These Violent Delights: A Novel

Well, this book absolutely gutted me. I think I'll be having a book hangover for awhile after reading Micah Nemerever's epic These Violent Delights . There's absolutely no way that I believe that this is Micah's debut novel, because the prose is so wickedly beautiful. It's being compared as The Secret History meets Call Me By Your Name, and I can definitely see that, but honestly, this book is better than both of them.These Violent Delights takes place in 1970s Pittsburgh and centers around two main characters, Paul Fleischer and Julian Fromme. Paul and Julian are two freshman students joining college and connect instantaneously during their first interaction in class. They are immediately drawn together, but they couldn't be more different. Paul is a shy, artistic, loner; while Julian is wealthy, charismatic, and cunning. The two immediately form a fast friendship, but little did they know that this friendship would grow more intense each day.As Paul and Julian's friendship grows, the bond quickly turns to love. Their love is so powerful, so beautiful (and steamy!), but also so dark. Their love grows eventually forms into obsession and violence. The two form an unhealthy, yet captivating romantic bond, that allows the two of them to become stronger in their own way. This bond cannot be broken and anyone who steps in their way will have to suffer the consequences.Whew, this book is heavy on my heart. Never has a book triggered me with so many emotions. At first, the writing seemed a bit dense and difficult to get through, but then I realized, oh wait Dennis, you're just not as smart as Micah Nemerever so PUSH THROUGH. I eventually got the hang of the intellectual conversations had between the characters and fell right into the trap of this book's atmospheric content. These Violent Delights has the perfect slow building suspense that you just get immersed into the story. I could not put this book down if you tried to pry it from my hands. I just couldn't.I loved My Violent Delights so much for many reasons, but I think the main reason was that this story is so different than other novels in that it felt like it had its own universe of content. It's hard to describe, but I just feel like a lot of literary fiction works lately have just a straightforward plot, from beginning to end. With My Violent Delights , there's just so many details that encompass everything that you just can't help but take notice. For example, I double checked and reread the ending twice, and I never do that. I read some chapters over and took pictures of quotes (so I can share on publication day) as well. I can picture myself actually rereading this book again, without any doubt. I also loved the romance between Paul and Julian and how it teetered on the balance of pain and pleasure, and of security and controversy. I can probably go on and on about why I loved this book so much, but I think you get the hint. It may be a bit early to state this, but My Violent Delights may very well be my favorite book of 2020.

A deeply disturbing, utterly gripping book. Its sources are clear - Raskolnikov, Leopold & Loeb, the tortured souls trying to find their place in a world they fail to understand. It's unyieldingly harrowing, but brilliantly composed.Paul comes from working-class Pittsburgh. In college, he falls desperately in love with Julian, from a rich family outside Washington, DC. Julian's mother comes from European wealth - but Jewish money, which makes them parvenus in their rarified circles. Still, money is money, and Julian's family plays by the WASP rules; they join the right clubs and throw the right parties. Their son being gay is utterly unimaginable to both families.Far worse, Paul's social anxiety is off the charts. He cannot afford to live on campus, and takes the bus to school. He is desperately out of his depths in class and in Class. His self-loathing is so profound that he cannot accept his lover's affection as anything other than a malignant strike at Julian's upper-crust parents. The two teenagers share a deeply tortured relationship, with each twisting the other in knots to prove their affection. Needless to say, their sexual encounters easily turn violent. Although discreetly portrayed, these intimate moments are nonetheless a vivid depiction of their profound troubles, with themselves and each other.Like Raskolnikov, they hit upon the Nietzschean solution - to kill another, less worthy person. Somehow, this will cement their abiding love for one another.To say more will ruin the unfolding of events - the tortuous family encounters on both sides, the poisonous nature of their relationship, the dreadful uncertainty that both teens share that each is unworthy of the other. It's deeply upsetting, but completely gripping. I'm not sure I've seen such a naked portrait of two young men with such complex identity issues, whose insatiable thirst for one another drives both of them toward madness.The story is told entirely from Paul's perspective, thus Julian remains more than a bit opaque. But that is both our antihero's fascination and their mutual ruin.A tough read, but a brilliant debut.

please buy it

This book absolutely consumed me for the few days it took to read. Had I no other commitments I would have done nothing else until I finished it. The writing style is beautiful and compulsive author has captured so well the obsessive, destructive love between the two main characters. It does get quite dark, although not gratuitously so.

Konnte den Roman nicht aus der Hand legen. Klare Kaufempfehlung. Nichts für zartbesaitete.

Okay maybe a couple but really it's for the characters themselves, like... as people, not the author. Just my cup of tea.

Para ler