I Was Dora Suarez
Factory 4
Published on 13. March 2008
Book
Paperback/Softback
208 pages
978-1-85242-799-3 (ISBN)
Description
An axe-wielding psychopath carves young Dora Suarez into pieces and smashes the head of Suarez's friend, an elderly woman. On the same night, in the West End, a firearm blows the top off the head of Felix Roatta, part-owner of the seedy Parallel Club. The unnamed narrator, a sergeant in the Metropolitan Police's Unexplained Deaths division, develops a fixation on the young woman whose murder he investigates. And he discovers that Suarez's death is even more bizarre than suspected: the murderer ate bits of flesh from Suarez's corpse and ejaculated against her thigh. Autopsy results compound the puzzle: Suarez was dying of AIDS, but the pathologist can't tell how the virus was introduced. Then a photo, supplied by a former Parallel hostess, links Suarez to Roatta, and inquiries at the club reveal how vile and inhuman exploitation can become. I Was Dora Suarez is the fourth book in the Factory series
Reviews / Votes
A sulphurous mixture of ferocious violence and high-flown philosophy. * Prospect * A mixture of thin-lipped Chandleresque backchat and of idioms more icily subversive. * Observer * Deadbeat, downbeat but thoroughly believable, and evoked with the scary precision of a scalpel slicing through flesh... extreme, but like nothing else you'll ever read -- Richard Rayner * Los Angeles Times * I cannot think of another writer so obsessed with the skull beneath the skin. * The Times * Raymond writes with a stomach-churning exactness about murder, madness and mutilation. * The Times * If you think of the act of writing as a game of chicken between the author and his talent, then Derek Raymond is one author who achieves his ecstasy by sailing off cliffs. Everything about I Was Dora Suarez shrieks of the joy and pain of going too far. * New York Times *More details
Edition
Main
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Profile Books Ltd
Product notice
Paperback (UK-trade)
Dimensions
Height: 198 mm
Width: 131 mm
Thickness: 17 mm
Weight
147 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-85242-799-3 (9781852427993)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Person
Derek Raymond was born Robin Cook in 1931. His novels include A State of Denmark, The Crust on its Uppers, I Was Dora Suarez and How the Dead Live, which was made into a film. The son of a textile magnate, he dropped out of Eton aged sixteen and spent much of his early career among criminals and was employed at various times as a pornographer, organiser of illegal gambling, money launderer, pig-slaughterer and minicab driver. He died in London in 1994.