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Bloodlust: The Unsavoury Tale of Alexander Pearce, the Convict Cannibal
Powerful and relentless, the hunger pursues you like a wild beast without respite. You can resist it for hours, even days, but it eventually overwhelms your reason with its desperate desire to be satisfied. Eat or be eatenthat was the terrible choice facing the eight convict bolters from Macquarie Harbour, Australia's most remote and brutal penal colony. Lost and starving after a week in a wilderness no white man had ever crossed, order breaks down when one finally gives voice to their secret thoughts, "I could eat a piece of a man." Soon betrayal, lies, and murder reign and the convicts start to fear each other more than the spears of the Aborigines. Who'll be served next? Will any of them reach the settled areas alive? Bloodlust is the story of this terrible journey as seen through the eyes of Irishman Alexander Pearce, who discovers what happens when men are pushed past their limits and what lies in the dark shadows beyond.
396 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2008
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January 31, 2022
First of all not even that good. I found the prose kinda bland, the framing narrative unnecessary, and I was uncomfortable with the sexism and homophobia and the way rape was presented, as well as the racism inherent in telling convict stories. Not saying that these should be left out, as of course it is accurate to the time, but these aspects seemed fairly unexamined in Bloodlust.
But I live in lutruwita/Tasmania, and I’m obsessed with Alexander Pearce and cannibalism in general, and im the kind of gay person who loves homophobic fiction so oh my GOD I loved this.
Trigger warning for a lot of discussion of rape from here on out. And spoilers I guess.
First of all. I have to get into the gay shit. From the beginning I was struck by how Bloodlust presented gay lust and a craving for human flesh in a similar way. I’m not entirely condemning it. Like I said, I’m gay, and I love depraved shit in fiction, so I really kinda loved this. I’ve always been fascinated by the intersection of homosexuality and cannibalism. I’m unfortunately obsessed with Jeffrey Dahmer and Armin Meiwes, and to name a fictional example, NBC’s Hannibal. In The New Evil by Michael H. Stone and Gary Bucato, a small case study found that among 53 cases of cannibalism, 24 were bisexual men, and 23 homosexual men. From the book, “If this distribution were corroborated in a larger survey, it would point to something strange and not yet fully understood about pathological cannibalism.” I don’t know if Nick Bleszynski took inspiration from this idea for Bloodlust, but it seems possible!
All of the gay characters in Bloodlust are evil to some extent. There is a hint of this idea in Cuthbertson’s “unnatural tastes” – his sadistic nature and love of torturing convicts. Then there is James Dalway, who attempts to rape Alexander Pearce after he arrives on Sarah Island. These examples tie homosexuality to the harmful/violent acts of torture and rape.
There is a comparison to be made between survival cannibalism and sex acts between men in the absence of women. In both, a man must ‘make do’, and is driven by a kind of hunger. Indeed, in Bloodlust, the line between hunger for flesh and lust for flesh is very blurry. “Mollies”, “young, slim, pretty boys who could be mistaken for women” are described as “easy meat for the depraved”(p. 95). After Dalway’s attempted rape of Alexander, it is said that he “was a prisoner of his terrible urges and would persist until he nailed [Alexander]”(p. 99). This phrase is easily mirrored with Alexander’s hunger for human flesh: “[cannibalistic tendencies] took ahold of [Alexander] and [he] started to crave human flesh”(p. 47), “that terrible hunger will return again, but stronger than before” (p. 50). Adding onto this theme was the way verbs such as “nail” and “take” were used interchangeably to mean “kill” and “fuck”. There are other examples of a conflation of sex and murder/cannibalism in Bloodlust, but this is a goodreads review and not a real essay, so although I’m really obsessed with this, I can’t be bothered listing every one of them.
Then there is Greenhill and Travers, a gay couple presented as a united front who commit depraved acts together. Rope (1948) kind of thing. Murder husbands, if you will. (I think it’s kinda really funny that Bleszynski headcanoned these random real convicts as gay, just to add some more drama). The two of them have experience with cannibalism before the events of the book, and their gay relationship is presented by Alexander as a deviation, with the tone of gay relations having already been set by the descriptions of rape earlier in the book. It is Greenhill who first seriously suggests killing and eating one of the group’s number, and he and Travers partake eagerly when it does happen, even squabbling over which of them gets to eat the heart of Dalton. In the eat, Greenhill “bit into it like an apple” (p. 177). Cannibalism is consistently presented as animal (Greenhill “got down on all fours like a dog” to dissect Dalton’s body), primal, savage.
The death of Travers presents a rare sympathetic depiction of homosexual love. After Travers is bitten by a snake, Greenhill insists on bringing him with them for some days, and both are reluctant to kill him next. Only three men are left – Greenhill, Travers, and Alexander Pearce, and Greenhill and Travers had hoped to kill and eat Alexander next, saving themselves. But the snake wound is killing Travers, and finally it is agreed that he should be the next to die. “Without shame, they embraced one last time and Greenhill kissed him full on the mouth. I had always thought of such relationships between men as purely physical, satisfying some bestial need without ever considering that there could be any real tenderness or affection. This parting was as emotional as any I’d seen between a husband and wife or star-crossed lovers.” (p. 220). This tender moment (also illustrating the idea of gay love as a ‘bestial need’, again making it violent and similar to Alexander’s craving for human flesh) is immediately followed by violence, when Greenhill, quickly and cleanly, murders a sobbing Travers with the blunt end of the axe. Greenhill has a moment of quiet pain, and then “neatly [butchers] his lover’s body” (p. 221). The mens’ relationship is ended with one of the pair consuming the flesh of the other. But Greenhill is not allowed much time to grieve. Now, there are only two left, and either Alexander or Greenhill must die next.
With Travers’ death, for Alexander, finally “the prospect of eating human flesh didn’t faze [him] at all.” (p. 221). In fact, his stomach grumbles and his mouth waters. He states that his descent is now complete.
Alexander’s cannibalism is presented as a descent, a spiral into depravity, brought on by exceptional circumstances, and then solidified into a bloodlust that holds him in its grasp even when he has other food to eat. With this in mind, Alexander’s own homosexual lust, when it appears, is very interesting. And pretty homophobic. But hey.
So, Alexander is caught after over 100 days of freedom. He is caught with a gang of sheep stealers. These thieves are sentenced to death, but Alexander’s story of cannibalism is not believed – the officials believe he is covering for his mates still at large. He is sent back to Macquarie harbour, but he ends up escaping again, this time with one other convict, a young man by the name of Thomas Cox.
This time, some things are different – Alexander is somewhat an unwilling escapee, he is afraid that the journey will again come to cannibalism. But the other difference is that Cox has fishing equipment, giving them a source of food, although not necessarily a reliable one. But after only a few days, Alexander’s bloodlust makes an appearance, and it does so after he has raped Cox twice.
To break from the more formal tone of this review so far. holy shit LMAO NICK MADE ALEXANDER PEARCE GAY!?!?!????? i lost my MIND bro WTF. gay alexander pearce. literally froze for a few minutes to process what i was reading. never expected this shit when i bought this book. anyway.
So Alexander’s gay lust rises as he watches Cox from behind as they walk. “I felt the heat and that terrible aching spread up from my boots to my loins” (p. 325) really feels like another parallel between hunger for flesh and lust for flesh. That night, Alexander rapes Cox. In the aftermath, this is compared to the cannibalism of Alexander’s last escape: “Regardless of what had just happened, the cold and the lack of fire forced us to huddle together for warmth. In such situationsm survival must come before anything. I’d learned that lesson well on my last foray.” (p. 326). The next day, Alexander is struck by an urge to kill Cox so strong that he only resists it until the day after that. This paragraph really compounds the theme of homosexual lust and bloodlust: “I had violated Cox’s body and now I was sizing him up as my next meal. He was walking just ahead, oblivious to the murderous intentions that were rapidly overtaking me. As I looked at his muscular arms and legs, my mouth watered as the memory of the taste of tender pink meat beneath the skin came flooding back to me.” (p. 327). The next few pages follow this theme.
Alexander then kills and eats Thomas Cox, even though he still has bread, pork, and fish with him. This is a very intense climax in the book – Alexander giving into desire and raping Cox, and then giving into bloodlust and murdering him, despite there being no need for him to find other food. Alexander cries after killing Cox, but it is now, truly, that his descent is complete. He is caught soon afterwards, and this time his cannibalism is confirmed by officials, because he has a piece of Cox’s thigh in his pocket (even this could be read as sexual, with it being described as a “bulge in [his] pocket” (p. 336)), and he brings them to his corpse. Alexander is then sentenced to death.
Wooo okay! I don’t know exactly what Bleszynski’s intention with all of this was. I’m sure it was the average ramblings of a cishet male historical fiction author. It’s really all very homophobic. But it made my reading of this book that much more intense. Like I said, I like evil fiction. Love sex and violence!
Okay so, other aspects. Kinda really hated the ~devil made them do it~ aspect. I see cannibalism and murder as very human. There is always a tendency to label violent criminals as inhuman, but I think they are exactly the opposite, and are intensely human. I’m much more compelled by the idea of a human being driven to cannibalism by something inside them, rather than the cop out of oooo some evil outside force made them do it!!!
I’m not going to go every aspect of this book I had thoughts on, because I’m already exhausted by writing the above lol. Again disappointed with the very unexamined racism thoughout it all. Also the idea of the forests of lutruwita being home to some evil primal force like… yeah this place isn’t for you… as much as I call this place home, Bloodlust definitely presented the awful idea that the British people who came here were entitled to the land, entitled to be comfortable here and to farm European crops and all that. Eugh.
Uhmmm yeah loved the lutruwita setting duh… very familiar very cosy. I’ve only read another 3 or so books set here and I always love it… like yes that’s where I live :D! I know all these places! Omg also, in the acknowledgments Bleszynski mentions a man at the Penitentiary Chapel in nipaluna. Now, I have a very specific memory in primary school of going to the Penitentiary Chapel and being told by one of the guides a factoid that the nooses used to hang convicts had thirteen loops – twelve for the jury and one for the judge. And guess which fact Alexander recites near the end of the book!! I feel sure that Nick Bleszynski and I got this from the same source haha.
Oh also perhaps there was a reference to the song Words From the Executioner to Alexander Pearce by the Drones near the end!!!
"I'll tell [the executioner] that I bear him no judge; he wasn't the one who decided my fate, just the instrument ensuring my dispatch." (p. 359).
"Well, the chaplain loves you death row boys / more than he loves me / as though I have the choice" (Words From the Executioner to Alexander Pearce, the Drones).
At the end of it all, this is a mid-tier historical fiction that I enjoyed because of its subject, themes and because I’m Tasmanian. Check it out if you’re interested!
But I live in lutruwita/Tasmania, and I’m obsessed with Alexander Pearce and cannibalism in general, and im the kind of gay person who loves homophobic fiction so oh my GOD I loved this.
Trigger warning for a lot of discussion of rape from here on out. And spoilers I guess.
First of all. I have to get into the gay shit. From the beginning I was struck by how Bloodlust presented gay lust and a craving for human flesh in a similar way. I’m not entirely condemning it. Like I said, I’m gay, and I love depraved shit in fiction, so I really kinda loved this. I’ve always been fascinated by the intersection of homosexuality and cannibalism. I’m unfortunately obsessed with Jeffrey Dahmer and Armin Meiwes, and to name a fictional example, NBC’s Hannibal. In The New Evil by Michael H. Stone and Gary Bucato, a small case study found that among 53 cases of cannibalism, 24 were bisexual men, and 23 homosexual men. From the book, “If this distribution were corroborated in a larger survey, it would point to something strange and not yet fully understood about pathological cannibalism.” I don’t know if Nick Bleszynski took inspiration from this idea for Bloodlust, but it seems possible!
All of the gay characters in Bloodlust are evil to some extent. There is a hint of this idea in Cuthbertson’s “unnatural tastes” – his sadistic nature and love of torturing convicts. Then there is James Dalway, who attempts to rape Alexander Pearce after he arrives on Sarah Island. These examples tie homosexuality to the harmful/violent acts of torture and rape.
There is a comparison to be made between survival cannibalism and sex acts between men in the absence of women. In both, a man must ‘make do’, and is driven by a kind of hunger. Indeed, in Bloodlust, the line between hunger for flesh and lust for flesh is very blurry. “Mollies”, “young, slim, pretty boys who could be mistaken for women” are described as “easy meat for the depraved”(p. 95). After Dalway’s attempted rape of Alexander, it is said that he “was a prisoner of his terrible urges and would persist until he nailed [Alexander]”(p. 99). This phrase is easily mirrored with Alexander’s hunger for human flesh: “[cannibalistic tendencies] took ahold of [Alexander] and [he] started to crave human flesh”(p. 47), “that terrible hunger will return again, but stronger than before” (p. 50). Adding onto this theme was the way verbs such as “nail” and “take” were used interchangeably to mean “kill” and “fuck”. There are other examples of a conflation of sex and murder/cannibalism in Bloodlust, but this is a goodreads review and not a real essay, so although I’m really obsessed with this, I can’t be bothered listing every one of them.
Then there is Greenhill and Travers, a gay couple presented as a united front who commit depraved acts together. Rope (1948) kind of thing. Murder husbands, if you will. (I think it’s kinda really funny that Bleszynski headcanoned these random real convicts as gay, just to add some more drama). The two of them have experience with cannibalism before the events of the book, and their gay relationship is presented by Alexander as a deviation, with the tone of gay relations having already been set by the descriptions of rape earlier in the book. It is Greenhill who first seriously suggests killing and eating one of the group’s number, and he and Travers partake eagerly when it does happen, even squabbling over which of them gets to eat the heart of Dalton. In the eat, Greenhill “bit into it like an apple” (p. 177). Cannibalism is consistently presented as animal (Greenhill “got down on all fours like a dog” to dissect Dalton’s body), primal, savage.
The death of Travers presents a rare sympathetic depiction of homosexual love. After Travers is bitten by a snake, Greenhill insists on bringing him with them for some days, and both are reluctant to kill him next. Only three men are left – Greenhill, Travers, and Alexander Pearce, and Greenhill and Travers had hoped to kill and eat Alexander next, saving themselves. But the snake wound is killing Travers, and finally it is agreed that he should be the next to die. “Without shame, they embraced one last time and Greenhill kissed him full on the mouth. I had always thought of such relationships between men as purely physical, satisfying some bestial need without ever considering that there could be any real tenderness or affection. This parting was as emotional as any I’d seen between a husband and wife or star-crossed lovers.” (p. 220). This tender moment (also illustrating the idea of gay love as a ‘bestial need’, again making it violent and similar to Alexander’s craving for human flesh) is immediately followed by violence, when Greenhill, quickly and cleanly, murders a sobbing Travers with the blunt end of the axe. Greenhill has a moment of quiet pain, and then “neatly [butchers] his lover’s body” (p. 221). The mens’ relationship is ended with one of the pair consuming the flesh of the other. But Greenhill is not allowed much time to grieve. Now, there are only two left, and either Alexander or Greenhill must die next.
With Travers’ death, for Alexander, finally “the prospect of eating human flesh didn’t faze [him] at all.” (p. 221). In fact, his stomach grumbles and his mouth waters. He states that his descent is now complete.
Alexander’s cannibalism is presented as a descent, a spiral into depravity, brought on by exceptional circumstances, and then solidified into a bloodlust that holds him in its grasp even when he has other food to eat. With this in mind, Alexander’s own homosexual lust, when it appears, is very interesting. And pretty homophobic. But hey.
So, Alexander is caught after over 100 days of freedom. He is caught with a gang of sheep stealers. These thieves are sentenced to death, but Alexander’s story of cannibalism is not believed – the officials believe he is covering for his mates still at large. He is sent back to Macquarie harbour, but he ends up escaping again, this time with one other convict, a young man by the name of Thomas Cox.
This time, some things are different – Alexander is somewhat an unwilling escapee, he is afraid that the journey will again come to cannibalism. But the other difference is that Cox has fishing equipment, giving them a source of food, although not necessarily a reliable one. But after only a few days, Alexander’s bloodlust makes an appearance, and it does so after he has raped Cox twice.
To break from the more formal tone of this review so far. holy shit LMAO NICK MADE ALEXANDER PEARCE GAY!?!?!????? i lost my MIND bro WTF. gay alexander pearce. literally froze for a few minutes to process what i was reading. never expected this shit when i bought this book. anyway.
So Alexander’s gay lust rises as he watches Cox from behind as they walk. “I felt the heat and that terrible aching spread up from my boots to my loins” (p. 325) really feels like another parallel between hunger for flesh and lust for flesh. That night, Alexander rapes Cox. In the aftermath, this is compared to the cannibalism of Alexander’s last escape: “Regardless of what had just happened, the cold and the lack of fire forced us to huddle together for warmth. In such situationsm survival must come before anything. I’d learned that lesson well on my last foray.” (p. 326). The next day, Alexander is struck by an urge to kill Cox so strong that he only resists it until the day after that. This paragraph really compounds the theme of homosexual lust and bloodlust: “I had violated Cox’s body and now I was sizing him up as my next meal. He was walking just ahead, oblivious to the murderous intentions that were rapidly overtaking me. As I looked at his muscular arms and legs, my mouth watered as the memory of the taste of tender pink meat beneath the skin came flooding back to me.” (p. 327). The next few pages follow this theme.
Alexander then kills and eats Thomas Cox, even though he still has bread, pork, and fish with him. This is a very intense climax in the book – Alexander giving into desire and raping Cox, and then giving into bloodlust and murdering him, despite there being no need for him to find other food. Alexander cries after killing Cox, but it is now, truly, that his descent is complete. He is caught soon afterwards, and this time his cannibalism is confirmed by officials, because he has a piece of Cox’s thigh in his pocket (even this could be read as sexual, with it being described as a “bulge in [his] pocket” (p. 336)), and he brings them to his corpse. Alexander is then sentenced to death.
Wooo okay! I don’t know exactly what Bleszynski’s intention with all of this was. I’m sure it was the average ramblings of a cishet male historical fiction author. It’s really all very homophobic. But it made my reading of this book that much more intense. Like I said, I like evil fiction. Love sex and violence!
Okay so, other aspects. Kinda really hated the ~devil made them do it~ aspect. I see cannibalism and murder as very human. There is always a tendency to label violent criminals as inhuman, but I think they are exactly the opposite, and are intensely human. I’m much more compelled by the idea of a human being driven to cannibalism by something inside them, rather than the cop out of oooo some evil outside force made them do it!!!
I’m not going to go every aspect of this book I had thoughts on, because I’m already exhausted by writing the above lol. Again disappointed with the very unexamined racism thoughout it all. Also the idea of the forests of lutruwita being home to some evil primal force like… yeah this place isn’t for you… as much as I call this place home, Bloodlust definitely presented the awful idea that the British people who came here were entitled to the land, entitled to be comfortable here and to farm European crops and all that. Eugh.
Uhmmm yeah loved the lutruwita setting duh… very familiar very cosy. I’ve only read another 3 or so books set here and I always love it… like yes that’s where I live :D! I know all these places! Omg also, in the acknowledgments Bleszynski mentions a man at the Penitentiary Chapel in nipaluna. Now, I have a very specific memory in primary school of going to the Penitentiary Chapel and being told by one of the guides a factoid that the nooses used to hang convicts had thirteen loops – twelve for the jury and one for the judge. And guess which fact Alexander recites near the end of the book!! I feel sure that Nick Bleszynski and I got this from the same source haha.
Oh also perhaps there was a reference to the song Words From the Executioner to Alexander Pearce by the Drones near the end!!!
"I'll tell [the executioner] that I bear him no judge; he wasn't the one who decided my fate, just the instrument ensuring my dispatch." (p. 359).
"Well, the chaplain loves you death row boys / more than he loves me / as though I have the choice" (Words From the Executioner to Alexander Pearce, the Drones).
At the end of it all, this is a mid-tier historical fiction that I enjoyed because of its subject, themes and because I’m Tasmanian. Check it out if you’re interested!
April 7, 2010
This book is very disturbing (possibly because i live in tasmania, where the book is based) but brilliant at the same time! A great book based on a true story. I recommend it to everyone :)
February 10, 2013
Ok... I admit. When I purchased this book I did not realize it was fiction. I knew the story about Alexander Pearce from reading about Australian history. This is a true event, but this book is a fictional account of what happened during the convicts trek across unexplored lands in Australia. I have only read one other book classified as "historical fiction"... and I will say that both were still entertaining. For me, not being a fan of fiction, that's really saying something. The events in this book DID happen. The author just threw in conversations and details that will never be known. But some of the details were admitted by Pearce after his recapture. So technically, it is true history mixed with fiction. But still a good book.
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