"Lurid" is a tame word to describe what happens in Narrow Rooms, James Purdy's 1978 novel about a young man's perverse entanglements with a, well, really fucked-up family. The style and tone were unique: a mix of the arty pulp of Faulkner's Sanctuary and the matter-of-fact depiction of horrors. Like many readers, I credit Gore Vidal's appraisal for leading me to Purdy. Well, now Purdy has died. Although his biography has plenty of lacunae, I suspect he was more boring than we think.