Rating: 
Summary: YOu mean there was stuff cut OUT of the other version?
Review: I've only read the out-of-print edition only, and I don't know if there's new/deleted material here or not in this "Author's Preferred Version". Furthermore, I don't think I WANT to know. The tagline to the other one was "The Grossest Book You'll Ever Read!" The Bighead might not be THE grossest book I've ever read (I've read some pretty nasty ones) but it's up there in the top 5. It takes a lot to shock me and make me sick but at least every 10 pages I would say out loud "Oh MAN!". Unlike, say, American Psycho, which is also disgusting but boring, you actually care about the characters in this book and what happens to them, especially the priest and the nympho. There is some really sick stuff in here, that makes me want to not run into either Ed Lee or John Pelam in a dark alley. But, if you can stomach it (and why would you buy it if you wanted something mild) it's a great read. There are images in the book, mainly the detailed exploits of the two hillbilly killers (who make the guys from Deliverance look like Mr. Rogers) that will stick with you for a looooooong time. I dare anyone to read it while eating and not spit out their food. Edward Lee and John Pelham are a great team, and I eagerly await their next collaboration...just not while I'm trying to eat...
Rating: 
Summary: Eeewww!
Review: If you are not familiar with Mr. Edward Lee and his weird, wacky brand of grue soaked fiction, "The Bighead" is an excellent book to cut your teeth on. The author of "City Infernal" and "Creekers" pulls out all the stops in this updated version of what must surely rank as one of the most disgusting, vile, and [disturbing] books of all time. There are certainly many [ugly] books out there in the market, but very few will prepare you for this nightmarish excursion into the backwoods of Appalachia. Where else will you see a drug addicted nymphomaniac, a Catholic priest with a love for unfiltered Lucky Strike cigarettes, booze, and a flair for spoken profanity, two hillbilly moonshiners who get their kicks violently torturing ... anyone who comes their way, and a hydrocephalic [person] whose never taken a bath, loves to eat human brains, and kills people in a most unpleasant way? The plot of "The Bighead" is about as straightforward as they come (for extreme gore novels, that is). Charity, a young woman who is a student at the University of Maryland, decides to return home to Luntville, a little town [right] in the middle of redneck country. Charity left Luntville as a small child when her aunt could no longer afford to take care of her. After Aunt Annie comes into some money, she wants Charity to come and visit. Charity, needing a ride into the sticks, manages to hitch a ride with Jerrica, a newspaper reporter who is planning to write a story about hillbilly country. Jerrica has her own problems; she is a nymphomaniac and recovering drug addict who needs men like most people need food and water. Unfortunately for Jerrica and Charity, Luntville has a few nasty secrets in store for them. Two killer rednecks, "Ricky" Caudill and Tritt Conner, are sweeping through the county on a crime spree that routinely involves ... unpleasant activities .... Then there are the constant references around town to the Bighead, a local myth about a hideously deformed [person] who stalks the countryside maiming and killing the local populace. Even Charity's Aunt Annie has a bizarre secret,...To top it all off, everybody starts having weird dreams about demons and long lost lovers. Luntville is definitely not the place for a relaxing break from city life. Thrown into this chaotic mix is Father Tom Alexander, an unorthodox priest sent to the area to restore a local abbey shrouded in its own dark secrets. Father Alexander must uncover the secrets in the abbey while dealing with the attentions of Jerrica, who falls for the priest in a big way. When Alexander starts having sick dreams about two nuns with some weird fetishes, the abbey and its secrets take on a completely new light. Then there is the Bighead, an unwashed seven-foot tall monstrosity with eating habits so disgusting they defy description here. Bighead, raised by an inbred hillbilly in the deep woods, is making a beeline for Luntville and a showdown with the other characters. The ending of the book takes so many weird twists and turns that one is left in open-mouthed awe. It is enough to say that the conclusion is not a happy one. Lee goes in heavy for atmosphere in this puker of a story. His narratives concerning Ricky and Tritt, as well as Bighead, involve writing in hillbilly accent. This works to some extent, although it quickly moves into the realm of tiresome as the book progresses. There is only so many "hails!" and "I'ses" a reader can take before the eyes start to roll. "The Bighead" is not for anyone with a weak stomach. The [abnormal] acts and ... violence will cause anyone not accustomed to such stuff to run full steam for the bathroom. Even the hardest stomachs will do a few acrobatics, especially during some of Ricky and Tritt's nighttime excursions. These two hillbilly murderers provide Lee with the opportunity to write his most graphic scenes, although the Bighead character also has his own ... moments in the sun. For fans of small press horror, this is must have reading. ... Those not familiar with Ed Lee may want to start with some of his lighter fare, such as "City Infernal" before diving into this nightmarish bloodbath of a novel. Overall, "The Bighead" is effective in some of its gritty depictions of the dark side of human nature, but the misogynistic undertones of much of the violence significantly lowers the quality of the story.
Rating:
Summary: Cheap Gutter Trash, But Oh So Worth It
Review: Now I love the word 'cornholin' as much as the next guy, but after 200 pages or so, you get a LITTLE worn from it. Still, even though Lee's splatterspunky images permeate the book, I thought it worked. Example of same sort of thing I felt DIDN'T work: CRASH by ballard -- i got 100 pages in and threw it down, exclaiming, 'if ONE MORE FINGER SLIDES TOWARD ONE MORE PERENIUM .... ! ' which of course many more did, and so i finally just quit over halfway through the book. Lee, however, does wacky things like ... provide interesting characters, and a weird mystery (Geraldine, I'm sorry!) that I kept thinking I had figured out. usually I don't do this, i simply read along. but i thought i had it all deduced, and then WHAMMO, ed hit me over the head at the end. apparently in the author's preferred version, the last 20 pages are significantly 'conceptually' different. i'm really curious what the original is like, since those 20 pages were my favorite. usually a climax lets me down a lot; this one was nothing like that. dunno if i'm commenting on CONTENT here really. hmm. let's see -- rape, murder, disgust, but also faith and devotedness all play a part. and sex. lots of sex. and some things i don't think are physically possible. i'll admit, i flinched a couple of times (the whole urethra thing ... ouchie). overall, a very fun book. enjoyable, and i read over half of it in one sitting i was so engrossed. or just grossed. :)
Rating: 
Summary: The splatterpunk equal to Dead Alive
Review: Of all the horror novels Ive read in the past 20 years (and thats a whole hell of a lot), this sick puppy will always stand out as the most extreme. This was the first Ed Lee novel I had read (now I pick up everything I can afford by him), and I'd been told that he was even more wicked than Rex Miller or Jack Ketchum (wich I found hard to believe, until I was 3 pages into THE BIGHEAD....). Reading it is almost like the first time you saw Evil Dead or Re-Animator, just being awe-struck that someone has taken the horror genre to this splattering chunk blowingly woderful extreme. It is so gawdamn over the top that at times it is as hilarious as it is revolting. If your already a fan of Ed Lee, I can't recommend this highly enough, and if you have not read him before, but have a strong stomach and a dark sense of humor, this is totally worth checking out. Edward Lee is the top of the rotten heap when it comes to extreme horror!
Rating:
Summary: Funny gross
Review: Splatterpunk God Edward Lee has won the tag line "The Grossest Book You'll Read!" for his novel "The Bighead." Forget "not for the faint of heart" and replace it with "better have a strong stomach." I'm embarrassed to say I laughed at something so completely depraved, since there is NOTHING sacred in this book, but it's so over the top it's down right funny at times. From the priest carrying on with the nympho prostitute and the 2 nuns with "unusual" fetishes he brings out of his dreams, to the hillbilly murderers who provide the most graphic scenes, to the Bighead, a hydrocephalic headed, never been washed, seven-foot tall, monstrosity who kills, maims and eats the brains of the locals, and the Luntville locals with secrets themselves, Lee hits them all. If you're looking for gross-out violence, hillbilly satire, sadistic sex, gore, and some great dialogue and characters, check out "The Bighead."
Rating:
Summary: How do I love Lee, let me count the ways
Review: The Bighead is one of those 'mutant in the backwoods' tales that screams to be glorified on film. I can already feel the cheese crawling off the movie version with barely restrained anticipation. As typical with Lee's more masterful pieces, this is a disgustingly gruesome, gross, violent, barf-inducing tale that the squeamish must stay away from at all costs. Only those with strong stomachs and iron wills should pick up this tasty morsel. The Bighead's grandpappy dies, and so Bighead heads out from the lower woods to find The World Outside, what his grandpappy always talked of. He is called the bighead because of his hydrocephaly: a head shaped like a watermelon, one eye the size of a grapefruit and the other the size of a tennis ball, an awl shaped mouth filled with jagged sharp teeth, and a low intellect that understands nothing but eating and mating, neither of which Bighead does daintily. With Bighead headed towards The World Outside, Charity Wells was heading back towards the town she was born in, a tiny place called Luntville nestled in the Appalachian mountains, heading home to be back with her dear Aunt Annie. Advertising for a ride share, she makes the journey with Jerrica Perry, a journalist assigned to write a four piece in depth article about the Appalachians. Charity and Jerrica both have problems, of an exact opposite nature. While Charity cannot seem to ever reach a second date with a boy, Jerrica is a sex addict who cannot stay with only one man, and who is never satisfied.
The two girls stay at Aunt Annie's boarding house, Jerrica starting on her article and Charity catching up on old times with Aunt Annie. Also staying at Aunt Annie's is Tom Alexander, an out of the ordinary Catholic Priest who has been sent by the Richmond Diocesan Pastoral Center to re-open the Wroxeter Abby. Once a hospice for terminally ill priests, the church had decided to reopen it as a rehab center for the priests who were accused of alcoholism, gambling addictions, and pedophilia. Tom is out of the ordinary because he does not follow the typical beaten path that one would expect of a priest; he smokes and drinks and cusses. Once a Army Ranger, a killer and rapist in the name of war, he swore off all his previous evils and became a priest. Tom is also a psychologist, which makes him the perfect choice for the task of establishing the rehab center. It also gets him and his embarrassing behavior out of the limelight of the church. Add in a couple of absolutely pustulant local boys named Dicky Caudill and Tritt 'Balls' Conner, who run moonshine over the state line and terrorize anyone who crosses their paths. Literally terrorize them; rape and murder are as common to Tritt as breathing. There are no holes barred with their depravity and viciousness. Take two pretty girls with problems, a renegade priest, two local human monsters, an odd Aunt with a past, a weird little cemetery, a haunted abbey, a bizarre lake, and an inhuman monster trekking cross country towards Luntville, stir them up all together and you have Lee's The Bighead. Add rape, murder, vomit, poop, disfigurement, dismemberment, cocaine addiction, sexx addiction, dirty little secrets, and a handyman named Goop Gooder, and you have an un-put-downable, gruesome read that will leave you both satisfied and disgusted. Despite how abhorrant the content is, Bighead is very well written and the storyline flows like a smooth river of blood, and there is some interesting artwork preceding each chapter by Erik Wilson. The Bighead is a five star nightmare that will leave you reaching for your barf bag. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: How do I love Lee, let me count the ways
Review: The Bighead is one of those �mutant in the backwoods� tales that screams to be glorified on film. I can already feel the cheese crawling off the movie version with barely restrained anticipation. As typical with Lee�s more masterful pieces, this is a disgustingly gruesome, gross, violent, barf-inducing tale that the squeamish must stay away from at all costs. Only those with strong stomachs and iron wills should pick up this tasty morsel. The Bighead�s grandpappy dies, and so Bighead heads out from the lower woods to find The World Outside, what his grandpappy always talked of. He is called the bighead because of his hydrocephaly: a head shaped like a watermelon, one eye the size of a grapefruit and the other the size of a tennis ball, an awl shaped mouth filled with jagged sharp teeth, and a low intellect that understands nothing but eating and mating, neither of which Bighead does daintily. With Bighead headed towards The World Outside, Charity Wells was heading back towards the town she was born in, a tiny place called Luntville nestled in the Appalachian mountains, heading home to be back with her dear Aunt Annie. Advertising for a ride share, she makes the journey with Jerrica Perry, a journalist assigned to write a four piece in depth article about the Appalachians. Charity and Jerrica both have problems, of an exact opposite nature. While Charity cannot seem to ever reach a second date with a boy, Jerrica is a sex addict who cannot stay with only one man, and who is never satisfied.
The two girls stay at Aunt Annie�s boarding house, Jerrica starting on her article and Charity catching up on old times with Aunt Annie. Also staying at Aunt Annie�s is Tom Alexander, an out of the ordinary Catholic Priest who has been sent by the Richmond Diocesan Pastoral Center to re-open the Wroxeter Abby. Once a hospice for terminally ill priests, the church had decided to reopen it as a rehab center for the priests who were accused of alcoholism, gambling addictions, and pedophilia. Tom is out of the ordinary because he does not follow the typical beaten path that one would expect of a priest; he smokes and drinks and cusses. Once a Army Ranger, a killer and rapist in the name of war, he swore off all his previous evils and became a priest. Tom is also a psychologist, which makes him the perfect choice for the task of establishing the rehab center. It also gets him and his embarrassing behavior out of the limelight of the church. Add in a couple of absolutely pustulant local boys named Dicky Caudill and Tritt �Balls� Conner, who run moonshine over the state line and terrorize anyone who crosses their paths. Literally terrorize them; rape and murder are as common to Tritt as breathing. There are no holes barred with their depravity and viciousness. Take two pretty girls with problems, a renegade priest, two local human monsters, an odd Aunt with a past, a weird little cemetery, a haunted abbey, a bizarre lake, and an inhuman monster trekking cross country towards Luntville, stir them up all together and you have Lee�s The Bighead. Add rape, murder, vomit, poop, disfigurement, dismemberment, cocaine addiction, sexx addiction, dirty little secrets, and a handyman named Goop Gooder, and you have an un-put-downable, gruesome read that will leave you both satisfied and disgusted. Despite how abhorrant the content is, Bighead is very well written and the storyline flows like a smooth river of blood, and there is some interesting artwork preceding each chapter by Erik Wilson. The Bighead is a five star nightmare that will leave you reaching for your barf bag. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: Love Lessons With The BigHead
Review: Urban legends come in all shapes and sizes and most, as we all well know, are based on an inkling of truth. It is, after all, the movement of information that produces misinformation, the passing down of tales that turns travesties into things that children scoff at before they journey off to sleep at night. The Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, they are all one and the same: myths based on fabrications and also on the 'real.' So, when Jerrica and Chastity, visiting a small town in the middle of nowhere, hear the story of The Bighead, a man-beast that devours brains and ravages the living, they laugh as well, knowing that this can't be truth. Sometimes, however, it is that shred of understanding, that cognitive portion spun into something seemingly nightmarish, which is truly of the most fiendish variety. In The Bighead, Edward Lee decides to pull out all the stops, trying to produce a tale about, amongst other things, a beastly creature that stalks the 'higher woods' on a journey toward understanding and toward fulfillment. After the death of its grandfather/keeper, it has found itself aimless, directionless, killing in the most depraved fashions but, at the same time, empty. It wants to know what lies beyond, in the realms its grandfather told it to avoid, so it begins wandering. And that's when it hears the voice that keeps saying one thing to it. Come. Herein, Edward produces a quality monstrosity, unleashing it on an unsuspecting world as it enjoys a variety of interactions that are amongst the most wretched types. Because of that, I was pleased. I was also pleased by some of the other characters as well, namely a priest that believes that profanity isn't a sin because it is communion and that also thinks that he sees and speaks with, and a few odds and ends that they inflict on others ' in the most gruesome manners. After a time, however, many of the characters and the things that plagued their lives, the little bits that should have made them stand out, began to bore me. For instance, with Jerrica, the uncontrollable libido in human form, there was a constant reminder of what she liked and what she wanted to do, to the point that my mind began fanning through pages to get to the reason behind the story: The Bighead. Other people followed the same methods as well, especially a pair of rurally-challenged killers roaming the land and killing between moonshine runs, with the horrific beginning to wear down and no longer shock this audience. Instead, the comparison of the human monsters versus the mysterious beast began to make me sometimes wonder when the true beast would emerge. That said, the ending of the book was interestingly odd and The Bighead and Charity, our human main character that seemed without purpose for most of the tale, began to play roles that were somewhat twisted. The Bighead's plight, that of being unsated in the realms of pleasure, found themselves manifesting ends and, despite the fact that many people died that had been worked on for so long without so much as a whimper, I found myself reading on and on. Why? Because there was a curve in the pitch and it hooked my gaze. For anyone thinking of reading the book, I am of a mixed mind in recommending it. First, I'll have to say that some of the book is pretty disturbing, crafting a lexicon of deeds that would make many quiver while journeying forward. Second, I feel I have to note that there is a repetition of ideas, that the hammer must strike the nail more times than I could contend with, and that this may cause of page skimming. Third, the beast itself, it may not be everything you might want from a monster and, in the end, it may disappoint you. That said, there are a few reasons to read it, namely if you are an Edward Lee reader already, if you want something that is overly graphic and just keeps giving and giving, and because the ending is interesting. If you aren't accustomed to the gore classification in books, perhaps you should begin somewhere else. If you are a new reader to Lee, you should also try another book on for size first, easing into the waters before going here. Otherwise, The Bighead might getcha!
Rating:
Summary: BIGHEAD -- BIG ON EVERYTHING BUT GOOD TASTE
Review: Welcome to the other side of subtle. Edward Lee, a cult figure of extreme fiction, pulls out all the stops and all the entrails he can in this testament to just how far one man can go in his writing. The novel concerns a mythic figure known as the Bighead, who preys upon backwoods tumbleweed folk, stealing their unborn children, virginity, and brains. Guided by a voice, his path will soon cross with those of a nymphomaniacal reporter, a rather profane priest, and two homicidal hicks. The book is an intense study in coal-black humor, reveling in sexual degradation and in-detail anatomical exploration without the benefit of anesthetic. The tag line reads, "The Grossest Book You'll Ever Read!" sparkling proof that there can be truth in advertising. Nothing has ever made me lose my appetite, but thinking back on the vile practices described in THE BIGHEAD about made me throw in the towel at dinner. There is something for everyone disinterested by that yawn-inducing thing some would call good taste in this novel. For all its intense and often hilarious sickening scenes, THE BIGHEAD manages to sport well-developed characters and plot twists that make for one of the best reads of 1997. Lee himself professes that writing the book almost induced him to vomiting. What further recommendation do you need? Read THE BIGHEAD, and see all thresholds of depravity well exceeded.
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