Somebody mentioned the atrocities in Cleansed, and I haven't read anything else by Kane, but I saw all the violence as being pretty specific.
I don't have my copy of Cleansed in front of me, but I think it goes like this (let me know if I mess up the order): Carl gets beaten Carl gets impaled with the rod Rod falls from a great height Carl has his tongue cut out Grace is beaten and raped Rod has his hands cut off Robin is force-fed Grace gets shocked Carl has his feet cut off Robin hangs himself Grace has her breasts cut off & Carl has his genitalia cut off; Carl's genitalia are sewn onto Grace
Now I might have missed something, but most of the violence seems to follow (as punishment, prohibition, compulsion, or as the fulfillment of a request) from something the character did just previous to the violence.
Carl gets beaten (Tinker has just seen him profess his love to Rod, admit his homosexuality) Carl gets impaled with the rod (to make him rat out/betray his lover; to make him break his promise) Rod falls from a great height (Carl has just ratted on Rod, etc.) Carl has his tongue cut out (Carl has just ratted on Rod; he is deprived of speech; he cannot make any more promises) Grace is beaten and raped (Grace has just made love with Graham; Tinker has fallen in love with Grace; Grace has tried to teach Robin to write) Carl has his hands cut off (Carl was trying to use his hands to communicate - in writing, using his hands - with Rod; deprived of writing) Robin is force-fed (Robin has fallen in love with Grace; Robin is learning to write) Grace gets shocked (for the love or the teaching or because she asked to be "treat[ed] like a patient"; to deprive her of affect, pain, desire, language) Carl has his feet cut off (because he was just trying to communicate with Rod by dancing; deprived of dance, physical expression) Robin hangs himself (Grace will not communicate with him, reciprocate) Grace has her breasts cut off & Carl has his genitalia cut off; Carl's genitalia are sewn onto Grace (make Grace like Graham on the outside - what she asked for; deprive Carl of his ability to communicate genetically, feel sexual pleasure, communicate with sex, gender identity).
So there is logic to the violence, the atrocity, and the idea of cause and effect is preserved. In fact, causation seems to be important. None of the violence is random, and none of it is general. It is specific to the character and the situation.
Carl receives 5 wounds, which I can't help but see as a reference to the 5 wounds of Christ, but I suspect thats probably a kind of personal joke.
Impaling, besides being a reference to the character Rod and the pen*s, is also one of those things you read about the Ottomans doing to the Serbs back in the day. I think the idea was to set the impaled person up in a public area as a sign to others as well as an individual punishment.
Please let me know your thoughts and any corrections you might have.
Thanks, Stephanie Stephanie Towery Austin, Texas