Truman Pinter is a sociopath.
Like all sociopaths, he sees himself as better—elevated in
every way. Removed and above those of us he sees as less. Less cultured. Less intelligent.
Less aware. Less significant. Less… human.
We are but bothersome insects to Truman. Base, vulgar creatures
who roam and rut our way through life without thought or care for things that truly
matter.
Truman Pinter is a Rapist.
This is a fact he never disputes… in fact he admits it almost
proudly. To police. To himself. To us. He infects us with his perverse
perceptions and false logic. He makes us question the very things we base our
own humanity on. He peels back the curtain and whispers, “there… see, you feel it too. You are no better than I.”
Truman Pinter is going to pay for his perceived crimes
against humanity.
Or is he?
It’s hard to pin down, Les Edgerton’s latest novel, The Rapist. Is it considered a classic noir
tale of a damaged man’s twisted path of self-destruction? Maybe it’s a gritty crime
novel that chronicles an evil sociopath’s final hours… perhaps it’s a highbrowed work of
literary fiction fraught with existential yearning.
The answer is yes. The
Rapist is all of those things… and much, much more.
The Rapist is a
dirty window used to peer into the blackest of hearts and the most vile of
souls. A window that can never be wiped clean enough to make us want to press
our faces against it… but we do so anyway, all the while feeling as if the black
of Truman Pinter’s heart has tainted us forever.
It is a murky kaleidoscope of appalling shapes and unspeakable
colors. Just when you think you’ve figured it out, just when you think you
finally understand the vision Edgerton has set in front of us, it tumbles away,
giving us another look from an entirely different perspective. A perspective we are not wholly comfortable with. One we reject, even as we unwillingly understand it.
The final result is Les Edgerton’s tour de force. A
masterfully raw, brilliantly unabashed study into the heart and mind of the most
cold-blooded sociopath you’ll ever encounter, on the page or off.
check it out!:
Thank you, Maegan! Your opinion means the world to me!
ReplyDeleteVery intriguing, Maegan! Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Les' latest. Sounds like a multidimensional plunge into inner darkness. Would it be fair to say this one takes edgy to a whole new level? Which would be pretty hard when you consider the standard Les has already set with his previous novels, The Bitch and The Perfect Crime...
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