Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always seen myself as the kind of person that could tolerate any painful reality. My life has led me in directions that required me to delve deep into the difficult aspects to find some light at the end of the tunnel. Growing up in Texas, I’ve found that being tough is a prescription given to every child. The elements and culture were always difficult, and the realities of loss, drug addiction, and an exhaustive worker culture were a constant that required reinforcement or abandonment. The books I’ve read and written are a product of that environment and its necessities. 


I wrote

Girl Flesh: An Extreme Horror Novel About Love

By May Leitz,

Book cover of Girl Flesh: An Extreme Horror Novel About Love

What is my book about?

Does anyone remember Angie Kirby and Caroline Ellis?

Two women, wholly enraptured in their professional lives, are thrust into the…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Exquisite Corpse

May Leitz Why did I love this book?

I read this book three years ago in my dingy apartment in Denton, TX, and it took me several attempts to finish it.

The grotesque elements of the prose were beyond overwhelming to the point of shocked hilarity. Through all its garishness, I gained an understanding that one can get away with literary murder.

You can write the most depraved thing you can think of if you want to. No one is stopping you.

By Poppy Z. Brite,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Exquisite Corpse as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From the author of Lost Souls, Drawing Blood, and Wormwood comes a thrilling and chilling novel that bestselling author Peter Straub says serves as a “guidebook to hell.”

To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the sole ambition of bringing his “art” to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, and drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a dissolute playboy who has pushed his “art” to limits…


Book cover of House of Leaves

May Leitz Why did I love this book?

I reviewed House of Leaves several times before the book finally revealed itself to me.

While on its surface, it’s a simple work of fiction, it carries the weight of something with pressing importance and unhinged meaning. Accepting the book and its sentiments becomes the biggest challenge in getting into it.

The book, just like its subject matter, is a winding journey into the depths of a physical world that none of us can truly grasp.

This book taught me about scope and its ability to challenge a reader more than its own surface-level prose and ideas.

By Mark Z. Danielewski,

Why should I read it?

23 authors picked House of Leaves as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

“A novelistic mosaic that simultaneously reads like a thriller and like a strange, dreamlike excursion into the subconscious.” —The New York Times

Years ago, when House of Leaves was first being passed around, it was nothing more than a badly bundled heap of paper, parts of which would occasionally surface on the Internet. No one could have anticipated the small but devoted following this terrifying story would soon command. Starting with an odd assortment of marginalized youth -- musicians, tattoo artists, programmers, strippers, environmentalists, and adrenaline junkies -- the book eventually made its way into the hands of older generations,…


Book cover of No Longer Human

May Leitz Why did I love this book?

No Longer Human spans an entire human life in all its nuances and difficulties.

In some of the more difficult periods of my life, I’ve remembered my experience of No Longer Human and its intricacies in depicting the swarm of political ideology and manipulation of difficult relationships.

It’s a work that beckons you to live your life to your ends and fear only your loss of control over your narrative.

By Osamu Dazai, Donald Keene (translator),

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked No Longer Human as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Portraying himself as a failure, the protagonist of Osamu Dazai's No Longer Human narrates a seemingly normal life even while he feels himself incapable of understanding human beings. Oba Yozo's attempts to reconcile himself to the world around him begin in early childhood, continue through high school, where he becomes a "clown" to mask his alienation, and eventually lead to a failed suicide attempt as an adult. Without sentimentality, he records the casual cruelties of life and its fleeting moments of human connection and tenderness.


Book cover of The Conspiracy Against The Human Race: A Contrivance of Horror

May Leitz Why did I love this book?

I wasn’t in a good mental state when I read this book, so the impact was deeply felt.

The book lines out in explicit detail how human consciousness was an accident of nature designed to make us miserable. I’ve grown to feel this worldview is deeply cynical, yet when I look back on it, I remember the moments where Thomas Ligotti punctuated himself with drab humor as the highlight.

A reader could come away feeling like this book provides small light in deep darkness. The blunt dissociative experience makes any writer shudder at doing this to an audience. 

By Thomas Ligotti,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Conspiracy Against The Human Race as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In Thomas Ligotti's first nonfiction outing, an examination of the meaning (or meaninglessness) of life through an insightful, unsparing argument that proves the greatest horrors are not the products of our imagination but instead are found in reality.

"There is a signature motif discernible in both works of philosophical pessimism and supernatural horror. It may be stated thus: Behind the scenes of life lurks something pernicious that makes a nightmare of our world."

His fiction is known to be some of the most terrifying in the genre of supernatural horror, but Thomas Ligotti's first nonfiction book may be even scarier.…


Book cover of Less Than Zero

May Leitz Why did I love this book?

While I’ve never loved Bret Easton Ellis, even as a writer, I’ve always felt this was by design.

Less Than Zero paints a bleak world where young people with nothing to lose get a crash course on exactly how silly of an idea that is. There’s always something to lose, even in recklessness.

No one imagines their life turning out irrevocably caustic, yet it is a commonality from the protagonists' viewpoint. They don’t know how bad it can be, and neither do we until we see it for ourselves.

The idea of recontextualizing our viewpoint on a character’s worldview has always been deeply affecting my writing.

By Bret Easton Ellis,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked Less Than Zero as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The timeless classic from the acclaimed author of American Psycho about the lost generation of 1980s Los Angeles who experienced sex, drugs, and disaffection at too early an age. • The basis for the cult-classic film "Possesses an unnerving air of documentary reality." —The New York Times
They live in a world shaped by casual nihilism, passivity, and too much money in a place devoid of feeling or hope. When Clay comes home for Christmas vacation from his Eastern college, he re-enters a landscape of limitless privilege and absolute moral entropy, where everyone drives Porsches,…


Explore my book 😀

Girl Flesh: An Extreme Horror Novel About Love

By May Leitz,

Book cover of Girl Flesh: An Extreme Horror Novel About Love

What is my book about?

Does anyone remember Angie Kirby and Caroline Ellis?

Two women, wholly enraptured in their professional lives, are thrust into the Texas mesa with nowhere to go and no one to trust. Angie is a chronically timid, guilt-ridden internet writer lost in a life she didn’t choose. Caroline is an ironic, nihilistic musician, pleased to be away from her responsibilities. They face unknown dangers and vast darkness, lost in a place without comforts. Will they succumb to the elements or find strength in their bond enough to escape?

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Lethal Impulse

By Steve Rush,

Book cover of Lethal Impulse

Steve Rush Author Of Blood Red Deceit

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

Author Investigator Instructor Outdoors lover Book enthusiast Researcher

Steve's 3 favorite reads in 2023

What is my book about?

He’s riddled with guilt. She’s annoyed with the status quo.

The death of a crime boss’s daughter forces Detective Neil Caldera to leave NYC. He seeks refuge in the tranquil embrace of a small town, where he finds himself entangled in the labyrinth of a teenage girl’s murder. Tess Fleishman’s pale skin and extreme weight loss portrays a disease she wants others to see. While inside, a compulsion for Neil fuels her passion to have him or destroy him.

Lethal Impulse

By Steve Rush,

What is this book about?

He's riddled with guilt. She's annoyed with the status quo. The death of a crime boss's daughter forces Detective Neil Caldera to leave NYC. He seeks refuge in the tranquil embrace of a small town, where he finds himself entangled in the labyrinth of a teenage girl's murder. Tess Fleishman's pale skin and extreme weight loss portrays a disease she wants others to see. While inside, a compulsion for Neil fuels her passion to have him or destroy him. As Neil delves into the heart of the town's secrets, will truth deliver solace? Or will Tess prevail?


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