Cuts by Richard Laymon
Cuts by Richard Laymon
327 pages
Horror / Horror
1999
Dorchester (I read the hardcover from Cemetery Dance)
https://amzn.to/44mSl6o
Cuts was one of the first Richard Laymon books I remember being absolutely disturbed by. It featured a villain in Albert Prince that made me imagine all the vicious psychopathic sexual sadists getting away with what they do. This is a zoom-in on a rampage that would be beyond terrifying if it were a true crime story. I think it is also the “home invasion” nature of this book that had me so unsettled when I first read it as a young woman living on her own for the first time.
The stabbiest of stabby books
While we follow the killer Albert, we are also following the supply teacher Janet and waiting in high tension until their story lines converge. Of course while we are following Albert we are seeing his insanity ramp up with his newfound love of cutting people. And no pun intended – those scenes often cut away. I think this helps build some good suspense for the end scene of the book.
From the back
Many people have a hobby that verges on obsession. Albert Prince’s obsession happens to be cutting people, especially pretty girls. There’s nothing he loves more than breaking into a stranger’s house and letting his imagination―and his knife―run wild. Albert’s on the run now, heading cross-country, but he’s not about to stop having fun…
As you may guess this involves Helen; why would we follow her otherwise? Helen has some trouble of her own; she in in the middle of a messy breakup after discovering that she’s pregnant. Rest assured though, she is a very strong and determined woman. Instead of feeling bad for her with her little love triangles, we feel hopeful as she is a gal with a plan for the future. I think that sentiment is well placed; that hopeful feeling leads us to further tension knowing who she is inevitably going to cross paths with.
Hot or not, for teacher…
The one thing I had forgotten about this book was how much it focuses on the teachers’ lives. As you can imagine, high school teachers have very full lives outside of the classroom in Laymon-land; costume parties drinking, fooling around on one another and lamenting their resulting loveless marriages. So, if that sort of drama speaks to you and you enjoy that in your horror then you may be very interested to see where Helen fits into this as she lands a job eventually as a supply teacher. I found it detracted from the excitement of the horror story, as I prefer narratives that don’t stray into sundry drama.
The last chapter is a fantastic payoff for all the insanity we have endured. It plays very well into Albert being a fetishist that likes to cut people. He likes to inflict pain and is a sexual sadist that gets joy from using a knife on his victims. While that is told unflinchingly. as mentioned, we cut away from his coup de grâce but we are right there while he is torturing victims. We stand next to him as he spends time with dead bodies and listen in while he plans his next move, so it is this sad voyeuristic sense that we gain as the reader; and it has not a good feeling. That is to say, if you enjoy horror that horrifies, it hits the perfect note!
Often in horror there is not a proper “payoff” because an ambiguous ending or tragic ending is the name of the game, and I love books like that, however this is one of the few where the bad guy gets comeuppance and that I truly appreciate. While I feel that there are words wasted in gallivanting with teachers after hours, there is not one wasted line for driving home how vile and evil and warped Albert is. Every sentence is an arrow driving toward these last few chapters of the book. Just fine writing at its core, in spite of the subject matter, which makes it somehow devilish.
Still one of my favourites
While Richard Layman books do often glorify the killer we don’t spend this sort of time with them, typically. Two books come to mind that are similar although written in sort of diary format; Endless Night and Island. one from the killer’s point of view and one from a victim’s point of view, respectively. They have a somewhat similar tone but this is probably more like the book Night Show. Although they are slightly similar, I don’t feel there’s anything exactly like Cuts in the rest of Richard Laymon’s repertoire so it does stand out to me as one of the more intimate reflections on a serial killer one of the most creative methods from which they derive their satisfaction and one of the most clearly painted main victims or final girls. Years after my first read, I find it just as enjoyable though not as shocking as it seemed when I was twenty years younger, As it says on most of his books “if you’ve missed Laymon, you’ve missed a treat”, and I’d say one of those treats is definitely Cuts.