Self-Murder

A dark love story of obsessive fixation perceptual disorientation insomnia and psychic seizures--with madness waiting in the wings.Do you dare to fall in love? asks the narrator of Self-Murder and then answers by detailing an instance of attraction to a breath-stealing beauty which swiftly becomes an obsessive fixation such that all else melts from his awareness his sanity is stretched to its limits and madness threatens to engulf him. Shifting emotional extremes sensual excess and prolonged sleep deprivation: all combine to erode the narrators tenuous hold on rationality and propel him into a somnambulistic waking state where the distinction between whats real and imagined blurs and hes no longer able to be certain of how hes behaving; without being aware of it he may have committed murder.Self-Murder depicts a hallucinatory landscape of the mind and emotions as terrifying as it is surprisingly and astoundingly beautiful while probing the elusiveness of memory and difficulty of accurately apprehending our inner state of affairs--or of understanding the underlying motives of our actions.Reviews: Self-Murder is a fascinating and excellent psychological thriller readers wont be able to put down.--Midwest Book ReviewA phantasmagoria of unbridled lust sexual obsession and stealth madness Robert Scott Leyses Self-Murder is a dazzling indictment of desire that brims with sensory imagery and moments of exquisite verbal beauty delivered by a narrative voice that is baroque but disturbing and more than a little reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe.--Gary Earl Ross Edgar Award-winning author of Blackbird Rising: A Novel of the American SpiritRobert Scott Leyse channels Baudelaires Queen of Spades and Jack of Hearts speaking darkly of dead loves in this new book. He also reminds me of James Purdys notorious eccentricity. Theres plenty of middlebrow stuff if you want it. Self-Murder isnt that.--Kris Saknussemm author of Private MidnightIn Self-Murder Robert Scott Leyse achieves a striking stylistic gallimaufry: Proustian memories underpinning thoughts words and deeds; obsession treated in a way which evokes Lolita; romps that Henry Miller would have enjoyed; a finale that delivers a blow to the solar plexus.--Barry Baldwin Emeritus Professor of Classics U. of Calgary Fellow of the Royal Society of CanadaSelf-Murder is lush sensuality of language injected with menace. A vivid portrait of mental disintegration and an explosive picture-show. Hallucinations without substance-abuse. Overwrought nerves and insomnia are Self-Murders drugs of choice.--George Fosty ESPN featured author of Black IceHere is a psychological struggle and sensual breakout where you best get a comfortable seat grab the joy stick and hang on. Self-Murder is a delicious look at the mystery of self-psychoanalysis sensual release acceptance of gifts of the tallest order or the lowest.--Tom Sheehan author of Epic Cures