I have yet to read Strange Kisses or Stranger Kisses, so I can’t really answer your question, but gravel did seem like it could have more to it than shock value. I’ll reserve judgment until I’ve read a few more in the series. I’ve got issue #2 in the stack here, waiting to be read and reviewed, so you shouldn’t have to wait too long for another opinion.

It does seem like Ellis has two sides to him… he’s got some really gnarly stuff, dense and hard to get into. I think all of his stuff has a bit of the old shock ‘em to wake ‘em up in it, but yeah, it’s never enough when it feels like that’s all something has going for it. (Truth be told, that’s sort of how I felt about his novel, Crooked Little Vein.)

I’m curious what you’ll think of Strange Kisses; I read it when it came out (and the follow-up, Stranger Kisses), and actually, it didn’t do anything for me. I’m a BIG Ellis fan since Transmet, but it just seemed full of shock value with little story.

Now, that’s just me… but I haven’t picked up a couple of his other works because they looked like they were in the same vein.

Anyway, that’s the long way of me tellin’ you, I may pick Gravel up if you think it’s a bit different from Strange Kisses. Otherwise, I’ll likely skip it.