Illustrator Davit Buck Media type Print (paperback) Originally published 23 October 2012 ISBN 9780988561106 | Language English Pages 62 pages | |
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Publisher Auspicious Coney Productions Publication date 23 October 2012 (2012-10-23) Genres Science Fiction, Urban fiction | ||
Peeled and Quartered is a sixty-two page novella by Jessica I. Rowe, published in 2012. In it she creates a disturbing form of science fiction melded with certain dark elements that she terms "disturbanization". While there are aspects of science fiction infused into the writing, the dark and twisted turns of the plot coupled with the grimmer side of urban life (drugs, the homeless culture, mental illness) create this aspect of "disturbanization".
The novella has been compared to the fusion of James's giant peach, and Burgess's madness in A Clockwork Orange. In this work, the drug and homeless cultures are represented along with a maniacal control freak from an alien planet who tortures and harangues the main character.
Of significant importance to the element of "disturbanization" is the use of Bakhtin's "chronotopic narrative" with an emphasis on spatial and temporal movement. Aspects of Spinoza's concept of affect also present themselves to some degree.
The Cult of the Rooster
In Rowe's second release The Cult of The Rooster (February 2013), the philosophic content is accentuated. The urban block, drug and homeless culture recur in this work, with the science fiction aspect being supplied by the dangerous alien reptiles that roam the blocks. The narrative darkness is undercut with footnotes and humor.