edited by Molly Llewellyn & Kristel Buckley ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 12, 2023
A riveting collection in which downtrodden, vindictive, and occasionally just plain evil women choose violence at every turn.
A 16-story anthology highlights a diverse list of authors who let their protagonists embrace their unhinged natures.
A smart-mouthed child locked inside a shed discovers a match and the intoxicating allure of fire (“All You Have Is Your Fire” by Yah Yah Scholfield). A disabled teenager takes the Devil, named Max, as her girlfriend through the summoning power of masturbation (“The Devil’s Doorbell” by Amanda Leduc). A Black woman ruthlessly disposes of men guilty of “the crime of wasting a Black woman’s time” (“Fuckboy Museum” by Deesha Philyaw). The protagonists of these stories bring new meaning to unsavory and unhinged and prove that characters—women especially—need not be well behaved or morally pure to have delightful literary value. Ranging from merely unlikable to downright deplorable, these women leave bodies, burning buildings, and broken plates in their wakes in these deeply disturbing and sublime narratives. The latter half of the collection is heavy on speculative fiction and magical realism. In Chantal V. Johnson's “MS Wrong,” Valerie contemplates the benefits of an Impenetrable Body Mod that seals up “all three holes” but instead turns to drugging men with an aphrodisiac—“ethical angle” aside—to enjoy mutually pleasurable kinky sex. Alison Rumfitt's “Buffalo” features a genderqueer woman who falls under suspicion when the skinned bodies of young women keep popping up in the neighborhood—just because she happens to own eight skin suits (“made from a clever mix of plastic, latex, and lycra,” not real flesh, thank you very much). While the book has a few weak links, standouts include Chaya Bhuvaneswar’s “The Monolith,” in which oncologist Jane Chun obsessively works to destroy the budding career of a young female medical student; Lauren Groff’s “Amaranth,” in which the title character spends years following her father’s death calculating the best way to ruin her mother’s happiness; and Chana Porter’s “Aquafina,” which takes the form of poetry written by the narrator about her best friend, whom she lusts after and envies in equal measure.
A riveting collection in which downtrodden, vindictive, and occasionally just plain evil women choose violence at every turn.Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023
ISBN: 9781950539871
Page Count: 237
Publisher: Dzanc
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2023
Share your opinion of this book
by Deborah Harkness ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 16, 2024
Not without its charms and rewards; read on, if you must.
Two professors who happen to be a witch and a vampire face new challenges in the fifth volume of what was originally a romantasy trilogy.
Despite the conclusive-seeming confrontation that the witch Diana Bishop and the vampire Matthew de Clermont had with the Congregation—the governing body of witches, vampires, and demons—over their taboo relationship at the end of Book 3, The Book of Life (2014), it seems the group will not let this couple and their gifted twin children alone. An ominous visit from ravens, an invitation from a previously unknown great-aunt, and a summons from the Congregation to examine 6-year-old Pip and Becca for the often-feared potential for higher magic lead Diana to travel to Ravenswood, home of her late father’s family. As Diana connects with these new relatives, uncovers fresh secrets about her heritage, and begins to travel the first steps of the Dark Path to higher magic, enemies both new and old attempt to block her from proceeding. Like Diana, Harkness treads a tricky path that many others have attempted before her: in this case, trying to extend the magic of her epic trilogy into future volumes without it seeming contrived. The author is not entirely successful in this endeavor, alas. Book 4, Time’s Convert (2018), was a reasonably diverting but entirely unnecessary coda that mainly focused on secondary characters from the previous works. This novel returns to the original two protagonists, filling in some gaps from the original trilogy while opening the storyline to multiple future installments. Diana and Matthew have an entertainingly angsty relationship and it’s always fun to spend time with them. However, the book’s plot retravels a great deal of territory. Harkness has demonstrated enough creativity in her previous books that she could take her tale in a fresh direction; whether she will remains to be seen.
Not without its charms and rewards; read on, if you must.Pub Date: July 16, 2024
ISBN: 9780593724774
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Aug. 3, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2024
Share your opinion of this book
More by Deborah Harkness
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 28, 1990
It's being called a novel, but it is more a hybrid: short-stories/essays/confessions about the Vietnam War—the subject that O'Brien reasonably comes back to with every book. Some of these stories/memoirs are very good in their starkness and factualness: the title piece, about what a foot soldier actually has on him (weights included) at any given time, lends a palpability that makes the emotional freight (fear, horror, guilt) correspond superbly. Maybe the most moving piece here is "On The Rainy River," about a draftee's ambivalence about going, and how he decided to go: "I would go to war—I would kill and maybe die—because I was embarrassed not to." But so much else is so structurally coy that real effects are muted and disadvantaged: O'Brien is writing a book more about earnestness than about war, and the peekaboos of this isn't really me but of course it truly is serve no true purpose. They make this an annoyingly arty book, hiding more than not behind Hemingwayesque time-signatures and puerile repetitions about war (and memory and everything else, for that matter) being hell and heaven both. A disappointment.
Pub Date: March 28, 1990
ISBN: 0618706410
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1990
Share your opinion of this book
More by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
BOOK REVIEW
by Tim O’Brien
More About This Book
SEEN & HEARD
IN THE NEWS
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Trouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Trouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.