Rating: 
Summary: SOUL NO LONGER LOST
Review: OK, so maybe my review won't tell you much about the book itself (I'll let the other reviews do that for me) but the rating should go way beyond 5 stars for this one. Buy this one, you will not regret it. I bought this about 6 years ago and it is still my favorite book of all time. This book influenced me to (temporarily) move to New Orleans which is the most awesome city in the world. I have read all her books (except "Plastic Jesus" but I shall soon change that) and Poppy Z. Brite can do no wrong.
Rating: 
Summary: disappointing
Review: After reading all the above reviews, I was expecting a lot more. I found it tedious, overwritten, not at all scary, and lacking in narrative drive. Stick with King.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best horror/vampire/all around novels ever!
Review: It's hard to believe that it's been almost 10 years since my friend Damien told me that he had just read the most disturbing novel of his life, one in which "loss of innocence" is suspect as the innocence is never so innocent, but the vampirism is more cruel than pretty.This book is about a teenage goth who is distinguished from other goths as he really is a vampire. Running away he hooks up with his family and they find that his taste for blood is more than teenage angst. Incest, bad births, betrayal, obsessed wanderers and vampires of utter horror is what you get with this book. Unlike the works of Anne Rice, the vampires possess a dark and horrible beauty but they don't pretend to be decent souls. They are thoroughly horrid people that shouldn't have survived for human lifetimes much less centuries. The twist of having vampires borne but eating their way out of their mothers is truly twisted as is most of this book. Rendered in some of the most lucid and poetic prose ever, you are enraptured and seduced by the deadly horror of this text. The only other vampire book that even comes close is Dark Dance by Tanith Lee. I read an interview with Poppy Z. Brite complaining that she doesn't want to be called the vampire writer, but this book is still her best work and she has yet to write a book that so balances the beautiful and the horrid. Exquisite Corpse might be more disturbing but it doesn't stay with you like this one.
Rating:
Summary: THE DARKSTYLE SUBLIME
Review: As an advance reviewer, I've read and reviewed (for Kirkus Reviews) all of Poppy Z. Brite and find LOST SOULS still her best. As with many first novelists, her heart sings more freely than it ever will again, without cunning and the need to equal herself. And there is no way any novelist can recapture that rapture sublime when first tearing the skin off her heart, although Thomas Wolfe is the exception since his second novel clearly equals his first. Poppy here carries the surreal grotesque into wild hillsides of humor and ghastliness, with hillbilly vampires wheeling through the South in a jalopy and swilling bottles of blood as if whisky. It's the prose though, green stars caught on black velvet, that equals the story's bizarrely rocketing skywhiz and trail of gold fire. Her second novel, DRAWING BLOOD, about R. Crumb and Charlie Parker, has its far, far out moments, and perhaps should not be compared with LOST SOULS since it compells more intellectually than the fireworks of LOST SOULS. Sure, as some reviewers above make clear, this novel's not for everyone. But those who like it will really see LOST SOULS for the unique work of art it is, one not to be duplicated even by its author. So far it's her highest point of excellence. The only horror or fantasy stylist to equal her is the early Kim Newman of THE NIGHT MAYOR, BAD DREAMS and ANNO DRACULA. That's high praise.
Rating: 
Summary: Tales of a Superhuman Gothic Teenage Vampire
Review: Lost Souls, a horror novel by Poppy Z. Brite, brings together the lost souls, children of the night, and crazy vagabond vampires in Missing Mile, North Carolina, where Ghost, an eccentric musician who sees secrets and phantoms that burden his existence, meets Nothing, a fan whose secrets are so dark, fascinating and horrifying Ghost at the same time, and Zilla, the seductive androgynous vagabond vampire who lives off blood and Chartreuse, and twisted attractions lead them to New Orleans. The strange but not brilliant plot would not have worked without the author's extremely complex characters, namely Nothing, who is a driving conflict himself, with Ghost and Zilla on either side of him, reflections of the balance between his innocence and dark vampiric nature. However, the characters were so perfectly dark that they were unrealistic, like superhuman gothic teenagers. Nothing, though lovely and complex, is a generic hybrid character produced by teenage angst and blood-drinking fantasy, characterized by black coats, clove cigarettes, altars, dried flowers, black make-up, and heavy wine. However, Poppy Z. Brite uses these objects as symbols and all other aspects of her writing to create a distinctively dark, almost tangible atmosphere. For example, New Orleans, full of death, magic, and Chartreuse, is used as a setting to reflect her vampire characters. This, combined with her thick and fluid poetic prose, is perfect for the horror genre. To describe a kiss between two characters, Brite writes, "The golden flavor on Steve's tongue, that was not Dixie beer. It was the taste of childhood summers long gone, and laced through it was the dark taste of fear" (300). This writing style is applied to her graphic descriptions that she isn't afraid to write, and balances out her writing with poetic beauty and grotesque imagery. Thus, a reader of Brite's work can not be fainthearted, and must have an appreciation for her poetic language, as well as the ability to identify with her lost souls.
Rating:
Summary: If you like grubby, depressing vampires...
Review: then this is the book for you. Everyone else should avoid this book like the plague. The characters are two dimensional, and the plot is pointless. The driving force behind this book is a pervasive sense of apathy, and the insistence that being a social outcast somehow makes one 'cooler than thou.' After finishing the book I felt more like I'd read a description of Poppy Z. Brite's attempts to combat her own insecurities than like I'd read a work of fiction intended to entertain.
Rating:
Summary: A goddess in the making
Review: At the time I bought this book, I was barely old enough to understand half the words in it. The cover art grabbed my attention, and reading the first few pages reeled me in. The rest was history. I bought it, and within three hours, had finished the book, along with four caramel mochas from Borders. My original copy is in pieces from over-reading... and I couldn't bear to part with it, though I've gone through two others. Since that day in the bookstore, I've been an avid Poppy Z. Brite fan, and devoted follower. I've read everything of hers I could get my hands on, but Lost Souls remains my favorite by far, followed in close second by Drawing Blood.
Rating:
Summary: excelnt work
Review: Poppy Z. Brite is a masterful storyteller. She has created people so in depth that you can instantly fall in love or hate them in an instant. This is a must read for any erotic horror fan.
Rating:
Summary: Did nothing for me
Review: Unpleasent and unsympathetic characters doing nasty things to one another do not a horror tale make. Let me give this much as an example - a self-pitying rapist is the "tragic hero" of this sordid story. I could not finish it.
Rating:
Summary: Wow....
Review: This book made me question human nature and it brought out qualities in me that deeply intrigue me... I suggest everyone reads it, so they might be able to imagine Zillah's capturing eyes or Ghosts astounding visions and foresight Best book i've read, by far.
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