Richard Laymon does not waste any time. Not even two sentences deep into his novel CUTS, bare breasts are being rubbed in a guy’s face. Love him or hate him, at least the author delivers from the word “go.”

Originally published in 1999 in a long-out-of-print Cemetery Dance edition, the ’70s-era CUTS centers on Albert Prince, who’s anything but. Like any other 17-year-old high school senior, he’s sexually frustrated, but takes said frustration out with a big ol’ butcher knife, which begins when he has an orgasm while stabbing a dog for no good reason.

Albert then begins a habit of breaking into people’s homes, preferably those with hot women in them whom he can tie up and cut on for days. Eventually crossing his path will be other characters whose lives play out between Albert’s own: Janet, a newly pregnant and newly dumped woman; Lester, a henpecked husband; Helen, his cheating shrew of a wife; Ian, their successful novelist friend; May Beth, an aspiring actress who gets her big break in an adaptation of one of Ian’s books; and Emily Jean, her seductive cougar mother. There are others, who don’t last nearly as long.

Many will be troubled by the explicitness of Laymon’s style, as he holds little back in terms of sex and violence. If there’s a female character who isn’t described in terms of her nipples or the way her breasts bulge out – or leap from – her bra, I must’ve missed it. And as repulsive as the mere idea of Albert’s stabfest is, it’s nothing compared to the scene in which he dons drag, complete with a bosom he carves off a victim. And even that has zilch compared to the book’s, er, climax.

Those who aren’t too bothered by the proceedings may find issue with Laymon’s other usual bent: not giving his characters proper motivation. Never mind Albert becoming a psycho with zero explanation; I speak more of Janet being molested on a first date – finger entry and all – so what does she do? If you answered, “sleep over at his house, invite him to dinner and set him up with her best friend,” you win a prize.

Janet has another fatal flaw in garnering our sympathy: She’s presented as all high-and-mighty for wanting to keep her baby, despite her ex-boyfriend’s repeated suggestions of abortion. Yet she drinks beer and wine no fewer than six times throughout the book, without questioning or worrying about it. Certainly Laymon knew that’s a no-no?

But who reads Laymon expecting realism? He’s known for the visceral, for going so over-the-top that the work takes planetary orbit, and CUTS does just that. While some of his other novels do so the point of being unfinishable, at least this one assumes its plotless rotation with a large degree of entertainment. As sick-minded as it is, as exaggerated as it gets, one can’t look away. You’ll have a hell of a time being thoroughly disgusted. –Rod Lott

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“The hot dog was warm through its wrapper. He took it out. The vinegar smell of mustard made him pucker. He moaned with pleasure as he took it into his mouth: the warm soft bun, the eye-watering mustard, the wiener that sprayed hot juices into his mouth when he broke its skin. He chewed for a long time, savoring it before swallowing.”

OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THIS AUTHOR:
• AFTER MIDNIGHT by Richard Laymon
• THE BEAST HOUSE by Richard Laymon
• THE CELLAR by Richard Laymon
• COME OUT TONIGHT by Richard Laymon
• ISLAND by Richard Laymon
• THE LAKE by Richard Laymon
• SAVAGE by Richard Laymon
• TRIAGE by Jack Ketchum, Richard Laymon and Edward Lee