous protagonist buries all his victims in the same plot, and firmly believes they grow into a family. He talks to them frequently, and believes they understand the "opportunity" he's presented them, to become something more than they would have in life. What he perceives as their eventual betrayal is also a really neat idea, if underdeveloped.
Every once in awhile, the book approaches what could provide a plot, or at least an interesting development, but each time it takes the nearest exit and returns to a random collection of stolen memories. At one point, the progtagonist kills a sadistic mass murderer looking for his next victim. The memory he steals is the most recent victims, who the killer left alive and tortured, which I thought had interesting implications. If he could solve mysteries and things through liquid soul, help the police find victims and things like that before it's too late (or at least help them find the bodies)... But no, our John Doe just shrugs and goes on his merry way. Even when he encounters the father who murdered his mother and abandoned him as an infant (and how big a coincidence is that?), John Doe merely thinks "oh, how interesting." There's no rage, no abandonment issues, no emotion at all.
Liquid Soul also stretched my suspension of disbelief far, far beyond the breaking point for more mundane reasons. John Doe can walk into a hospital, slit the throat of a terminal patient, and walk out again with the body? Really? Chapters average at only a couple of pages long, and since every chapter involves killing a new victim, there are a lot of bodies piling up behind his house. All in the same city. Since the kills are made out where he finds the victims, with the bodies brought home afterwards, you'd think this wouldn't go on very long before he was caught, but about as much attention is paid to this as to the character development.
In case this wasn't enough to make me bash my head against the desk, of the four female victims he takes, one is the victim of a gang rape and one is an abused housewife. Really? You go out randomly hunting for people and 50% of the women have been horrifically abused? To make this worse, after they're dead, John Doe claims they become close friends, and are the ones who eagerly take the child under their wing (yes, he kills a child for the sake of killing a child). This is just so wrong and offensive on so many levels, I don't even know where to start.
So instead I'll start in on the prose. As there isn't a single line of dialogue in here, the book is nearly 200 pages of straight prose, including gems like "The one I mysteriously love ignorantly is unaware and sees this as just another dinner." Yeah, pretty sure it's not a good sign when I want to take out a red pen and fix the prose in the book. First, two adverbs in one short sentence? Ouch! Neither of them are necessary. Mysteriously love? What does that even mean? The verb is no stronger for the adverb. And ignorantly unaware? Ugh. Redundancy is something to avoid, kids.
Even worse was the constant disagreement in verb tenses. When a paragraph slips from past tense to present and back to past, all discussing the same event, this is the sign of a book that needs someone willing to dig in with a red pencil of doom.
Essentially, what started as an interesting premise is sorely in need of a competent editor, a plot, and something to add enough weight to the protagonist to give him a full third dimension. Having finished the book, I'm off to dive into some soul-salving chocolate, because I know that won't be disappointing.
The issue here, though, is that there are no other characters and no conflict. The protagonist makes bland comparisons between the memories he relives and his own life, commenting that the memories are richer (and often nicer) than anything he'd experienced in his own life, but since I don't know anything about him, I can't justify or even pity his claims. He has no friends, no acquaintances, and not much of a past. Every chapter involves him killing someone new and stealing their memories, with no clue as to what he does in his spare time or how he lived before he discovered liquid soul.
I did like the poke into mental instablity that grows over the course of the story. Our murderous protagonist buries all his victims in the same plot, and firmly believes they grow into a family. He talks to them frequently, and believes they understand the "opportunity" he's presented them, to become something more than they would have in life. What he perceives as their eventual betrayal is also a really neat idea, if underdeveloped.
Every once in awhile, the book approaches what could provide a plot, or at least an interesting development, but each time it takes the nearest exit and returns to a random collection of stolen memories. At one point, the progtagonist kills a sadistic mass murderer looking for his next victim. The memory he steals is the most recent victims, who the killer left alive and tortured, which I thought had interesting implications. If he could solve mysteries and things through liquid soul, help the police find victims and things like that before it's too late (or at least help them find the bodies)... But no, our John Doe just shrugs and goes on his merry way. Even when he encounters the father who murdered his mother and abandoned him as an infant (and how big a coincidence is that?), John Doe merely thinks "oh, how interesting." There's no rage, no abandonment issues, no emotion at all.
Liquid Soul also stretched my suspension of disbelief far, far beyond the breaking point for more mundane reasons. John Doe can walk into a hospital, slit the throat of a terminal patient, and walk out again with the body? Really? Chapters average at only a couple of pages long, and since every chapter involves killing a new victim, there are a lot of bodies piling up behind his house. All in the same city. Since the kills are made out where he finds the victims, with the bodies brought home afterwards, you'd think this wouldn't go on very long before he was caught, but about as much attention is paid to this as to the character development.
In case this wasn't enough to make me bash my head against the desk, of the four female victims he takes, one is the victim of a gang rape and one is an abused housewife. Really? You go out randomly hunting for people and 50% of the women have been horrifically abused? To make this worse, after they're dead, John Doe claims they become close friends, and are the ones who eagerly take the child under their wing (yes, he kills a child for the sake of killing a child). This is just so wrong and offensive on so many levels, I don't even know where to start.
So instead I'll start in on the prose. As there isn't a single line of dialogue in here, the book is nearly 200 pages of straight prose, including gems like "The one I mysteriously love ignorantly is unaware and sees this as just another dinner." Yeah, pretty sure it's not a good sign when I want to take out a red pen and fix the prose in the book. First, two adverbs in one short sentence? Ouch! Neither of them are necessary. Mysteriously love? What does that even mean? The verb is no stronger for the adverb. And ignorantly unaware? Ugh. Redundancy is something to avoid, kids.
Even worse was the constant disagreement in verb tenses. When a paragraph slips from past tense to present and back to past, all discussing the same event, this is the sign of a book that needs someone willing to dig in with a red pencil of doom.
Essentially, what started as an interesting premise is sorely in need of a competent editor, a plot, and something to add enough weight to the protagonist to give him a full third dimension. Having finished the book, I'm off to dive into some soul-salving chocolate, because I know that won't be disappointing.
August 29, 2013
Traumatic experiences are sadly common in life,each person handles it differently. Some fight their way to the surface and others are consumed so deeply in the muck an mire they cannot ever find the surface. Such is the case of the main character in this riveting tale that takes us inside the mind of a serial killer. Searching for a way to achieve what he was denied since early childhood he stumbles upon a most glorious drug called Liquid Soul. Through Liquid Soul he is able to create a lasting bond with people that quickly become the family he longs for.Matthew Carter seamlessly shows us the inner workings of a broken mind. To the outside world the character would be considered a monster but inside his own mind he is a savior, striving to give people the perfect happiness he was always denied. This is a work of pure intellectual genius! I bow down to you Mr. Carter,well done!!
August 19, 2009
Liquid Soul is quite a disturbing and gross read, following a killer who discovers his ability to briefly transport himself into the lives of others upon their blood spilling out over his skin. Yet reading the stories of the lives he takes, and the vivid descriptions of his adventures coupled with his own lonely, sad life, actually makes the reader oddly feel for, and almost root for the continued success of this killer.
This story is as gruesome as a horror story can get, but on the other hand it lacks a bit of background to it, leaving the reader wondering throughout the story with no resolution even in the end.
This story is as gruesome as a horror story can get, but on the other hand it lacks a bit of background to it, leaving the reader wondering throughout the story with no resolution even in the end.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews