They congeal, time and again, into flesh and into language. But they never maintain any one shape for very long. They are always bleeding into new configurations. The novel is a flux of words, meeting a flux of bodies. Rice's gorgeous prose stutters and sings by turns.
Words cascade in syncopated rhythms.
Pronouns shift in gender, person, and number. Sentences break into fragments. Phrases proliferate in kaleidoscopic patterns. Language is intensely carnal. This gets in the way of meaning.