Are You Loathsome Tonight Author:Poppy Z. Brite Like the aging Elvis who succumbs to self-destructive indulgences in the title tale, the 12 stories in this collection of transgressive fictions are adrift in a sea of excess. Cannibal zombies, sentient maggots and professional sexual submissives are just a few of the characters at large in the landscapes of death and desire that Brite maps out.... more » In "Entertaining Mr. Orton," a pair of gay lovers rent the apartment where playwright Joe Orton was murdered and fall victim to its legacy of lust and violence. In "Mussolini and the Axeman's Jazz," a series of ax slayings that terrorized New Orleans in 1918 are explained as the result of supernatural war between two feuding spirits. "Monday's Special" and "Are You Loathsome Tonight?" both conclude with clinical descriptions of autopsies. « less