Rating: 
Summary: undeserving of the Nabokov comparison...
Review: ...but given the shared subject matter, I suppose the comparisons are inescapable. Having said that, Lolita is lyrical, poetic, humbling. This is just drivel. A pedestrian attempt to shock the unsuspecting masses with tales of prison rape and --wait for it-- scab eating. The writing style quickly grows tiresome and taxing, and since there is no story, no character development, no overarching theme, and (surprise, surprise) no conclusion, I had a hard time fininshing it. It is very had to care about anyone in this story, be they good or bad. And the writing about the sex is funny in a way I'm sure wasn't intended ("Bad Sex in Fiction" award?)
Anyway, if you want to be shocked and delighted at the same time, read Fermata by Nicholson Baker, or if you just want to be shocked, de Sade's Justine.
Rating: 
Summary: Product of a Childish Mind
Review: a note of warning, when hearing the words "shocking", "spectacular", "erotic" and the likes from the literati, immediately flee to the next book. Such was the case with a little known French piece (baise moi) and likewise holds for this book. Overall the book stinks of an academic exercise whereby the thin skins of its characters are loosely fitted to their phantom haunches. Not a difficult read in particular or hard to follow - very dry and flat. Go to the masters instead: houellebecq, ballard, selby, bataille, nabokov.
Rating: 
Summary: The best book I've ever read!
Review: I found "The End of Alice" to be one of the most interesting and unique books I have ever read. I thought it to be more of a grotesque love story than a horror story. Basiclly the first 13 chapters or so goes through out the narators correspondance with a 19 year old girl. The girl opens up her whole life to this 54 year old convict and tries to model herself after him. The convict eventually falls in love with her and his past comes back to haunt him. Around the 14th chapter things start to get interesting, this is where the misterious Alice comes in and everthing starts to fit together. By the end your expecting a death, but you'll be shocked by the gruesome details. "The End of Alice" is a book filled with love, jealousy, and most of all blood! I suggest it to everyone because it's so shocking yet so wonderful. Homes really knows how to catch someones attention
Rating:
Summary: Disgusting, but impossible to forget
Review: I read this 1996 novel by A.M. Homes when it was first published, but just thinking about it still gives me the shivers. It's a scary book, mostly because it forces the reader's mind to think in a sick and grotesque way.The narrator is a 54-year old pervert who serving time in Sing Sing for the rape and murder of a 12-year old girl. He has served 23 years already when he receives a letter from a 19-year old girl who is planning to seduce a 12-year old boy. A correspondence follows which forces the pedophile's memory to reveal the most shocking and lurid details of his crimes. This was easily one of the most disgusting books I ever read. The act of reading it made me nauseous, but yet I applaud the author for her courage to write it and do recommend it to the few brave souls who are willing to experience its horrific roller coaster ride. But be forewarned: the disgust and revulsion last long after the book is finished, and its essence is impossible to forget.
Rating:
Summary: Worst Book I Have Ever Read In My Life
Review: I would have to disagree with most of the other reviewers, who seem to be divided about equally into the "it's shocking, so it must be good" and the "it's shocking, so it must be bad" camps. Instead I would suggest a third "it's kinda but not really shocking, and even if it sometimes is, so what?" camp. Even on the level of pure prose, an aspect of the book most readers seem to agree is terrific, isn't really. Instead Homes presents an overblown and overwritten first-person narrative (by the killer) written in a silly and juvenile style I wouldn't have thought possible for any serious writer over the age of 20. Homes fails on every level in making the killer credible or believable as a character, especially a male character, yet still focuses on the killer's backstory instead of the much more interesting but disappointingly underdeveloped story of the girl he corresponds with (filtered through his psyche and mostly or entirely imagined by him). The post-modern narrative tricks are distracting and not very illuminating, more clever than smart, and even the ratio of genuine shocks to limp shock-for-its-own-sake ones, which can be credited only to Homes' constant grandstanding, is extremely unfavorable to say the least. The only reason this one gets three stars is because the girl's story really had some merit and (squandered) potential.
Rating:
Summary: Repulsive, Textual Vomit
Review: If Hannibal Lechter were to pen a cheap Harlequin romance novel, this is would be the outcome. The author's overuse of ridculous adjectives and graphic sexual deviance does absolutely nothing to create any semblance of a story. These characters are so ridiculously pathological that I found myself actually laughing out loud. Scab eating? Oh, please. Why didn't the author throw in a farting contest as well?
Not too mention the sexual shock factor is littered with phrases like "moony mounds", "loving piles" and "milky brown suede." Hey readers! There is more rear-action than a Super Bowl Tailgate party. Absolutely nothing redeeming about this book. It is gross, infantile and just plain ridiculous. Pass the vomit basin!
Rating: 
Summary: Art in the service of Lust
Review: It doesn't have to be Nabokov's classic "Lolita," and it stands quite firmly on its own merits. I found it both arousing and deeply disturbing, a heady combination to say the least. It's not often a novel flagged as "erotic" gets you thinking deeply about your own preconceptions and prejudices. I enjoyed it quite throughly as both a sensitive exploration of human sexuality and a horny read.
Rating:
Summary: You'll love it, or you'll loath it -- no middle ground . . .
Review: It's hard to know how to write a review of such a strange and disturbing book. I can start with the "abouts." It's about a convicted pedophile and killer who has been in prison in upstate New York for twenty-three years, a deeply bent personality, but also a tragic figure. He's nameless, an untrustworthy narrator with a confused memory of events and a sometimes very shaky grasp on reality. It's also about Alice, his twelve-year-old victim, who may have been to some extent complicit in her own death -- if the narrator's tale is to be believed. And it's about a college girl, also nameless, who corresponds with the prisoner, describing her own pedophilic activities and asking his advice -- although it's unclear how much of what she tells him actually happened, how much is her imagination, and how much is simply *his* imagination. Homes does an astonishing job of leading the reader to question what "normal" really means, and her masterful control of the narrative brings out the distasteful depths of all the characters. There are no "heroes" in this book, believe me -- not even the narrator when he wreaks a satisfying revenge on a tormentor in the shower. In many ways, to many readers, this will be a horror story, but the truly horrifying thing is that it could very easily all be true.
Rating:
Summary: Repulsive, Textual Vomit
Review: The End of Alice is not for everyone; especially those off-put by racy subject matter. Homes has a natural ease with which she writes about the most perverse (and at the same time normal) things that people go through. I would say it's a hard feat to achieve, writing about the life of an aging pedophile in prison or a young girl following in his footsteps on the otherside using such detail and intimacy, as if you could've been them in another life. I rarely read such horrible things written so beautifully and eloquently. The pedophile's thoughts and letters are very intelligent, lending a side to criminals that tends to be pushed to the back; that not all of them are mindless brutes. As many people have said, this is like a twisted, darker version of Lolita and it's well worth such praise. I highly recommend it to anyone wishing to engage themselves beyond the normal criminal/victim dramas.
Rating:
Summary: Aroused & Disgusted
Review: This book reads likes a dream. It's slow, dreamy and hard to follow in the beginning but eventually everything becomes clear. I applaud the author for touching on subjects that are not easy to write about. Everyone seems very uncomfortable dealing with issues that are taboo. There were moments when i had to reread what I had just read in order to confirm it was true. Pedophiles exist...that is reality. I admit this book is not for everyone...Take note the author is good freinds with American Psycho writer Bret Easton Ellis. When Chappy finally begins to tell the story of Alice...you forget that the Alice is twelve. It becomes a twisted love story.
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