Preliminary Impressions on Iron Gates

I've decided that since I tend to prefer writing about things that I'm actively critiquing, that I'll be writing an essay exploring and interrogating the book Iron Gates by Joshua Sutter, better known as Czar Azag-Kala of the Tempel ov Blood. I don't know which works or theorists I'd like to consult for this essay, so before I think about any particular analytical framework to employ, I've decided to gather my thoughts on this book togther, chapter by chapter, so that later I can reread them and make a more informed decision about what to do with what I've written.

This project was inspired partly by a similar attempt at analysis by the author behind Yperion Press, who I often think is flatout wrong about the book the majority of the time. Though, I'm unlikely to present any potshots against their analysis and my own reading is unlikely to be informed by theirs, as they charge 33 dollars for their book on the subject. It's roughly 240 pages, too long for this particular book. I hope to accomplish something similar in a fraction of the space.

A certain egocentrism is present on my part, as this essay is partly a challenge to prove to myself that I can write compellingly and competently if I put in enough effort, even if I'm writing about something no one cares about, so please forgive me if somewhere along the way I get an inflated ego.

It Should've Been an Apocalyptic Book

This isn't the Turner Diaries. Neither is it Mein Kampf. This book doesn't have a body count. Corpses only litter the pages, in degrees of dismemberment or burning. Stay there long enough and you can smell it.

Chapter 1

Your response to the first three paragraphs of this book will dictate your response to the work as a whole. It depicts 2 anonymous soldiers of the Organization and their field marshal killing a mother and her infant with no justification, and drinking the infant's blood. Somewhere in the distance, I watch.

Libidinal Economy and A Thousand Plateaus might be the best works to read alongside this book. I'll be choosing something more interesting to misinterpret. As I attempt to write this, my mind is swimming in an ocean of books I either haven't finished or haven't read. Somewhere along the line, I've done a disservice to myself.

The only other writings I can think of this bleak and fatalistic are the works of Peter Sotos, particularly those found in the Proxy collection. I might want to finally pick up a copy of Blood Meridian. I'm realizing now that I'm only really interested in the worldbuilding of this book, I can take or leave the characters.

Book Outline

If you've made it this far, there's nothing particularly valuable here, I just decided to make an outline of the chapters and its scenes for future reference if I ever decide to take this writing more seriously.

Chapter 1
1.1 Scene of Organization members killing a woman and her baby.
1.2 Field Marshal typing up reports on a ThinkPad.
1.3 Introduction of the Commander and his role within the Organization.
1.4 Introduction of Organization headquarters in a former penitentiary. I think that part of what makes this book work is the fact that simply by living in the US itself most people live close enough to a prison that you can imagine your local prison being the base of the Organization in some post-apocalyptic scenario. America has too many prisons.

Chapter 2
2.1 Dingus named Private Bonn summoned to the inquiry center and gets fingered in the ass. Not one of my favorite chapters.
2.2 Private Bonn arrives at the entrance of the inquiry center.
2.3 A segment of interesting worldbuilding detailing the lack of refined fuels necessary to power abandoned machinery.
2.4 Private Bonn gets walked into the inquiry center by his escort.
2.5 Private Bonn begins to be interrogated by an officer of internal security.
2.6 After having shown Private Bonn photographs of a mysterious woman, the officer proceeds to insinuate that Private Bonn has been having an affair with the woman, where he begins to berate and torture the private.
2.7 Two other members of internal security come to join in on the fun. I just realized now that the look of the shock troops in this book reminds me of the look of similar units with similar functions in the 2013 film Snowpiercer.
2.8 A gloved finger starts to enter Private Bonn's ass.
2.9 The torturers manage to get a false confession out of Private Bonn.
2.10 For the crime of false confessions, Private Bonn is forcibly stripped and relieved of duty.
2.11 Private Bonn is taken to some unknown section of Organizational headquarters as he gets catcalled by secretaries.

Chapter 3
3.1