[BOOKS OF THE DEAD] Wretch: Or, the Unbecoming of Porcelain Khaw - Eric LaRocca

Feb 28
4 min read

Wretch: Or, the Unbecoming of Porcelain Khaw- Books of the Dead Review

Welcome to Books of the Dead. A monthly series by published author and founder of The Readers in the Rue Morgue Book Club Victoria Brown where she deep dives into some of her favourite (and not so favourite) authors and books.

Author: Eric LaRocca

Publication Date: 24/03/26

Synopsis: From rising horror star and award-winning author of ‘Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke’ comes a nightmarish, haunting, tech-Gothic thrill ride about sorrow, memory, and the unabashed complexity of love as a transgressive act.

After his husband dies, Simeon Link finds himself overcome by grief and seeking comfort in an unusual support group called The Wretches, who offer an addictive and dangerous source of relief. They introduce Simeon to a curious figure known as Porcelain Khaw—a man with the ability to let those who are grieving have one last intimate moment with their beloved...for a price.

Hallucinatory, fiendish, and destructively beautiful, Wretch transports us to a world where not everything is as it seems, and those we love may be the ones who haunt us most.

Thoughts:

Spoilers ensue, dear reader.

This is my first Eric LaRocca read and, to be honest, I was a little bit disappointed for the first 90% of the book. Not because of the story or LaRocca’s writing style – both of which I thoroughly enjoyed – but because it was marketed as a book for Clive Barker fans. I adore Clive Barker’s work and while queerness, philosophy, and transgression are all things both LaRocca and Barker explore in their work, I was expecting Barker levels of gore and visceral horror from early on. I didn’t get that for a long time, but the final 10% of the book is really where Barker’s influence shines and where LaRocca really lets loose.

The story definitely intrigued me from the start. Our protagonist Simeon is a queer man in his late 30s/early 40s who has recently lost his husband Jonathan to cancer. Simeon is grief-stricken. He can barely function, he is trawling through chatrooms for any semblance of connection and distraction, and is doing something many, many of us do when a relationship ends (regardless of the circumstances) – obsessively worry that you are not only losing and distorting your memory of your ex, but wondering if they ever really loved you in the way you thought they did.

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Much of the book’s discourse focuses on this, with Simeon lamenting throughout his narrative on grief, what it means to not only be queer but to come out later in life after being in a straight-passing relationship and fathering a son, and what love really is. Simeon is a fairly cynical man and that was clear from diary entries before his husband even passed, where he fantasises about hurting his husband and throwing his son into a pit of alligators at the zoo. He wonders if you can ever truely love a person, because to love them is to own them, possess them, and can love therefore ever be selfless? He laments on love as a cannibalistic thing, something that consumes both the one you love and your sense of self. It’s a very honest and often uncomfortable exploration that prompts the reader to consider if you agree with Simeon, or if it’s just his grief clouding how he sees the world.

The narrative shifts when Simeon finds himself in various chatrooms and online forums and discovers the existence of a man referred to as Porcelain Khaw, a man who seems to be more than human and who, most importantly, can take his sorrow away. Before fully diving into this fantastical option, Simeon attempts to join a grief group called The Wretches, under the advisement of someone he met in a chatroom under the name of babyfacexoxo. This group isn’t a traditional grief group. Rather, their goal is to reunite with their loved ones through photography, and specifically taking photographs of everyday objects that they feel resemble the soul or essence of the person they’ve lost. As someone who has been through gut-wrenching grief, I understand the desire to try anything to see that person again so despite Simeon’s constant and, in my opinion grating, philosophising, this part of the story ensures he remains relatable.

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When joining The Wretches inevitably doesn’t work, Simeon seeks out Porcelain Khaw under the advisement of a Wretches member who went through something similar. Simeon is given specific instructions to ensure the ritual works and he eventually reunites with his beloved Jonathan…well, sort of. I won’t spoil how the ritual goes, but it further cements LaRocca’s exploration of how memories can distort both our current reality and the reality of past events.

I was enjoying the novel up until this point, but when I realised that I only had twenty or so pages left, I was left frustrated – where was the horror? Grief and loneliness is, of course, its own kind of horror, but I was expecting something grotesque, something visceral. But then the novel ramps up drastically and the body horror is worth the wait. Not only for the Hellraiser-esq visuals and existential impact, but the betrayal at the novel’s climax. And, to make it even better, the novel’s narrative comes full circle, which is not only satisfying as a reader but it plays into all the ideas explored throughout the story.'Wretch: Or, the Unbecoming of Porcelain Khaw' is a short read and it is worth every page.