A few months back, Jenclair posted a review about a book called An Absolute Gentleman, a novel by R.M. Kinder which was inspired by her own encounter with a serial killer. Arthur Blume is a middle-aged English professor who claims that this book will be his truthful account of who he is, and his motivations for what he has done. After relocating to a small Midwest college town, he proceeds to form troublesome and menacing relationships with the various members of the English department, including one woman whom he takes as a lover. Blume shares increasingly disturbing details of his past, including his childhood in rural Georgia with a psychotic mother.

The book never turns lurid even as it reveals the grisly and horrifying mentality of a serial killer. Rather, its tone is restrained and subtle, so that I found myself strangely intrigued by Blume even as I cringed at many of his thoughts and actions. What he shares is not necessarily the truth, and so the reader becomes just one more person that Blume has manipulated.

And with that, I have completed Carl’s RIP Challenge for this year, with four books in total, including Her Royal Spyness, Mary Modern, The Ivy Tree, and finally, An Absolute Gentleman. My favorite of these books was Mary Modern although I enjoyed them all. I still have a couple books I am in the process of or want to read that I’d originally earmarked for this challenge, particularly The Town That Forgot How to Breathe and Heart-Shaped Box, so I will probably fit in a couple more spooky stories before the challenge is over. Thanks again for hosting the challenge, Carl!