the last book I ever read (Angel Down: A Novel by Daniel Kraus, excerpt one)

from Angel Down: A Novel by Daniel Kraus:

and what impresses him about Lewis Arno, from a con man’s perspective, is that the kid’s not easily bluffed, Arno points at him and says, “You got face on your face,” a statement that, at any other time and place would be gibberish, but there’s only one interpretation here, a real unfortunate one, and Bagger gingerly touches his own face, cracking the blood glaze into fragile plates, and Arno grimaces, and Bagger traces the grimace to his own right jaw, where something dangles, slight and flexible like a human ear,

and Bagger peels it off his face and holds it before him, and that’s exactly what it is, a human ear, clotted with clay and matted with a tuft of blond hair,