Condiments are co-opted in this cavalcade of carnal congress, conspiracy, and cucumbers. Plus, there is a hermaphrodite who is a shaman. -Excerpt - Vivian, oblivious to all the coke, crosses the room and holds her hand out, not to shake hands with, but to receive something from the large amber-skinned man at the chalkboard. He smiles when he sees her, goes to the desk and retrieves a pint sized bottle of Peruvian Cucumber Facial mask. She pops the top unceremoniously and begins to drink. Matt Jorgenson has written several short stories, many are included in his previous book Coagulation: A...

Contents "Urethra" A tiny catfish and the calamitous consequences "Bunnies" Romanian rabbits on a rampage "The Little Man in the Canoe" An itch looks for a scratch. "He" He's watching you "For Skin" Circumcision revision. "Revenge of the Gerbils" An urban mythunderstanding. "This is Happening to Me" Darker darkness. These stories originally appeared in the Self Mutilation series published under the pseudonym S. Plat (Self Mutilation, Self-Mutilation 2, and SM3: Bloodbath). Poppy Z. Brite made the following comment about the first publication in that series. "It's good to see fresh voices...

excerpt... A pulsating plasmatic personality, a sentient sentiment, an interstellar dweller, moves in for a gawk and a gander summoning its fellow travelers. Like a nebulous convention of highly charged earthworms, they start to feed on the atomic nutrients and find themselves drunk on the sparse molecules that are present in an uncharacteristic abundance. They both seem to have male and female parts and line some of them up in opposing orientation - and in many cases, like meets like and they all begin to sparkle and glow in the pulsing brilliance of their drunken copulations.

As they are loading the car, a large bus-type RV covered in dark-smoked glass towing a matching trailer pulls past them into the lot and parks right up near the entrance to the store, nearly blocking it. As soon as it stops a handful of people emerge from the side door. Two of them wearing lab coats. The other three grab grocery carts and rush into the store, followed by the people in white smocks. -What do you suppose that's about?- asks Louis. -I don't know.- Cindy replies, with bedroom eyes. With that Louis forgets about the RV and the trailer and they head straight to his place, unload...