The Blood Poetry

Is Epstein a despicable man? He's certainly trying desperately at something. When his wife disappears he's frantic to talk to his daughter. But what can he tell her? There must be a reason and he's all but sure about the gruesome answer. Can he protect Sylvia from the truth, from her terrible lineage and, ultimately, from himself? Off-beat and sordid, THE BLOOD POETRY is a twisted, yet honest look at our desire to connect with others and the ways in which we are often stymied by our own efforts to get closer. Epstein is a curious mix of monster and romantic struggling to maintain a shred of dignity in his dingy, beat down world.

Horror Talk

"If one new horror book out there embodies the intelligence of great literary fiction with the best elements of psychological horror, The Blood Poetry has to be it...paragraphs screamed, asking to be taken out and plastered on gigantic billboards so everyone could enjoy their humor, brutality or blood-splattered philosophy."

Grace Krilanovich, author The Orange Eats Creeps

"From some forgotten box under Patrick Bateman's bed comes this rat rod of a novel: ragged, supercharged and wildly inappropriate...The main pervert's agony would be harrowing if it didn't also happen to be very funny."

Horror Novel Reviews

"This is a completely new type of read for me. Not the content so much as the style with which it has been written. Having been a poet and still enjoying the craft when I'm able to find something that catches my attention, I would say that this story is fundamentally just that: a poem."

About the Author

Leland studied Creative Writing and Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University where he discovered the enormous possibilities of poetry, experimentation, and critical theory. He eventually earned an MFA in Writing from Columbia University on a merit fellowship. He has published fiction in Open City, Fence, Dark Sky Magazine, Drunken Boat, and Monkey Bicycle, among other literary journals. He is also the project director for an upcoming literary event series, Phantasmagoria: Language and Technology of Suffering, for which he received fiscal sponsorship from the New York Foundation for the Arts. He lives in Brooklyn, NY.  About The Blood Poetry, Shelf Unbound magazine called it, "A brilliant, brutal assault of a novel." Grace Krilanovich, author of The Orange Eats Creeps, said it's "ragged, supercharged and wildly inappropriate. A Bataille sitcom full of meat and mommies."

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