Poppy Stringer spends her day telling her multitudes of followers what to wear and how to go about their lives. Her nights? She steals corpses from funeral homes for cash. When her celebrity idol and 80s icon Eddie Michaels is killed in a brutal car accident, she’s approached by a mysterious caller asking her to retrieve his remains. Can Poppy procure the mangled musician or will what she finds shock her.

While Chuck Tingle’s literary backbone lies in his countless erotic parody short stories, he’s started to write more “serious” horror novels the last few years. This has made me a pretty big fan of his and would easily recommend any of his first three spooky books to readers. That said, not everyone is perfect and not even the best authors hit it out of the park with every book.

Fabulous Bodies, while absolutely a Chuck Tingle novel to its core, felt less exciting than his previous work. I enjoyed the plot, but I had a hard time really feeling anything for these characters; it also felt quite rushed so perhaps that’s why I experienced the disconnect with Tingle’s cast. That being said, if you’re looking for a healthy heaping of gore, you’re in for a treat here. Tingle spares no expense when it comes to new and inventive ways for his characters to meet their ends (probably won’t look at a skateboard the same way again without thinking of one particular scene).

This is definitely one you can knock out in an afternoon and if you’re a fan of Chuck, I think you’ll at least enjoy yourself here. That said, if you’re dipping your toe into Tingle’s horror-verse, this is not where I would start. I would look at BURY YOUR GAYS.