The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things

I honestly have no idea how much of this book is fiction and how much is memoir, but while reading it I had a sneaking suspicion that it was all true. Ultimately, I suppose it doesn't really matter: "The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things" is an extraordinary book either way. Jeremiah, the young protagonist, is a child totally at the mercy of all the adults in his life, who are all insane, predatory and heartless. He is horrifically abused physically, sexually and psychologically until he completely loses all sense of self and identity. The tales are told so lucidly and honestly that the reader can completely understand why Jeremiah eventaully both learns to mistake pain for love and wages a personal war against his own body and sexual identity.In a way Jeremiah's story is a metaphor for how our exploitive society eventually destroys all our children's sense of self. God help us all.

Labels are often times erroneous or downright misleading. What JT LeRoy has brilliantly fashioned here is a horror story. No, not a horror story like those produced by Stephen King or Clive Barker, this is a horror story in that the subject matter is absolutely horrific. This is a savage and sobering series of interrelated stories dealing with the life long abuse suffered by a little boy named Jeremiah. Torture, pure and unadulterated. Mental, physical and sexual abuse are presented in a prose style which claims your attention like a brick through the front window. This is a shocking book on a variety of levels, the least of which is the subject matter. What is most shocking is the surety with which Mr. LeRoy writes. One would think that this material would almost assuredly repell its reader. However, the opposite is true. These stories grab on like a pit bull. Once you start, you simply must finish. That these pieces lack subtlety is only fitting. We aren't meant to be coddled or reassured by a Hollywood ending. I put the book down feeling drained and helpless. These are real horror stories. People actually live like this, treat one another like this, and the rest of the world looks away. Don't look away from this punishing, absorbing and challenging new book from one of the most exciting new writers of contemporary fiction.

These interconnected stories can be read as separate entities, or as a mosaic of the painful, crackling life of a boy searching. The emotions and the story details are literally bursting through each page, crammed in between the words and sentences, and the overall effect is an intoxicating disturbance which leaves the reader breathless, bereft, and strangely fulfilled. The book's journey ends with "Natoma Street", where the boy discovering the pleasure of pain, and rethreads his journey into a new shape. This is a book to believe in. I'd read "Sarah" last year, and now I realize that I misjudged it, and I need to read it again. With elements of Dennis Cooper, Gregg Araki, Scott Heim, and Tom Woolley, and with a hearty dose of skewed whimsy, J. T. LeRoy is the hurricane rattling the windows of mediocre fiction.