Publisher describes this as intense and deeply unsettling. I could not agree more. Our protagonist, a detective that had just gone through a traumatic experience - indeed an intense and deeply unsettling one, is co-opted, corrupted and lampooned when he gets involved in a religious cult that takes bodily penance, self-flagellation and the like to its extreme. The cult’s credo is the more body parts a member can chop off, cut off, the better. Ears, fingers, eyes, limbs -anything goes. Self-flagellation? No, Sir. That simply won’t do.
Our protagonist is disgusted, and rightly so, since he himself just lost his hand to a hatchet. And he did not volunteer - goes without saying. Soon our detective realizes that there is much more at stake than solve if a murder mystery for a cult of plum-mad religious fanatics. But read for yourself - if you got the stomach. ( )

One of the most relentlessly violent novels I have read, and I love it for that. ( )

This is a punch up of Evenson's "Brotherhood of Mutilation" an almost perfect short story. The second half, which pads the original out to novel length, really does feel like a shoddy sequel. Oh well ( )

I love this fucking book, no two stumps about it.

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ( )