sheldonnylander's review against another edition
4.0
If you want bizarro, Jordan Krall delivers with King Scratch. It's certainly one of the weirder books I've read by him up to this point, the others being Beyond the Valley of the Apocalypse Donkeys, Fistful of Feet, and Squid Pulp Blues.
King Scratch is a weird acid trip of a book involving a couple off to help the man's (Jim) ex-father-in-law (a moonshiner who Jim worked for) while being pursued by another man named Black Boned Keith for unknown reasons. After both are in different car accidents, things get really weird, involving sea creatures (mostly squid), Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth, and pancakes. This theme continues into the appendices of the book, which are really more a collection of short stories that are loosely related to the main story.
As I mentioned, this is one of Krall's weirder books that I've read, sometimes to the point that it gets a little confusing. It's also one of Krall's more graphic books in terms of sex and violence, so reader be warned. If books like Fistful of Feet were too tame for you, then you'll probably want to give this one a try.
It's hard to write a review for this one without giving much away because, despite the short length, the book feels dense with plot elements and psychedelic visions. While the common elements that run through much of Krall's books are present (i.e., squids and common characters, like Black Boned Keith; interesting that donkeys don't have much of a presence in this one), the style feels like a departure compared to the Krall's other works I've experienced. It's good but, in my opinion, also felt a little less than Krall's other books.
King Scratch by Jordan Krall earns 3.5 jars of squid moonshine out of 5.
King Scratch is a weird acid trip of a book involving a couple off to help the man's (Jim) ex-father-in-law (a moonshiner who Jim worked for) while being pursued by another man named Black Boned Keith for unknown reasons. After both are in different car accidents, things get really weird, involving sea creatures (mostly squid), Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth, and pancakes. This theme continues into the appendices of the book, which are really more a collection of short stories that are loosely related to the main story.
As I mentioned, this is one of Krall's weirder books that I've read, sometimes to the point that it gets a little confusing. It's also one of Krall's more graphic books in terms of sex and violence, so reader be warned. If books like Fistful of Feet were too tame for you, then you'll probably want to give this one a try.
It's hard to write a review for this one without giving much away because, despite the short length, the book feels dense with plot elements and psychedelic visions. While the common elements that run through much of Krall's books are present (i.e., squids and common characters, like Black Boned Keith; interesting that donkeys don't have much of a presence in this one), the style feels like a departure compared to the Krall's other works I've experienced. It's good but, in my opinion, also felt a little less than Krall's other books.
King Scratch by Jordan Krall earns 3.5 jars of squid moonshine out of 5.
xterminal's review
4.0
Jordan Krall, King Scratch (Black Rainbows Press, 2010)
Jordan Krall's obsession with squid continues apace, and he keeps honing it as he goes along. This is, of course, a good thing, as it guarantees that each book is going to get better as we go along. I can't claim to have read all of Krall's output (he's quite the prolific guy), but it is definitely the case that each of his books that I have picked up, if we go in chronological order, has been better than the last. Which is a pretty tall order when going from Fistful of Feet, which was a pretty singular achievement, to King Scratch. Yes, the latter is better, but on the other hand, comparing the two doesn't necessarily make sense; whereas Fistful is a bizarro take on a tentacled spaghetti western, King Scratch almost has a noir feel to it. So I can get out of having to directly compare them by assigning them to different genres (despite both being far more bizarro than anything else).
Plot: There are moonshine smugglers in New Jersey. Specifically, in the world this novel inhabits, there's Jim and his sometime lover Peggy, who are contacted by Jim's ex-wife Laura, who's worried about her father and who wants Jim to go over and check on him. And then there's Black-Boned Keith, a nasty sort who's got his eye on Jim. So much for the main human characters, because then there's Abraham Lincoln, a psychotic tentacled beast who...
why am I even trying? Summarizing the plot of a Jordan Krall novel is like attempting to explain the uses of the pluperfect tense in Latin to your chinchilla. You can do it, but it's ridiculous to even try, and if anything, you will end up spoiling the surprise (and pleasure) for the recipient of your efforts. What I should just be telling you is “buy this book, squid-face, and read it as soon as you can.” So buy this book, squid-face, and read it as soon as you can. ****
Jordan Krall's obsession with squid continues apace, and he keeps honing it as he goes along. This is, of course, a good thing, as it guarantees that each book is going to get better as we go along. I can't claim to have read all of Krall's output (he's quite the prolific guy), but it is definitely the case that each of his books that I have picked up, if we go in chronological order, has been better than the last. Which is a pretty tall order when going from Fistful of Feet, which was a pretty singular achievement, to King Scratch. Yes, the latter is better, but on the other hand, comparing the two doesn't necessarily make sense; whereas Fistful is a bizarro take on a tentacled spaghetti western, King Scratch almost has a noir feel to it. So I can get out of having to directly compare them by assigning them to different genres (despite both being far more bizarro than anything else).
Plot: There are moonshine smugglers in New Jersey. Specifically, in the world this novel inhabits, there's Jim and his sometime lover Peggy, who are contacted by Jim's ex-wife Laura, who's worried about her father and who wants Jim to go over and check on him. And then there's Black-Boned Keith, a nasty sort who's got his eye on Jim. So much for the main human characters, because then there's Abraham Lincoln, a psychotic tentacled beast who...
why am I even trying? Summarizing the plot of a Jordan Krall novel is like attempting to explain the uses of the pluperfect tense in Latin to your chinchilla. You can do it, but it's ridiculous to even try, and if anything, you will end up spoiling the surprise (and pleasure) for the recipient of your efforts. What I should just be telling you is “buy this book, squid-face, and read it as soon as you can.” So buy this book, squid-face, and read it as soon as you can. ****
More...