At Dark, I Become Loathsome Summary, Characters and Themes

At Dark, I Become Loathsome by Eric LaRocca is a deeply unsettling, emotionally raw psychological horror novel that explores grief, guilt, and the monstrous nature of suffering. 

With LaRocca’s signature lyrical prose and unflinching depictions of psychological decay, the book chronicles a grieving father’s descent into ritualistic self-punishment after the loss of his wife to cancer and the mysterious disappearance of his son. Through surreal hallucinations, intimate client rituals involving consensual burial, and emotionally charged relationships, the narrator confronts the depths of his trauma. The novel blurs the lines between reality, madness, and transformation, immersing readers in a haunting meditation on what it means to love, lose, and live with the unbearable.

Summary

The story follows an unnamed narrator, a grief-stricken man devastated by the death of his wife, Pema, from cancer. His son, Bailey, has also vanished under mysterious circumstances.

By day, the narrator appears to function. But at night, he claims a transformation—becoming something loathsome and alien to himself.

To cope, he performs strange psychological rituals for paying clients. The most extreme of these involves burying someone alive in a coffin for thirty minutes.

These rituals are consensual and non-sexual. They aim to provoke catharsis through symbolic death and rebirth.

A female client is the first we see undergo this experience. Afterward, she speaks of “nothingness” during the burial and seems grateful—forever altered by the process.

The narrator provides aftercare with emotional distance, but we begin to see how much these sessions cost him. He acts as both a guide and a caretaker, but emotionally, he’s barely holding on.

His mind frequently drifts to his wife’s agonizing decline and his son’s disappearance. The grief is corrosive.

Detective Cloade arrives with chilling news—Bailey’s hat has been found, stained with blood. The suggestion of his death devastates the narrator.

Spiraling, he isolates himself and dives into disturbing content online. A particular blog by a man named Tandy—who is aroused by his husband’s cancer—captures his attention.

Tandy’s grotesque emotional reactions mirror the narrator’s own self-loathing. He begins to see himself more as a monster than a man.

Hallucinations plague him. Pema appears in his dreams, at once tender and accusatory.

Bailey appears, disturbingly, dressed in his mother’s wedding gown. These surreal images reflect the narrator’s fractured identity and warped perceptions of masculinity and grief.

Eventually, a new client reaches out under the name “masterjinx76.” Their online conversation quickly becomes emotionally intimate.

Jinx shares a surreal allegory involving BDSM and psychological manipulation. This story parallels the narrator’s own role as both caretaker and tormentor.

Drawn in by Jinx’s vulnerability, the narrator arranges a ritual session. On the day they meet, he is struck by Jinx’s beauty and emotional transparency.

The connection between them feels profound, though unsettling. The lines between client and confidant blur rapidly.

Jinx signs the waiver and writes a final letter—his symbolic goodbye. The ritual is about to begin.

Just before being sealed into the coffin, Jinx makes a devastating confession. He claims to have abducted Bailey.

The narrator is crushed under the weight of this revelation. Grief, rage, confusion—all collide.

Jinx reveals he is terminally ill and came to the narrator to be buried—to die. But the narrator refuses him this escape.

Instead, he leaves Jinx alive and suffering, cursed to endure. It’s a cruel act, shaped by emotional torment rather than justice.

Unable to live with what he’s done, the narrator returns to the site. Jinx is still alive.

He exhumes him in a moment that might be redemption or merely guilt. Either way, something has shifted.

The novel ends with the narrator still haunted. He’s rescued a man he hates, but whether he’s saved himself is uncertain.

At Dark, I Become Loathsome is a meditation on pain, identity, and the fragile line between care and cruelty. It leaves readers unsettled, questioning how far we’ll go to escape—or embrace—the darkness within.

Characters

The Narrator

The narrator of At Dark, I Become Loathsome is a deeply complex character, marked by profound emotional trauma and an intense inner conflict. He is a man who has been shattered by the losses of his wife, Pema, and his son, Bailey.

These personal tragedies leave him emotionally crippled, and the aftermath manifests in his bizarre and macabre work. At night, the narrator transforms, retreating into a version of himself that becomes alienated and estranged from society.

His involvement in performing a ritual where clients are buried alive for catharsis or emotional exploration represents his effort to escape his personal grief and guilt. This is not merely a physical act; it is symbolic of his struggle with mortality, loss, and his desire to bring closure to his own deep-rooted emotional wounds.

His connection to clients is framed by his own inner decay, an external manifestation of his internal darkness. His self-loathing is evident in his interactions, particularly in his thoughts about his son’s disappearance and his own perceived failure as a father.

Pema

Pema, the narrator’s late wife, serves as both a memory and a haunting presence. She died from cancer, and while she is physically absent, she continues to influence the narrator’s psyche.

Through flashbacks and hallucinations, Pema’s character embodies both critique and compassion for the narrator. She represents the love the narrator lost but also a symbol of the unresolved guilt and sadness that still lingers.

Their conversations, which occur in the form of fragmented memories or spectral visions, show a relationship filled with emotional depth, but also tension. Pema criticizes the narrator’s withdrawal from life and his inability to move forward.

She serves as a mirror to his unresolved grief, a reminder of everything he has lost.

Bailey

Bailey, the narrator’s missing son, is not physically present in the narrative but is one of the central emotional drivers of the story. His disappearance and presumed death weigh heavily on the narrator, creating an intense feeling of guilt and helplessness.

Bailey’s image haunts the narrator in visions, and his absence is felt throughout the novel, exacerbating the narrator’s self-loathing and grief. The mystery of Bailey’s disappearance also plays a significant role in propelling the plot, especially when Jinx, a new client, reveals a shocking claim that he was the one responsible for Bailey’s abduction.

Bailey’s final moments, which the narrator cannot fully process or accept, contribute to the emotional collapse the narrator experiences. His absence is both a source of torment and a key driver for the narrator’s search for closure and meaning.

Jinx (“masterjinx76”)

Jinx, or “masterjinx76,” is a pivotal character who enters the story later in the novel. He reaches out to the narrator for the burial ritual, and over time, they form a psychologically charged connection.

On the surface, Jinx is a client seeking catharsis, but as the ritual unfolds, he reveals himself to be a more complex figure. He claims to have abducted Bailey, a revelation that sends shockwaves through the narrator’s fragile psyche.

Jinx’s confession represents a critical turning point in the narrator’s emotional journey, forcing him to confront his unresolved grief and rage. Jinx, who is also dying, comes to the narrator seeking an escape from his pain, but the narrator, instead of granting him death, decides to let him suffer.

Jinx’s role in the story, however, goes beyond that of a mere antagonist—he embodies themes of manipulation, trauma, and transformation, mirroring the narrator’s own internal conflicts.

Detective Cloade

Detective Cloade is a minor but significant character who acts as a messenger of grim news for the narrator. He brings the devastating update about Bailey’s disappearance, reporting that the blood near the missing child’s hat suggests a fatal injury.

Cloade’s role in the story serves to further deepen the narrator’s emotional collapse, as he is forced to confront the brutal reality of his son’s likely death. Cloade’s presence underscores the cold, external forces of law and order that stand in stark contrast to the narrator’s internal chaos.

His investigation is a reminder of the outside world that continues to move forward, while the narrator remains trapped in his own personal spiral of guilt and grief.

Through these characters, At Dark, I Become Loathsome explores complex themes of loss, guilt, trauma, and the search for catharsis. Each character serves as a mirror to the narrator’s inner turmoil, and together they weave a story that is as much about self-destruction as it is about the fragile hope for redemption.

Themes

The Nature of Trauma and Its Psychological Strain

One of the most prominent themes in At Dark, I Become Loathsome is the nature of trauma and the profound psychological strain it inflicts on an individual. The protagonist, a man marked by the grief of losing his wife, Pema, and his son, Bailey, to both death and disappearance, experiences an overwhelming sense of emotional fragmentation.

This trauma leads him to seek solace and a twisted form of catharsis through rituals involving the emotional vulnerability of others. These rituals, while ostensibly about offering psychological release to his clients, serve as a mirror to his own unresolved grief and guilt.

His transformation into a darker, more alienated version of himself at night speaks to how trauma warps perception and identity. The psychological toll is not just internal but also external, manifesting in his increasingly distorted view of human relationships and intimacy.

In this sense, LaRocca delves into the way trauma can transform one’s soul, creating a division between the public persona and the private anguish. Ultimately, it culminates in self-loathing and a loss of moral grounding.

The Ambiguity of Mercy and Punishment

Another theme that resonates deeply throughout the novel is the ambiguity of mercy and punishment. The protagonist’s rituals are rooted in a distorted sense of compassion, in which he offers his clients what he believes is a form of release, a way of absolving them of their internal suffering.

However, his own experiences with grief and loss complicate his views on what constitutes true mercy. When he encounters “masterjinx76,” the man who claims responsibility for his son’s disappearance, the narrator faces a moral paradox.

The traditional notion of justice, which might dictate vengeance or punishment, becomes blurred. Instead of offering death to Jinx as an act of mercy, the narrator condemns him to a life of suffering, choosing to twist his philosophy into one of prolonged torment rather than release.

This action speaks volumes about the narrator’s internal conflict—his struggle to reconcile his desire for closure and justice with his inability to let go of his grief. LaRocca uses this moral quandary to illustrate how the desire for vengeance can consume a person, distorting their understanding of mercy and punishment in ways that feel both justified and cruel at the same time.

The Loss of Identity and the Dangers of Self-Destruction

As the narrator becomes further ensnared in his rituals and emotional entanglements, another theme emerges: the loss of identity and the dangers of self-destruction. The protagonist’s spiral into a world where he allows his trauma to define him ultimately leads to his sense of self dissolving.

He begins to see himself less as a man grieving the loss of his loved ones and more as a monster—an entity bound by his grief, guilt, and the rituals he performs. This loss of identity is not just a personal breakdown but a philosophical one, where the line between what is human and what is monstrous becomes increasingly difficult to discern.

His actions, meant to facilitate emotional release for others, end up deepening his own existential crisis. He experiences the futility of trying to control pain through external means.

In trying to offer others an escape, the narrator only finds himself ensnared in a cycle of self-loathing and despair. This theme of self-destruction underscores how an unhealthy fixation on grief and guilt can erode one’s sense of self and lead to a path of irreversible psychological and moral decline.

The Illusion of Control and the Absurdity of Existence

Finally, LaRocca’s work delves into the theme of the illusion of control and the absurdity of existence. The narrator believes that through his rituals, he can manipulate fate and provide others with the catharsis he himself seeks.

However, the unraveling of his life reveals that control is an illusion. The more he attempts to assert his power over the situation—whether through the ritual or his interactions with clients—the more he is confronted with his own helplessness.

The arrival of “masterjinx76,” whose life and death become a twisted reflection of the narrator’s own loss, further complicates the idea of control. Jinx’s death wish and his ultimate survival serve as a stark reminder that life, suffering, and death are beyond the narrator’s ability to command.

This existential void, where nothing seems to provide meaning or resolution, is a key theme in LaRocca’s narrative, reflecting on the absurdity of human existence. The narrator’s repeated failure to find closure, despite his attempts to control his circumstances, reinforces the futility of trying to impose order on chaos.

In the end, the novel highlights the inevitability of suffering and the absurdity of seeking answers in a world that offers none.