I've been reading Jordan Krall's books out of order. I'm not sure why. I seem to have started with the longer ones of late and have worked my way down to the shorter books. After reading Beyond the Valley of the Apocalypse Donkeys, Fistful of Feet, Squid Pulp Blues, and King Scratch, in that order, I've finally gotten around to reading Piecemeal June.

This book was Krall's rookie effort for Eraserhead Press, and you can definitely see why people have paid attention to his work from the beginning. If there's one word that comes to mind when trying to describe this book, it would be “solid.” The plot is solid, the world is solid, and the characters are solid, even if we don't see all of it.

Piecemeal June is the story of Kevin, a loner in a dead-end job who lives above a porn shop with a tarot-card obsessed cat named Mithra. Mithra begins bringing home what appears to be trash at first, until Kevin realizes that they are parts of a realistic sex doll who, when assembled, comes to life and identifies herself as June. In the meantime, they're pursued by a pornographer who believes the doll belongs to him and a god of the Second World (we are in the First World) who loves her.

For a book about a sex doll, a pornographer, and beings cobbled together from various body parts, I'm surprised that there weren't more graphic adult situations in this story, but the amount worked just right. It's actually not gratuitous, but is really what is necessary to drive the story. Again, however, Krall seems to have an affinity for writing characters who have trouble controlling their bowels.

While the story is short and there's not a whole lot of space to develop the characters, it felt as though there was a lot going on under the surface that we don't see, giving them some depth. And the story, as I said, is quite solid and ties together quite well...sort of.

Let me explain this by saying that there are two main problems with this novel. The first and most obvious is that there are editing problems. Usually, I can overlook a few errors, but the errors here are numerous enough to be distracting, and I have to take a half-star off the final score in this case.

The second problem is the aforementioned issue with the plot. It's really good and absorbing all the way through...and then ends suddenly. I mean very suddenly. It's like the plot slammed into a brick wall at 70 MPH. I almost wonder if Krall either wrote himself into a corner or simply got bored with it and just decided to end it then and there. This is really disappointing because it was such a great story and I was ready to give the book a higher rating up until that point.

Piecemeal June is definitely worth your time, especially for it being a rookie effort from a talented bizarro author. Just keep in mind that it will end very abruptly and not in the most satisfying manner.

Piecemeal June by Jordan Krall earns four sex doll parts out of five. ( )

Well that was shitty, lol LITERALLY up to my ears swimming in shit.
There was a certainly strange fascination with diarrhea and other bodily fluids. It was QUITE disturbing, but in the end : This was a True Love story. Surprised myself by thinking the story was very sweet despite all the disgusting aspects. You can tell this was Jordan Krall's earlier works, but it I am curious to see his later novels, I Bet he has improved. What a special little delight this story was, unforgettable that's for sure. I love the cat Mithra, he is soooooooo adorable, may I have him please? ( )

This is has quite a bit of sex in it. The plot is about a loser named Kevin who lives over a porn shop. Everyday Kevin's cat brings him a piece of a body. Instead of being the result of a grisly murder of some sort, they are in fact the parts to a living sex doll named June.

June was made for this god/king sort of guy in another dimension where people can be taken apart and put back together in odd ways for various sexual purposes. The god king guy wants June back, because he is in love with the porn star she was modeled after. Unfortunately, Kevin and June have fallen in love. The god/king guy has some crab monsters and evil pornographers at his disposal, and he tries to use them to regain his lost love. There's also a washed-up boxer involved, as well. It's all just too strange to explain.

As you can probably guess from this, there is a lot of sex and gore in this book. A lot of the sex is weird sex, too. Still this is a good book if you aren't too prudish. ( )

While Kevin seems to be just another single guy with a cat, in Piecemeal June, (Eraserhead Press, January 2008) Bizarro author Jordan Krall has a lot in store for his unwitting and rather sweet protagonist.

In a regular world, Kevin modestly lives above a porn shop, works at a pet store and has a friend who has yet to get a handle on being an adult. It’s from an alternative world of mutilated human body parts and three crab-monsters who enjoy nothing more than chomping on puppy legs like humans do pork rinds where June, the sex-doll is created. When Kevin’s cat, Mithra randomly brings her disjointed parts home, Kevin glues the pieces together and his mundane life is transformed.

What moves the book along is Krall’s ability to both disgust and fascinate his readers with imagery that is perverse and downright dirty in one paragraph, and vaguely romantic the next. The reader gets a sense from the beginning what is happening in Kevin’s town, while it takes him the entire book to see it, let alone even try to grasp some understanding of it. That being said, Krall still manages to have a bit of a stun-factor in the end, leaving one to go back and flip through the pages to find the hidden pieces that were there the entire time.

Short, yet not as simple as you’d think, Jordan Krall’s Piecemeal June is as provocative as it is sentimental, leaving love to grace the pages just as much as the bodily fluids. Don’t be surprised if you feel the need to rub one out right along with Macchu, Bacchu, and Frank. ( )

Oh dear Lord. How do I even begin? Because I am a closet pervert, I ordered this book thinking it was going to be a bizarro pornographic romp. It isn’t, not really, even though the June of the title character is a sex doll come to life, created in the image of a porn actress, and the main character, Kevin, has sex with her. Despite that, this is high bizarro that leaves me conflicted. Too many descriptions of sweat and feet and more feet. But there is a cat. An awesome cat. So you can see my dilemma. Read the rest of the review here: http://ireadoddbooks.com/ ( )