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dolores_lola's review
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Suicidal thoughts, Body horror, Cancer, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, Death of parent, and Self harm
bookishmillennial's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
disclaimer: I don’t really give starred reviews. I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not. Find me here: https://linktr.ee/bookishmillennial
Thank you to my bookstagrammer friends who influenced me to read this: @titalindascorner & @borrowedbyaudrey <3 I adore yall!
This was such a gorgeously written novella, and I genuinely wish it was longer (but it works perfectly as a novella!!!) Here are some examples of the writing:
Thank you to my bookstagrammer friends who influenced me to read this: @titalindascorner & @borrowedbyaudrey <3 I adore yall!
This was such a gorgeously written novella, and I genuinely wish it was longer (but it works perfectly as a novella!!!) Here are some examples of the writing:
The city, for all its sutures of concrete, let her be anonymous; hell, it encouraged facelessness, participation in community optional.
She’d brought the outside world’s deep greens into her body, accepted the infection of her mind. Now the canvas would surrender to her wounded hands.
Every time she mourned her father she also mourned the idea of a life that had him in it. And guilt compounded her remorse and confusion, the sense that she was grieving incorrectly in her mourning that seemed both selfish and impersonal. Tomorrow — and all the days after it — was something that had only ever lived in her imagination.
The verdant and the vermillion burst forth in tapestries of life and death, blood and blooming, the abstract strokes constituting vine and flower, all wrapping the monstrous woman from previous paintings in an exciting culmination: instead of being devoured by flames, she is at one with life and her surroundings — a wishful sentiment accentuated by the artist’s mysterious disappearance shortly after its creation.
The urge to confess to them was absurd, but her words erupted like new growth rooted in testimony. If this was the last thing she would ever do on this earth, why shouldn’t she give them, these hallucinations or ephemeral monsters, her feelings about what it had meant for her to live? Maybe this was what they wanted from her. “Life was like a language I couldn’t speak.” </spoiler
Like, absolutely stunning writing. I was in awe as I read this, and can't wait to read more from Tiffany Morris.
This novella is about Rita, who in the midst of her grief, is accepted to a week-long artists residency after her girlfriend Molly submitted an application on her behalf. Though Rita is rightfully pissed off at the paranoid idea that Molly is trying to simply get rid of her and have some space from her, she goes to the cabin, which coincidentally is where her estranged late father grew up. Rita begins seeing and hearing things at the cabin, especially near the swamp, and must confront her deepest fears about mortality, her relationships, and her future.
Though I have not lost a parent, I felt completely immersed in Rita's grief, anger, and fear. TM's writing imbued Rita with such fervor, anxiety, and pain that felt almost tangible! Like you could reach into the book, touch it, and pull it out. It was atmospheric, eerie, and forced you to ruminate on these things alongside Rita. I read this in one sitting, and I highly recommend it!
Author info: Tiffany Morris is a Mi’kmaw/settler writer of speculative fiction and poetry from Kjipuktuk (Halifax), Nova Scotia.
(more) quotations that stood out to me:
The Mi’kmaw language always sounded weird coming from her mother, even though her mother was half Mi’kmaw. She had been estranged from that side of her family for years and wouldn’t tell Rita why, wouldn’t share any knowledge with her other than a few words or phrases. She was much more into telling Rita how she should behave and what convoluted beauty rituals could improve her appearance.
I am not indigenous, I am Filipino & Chinese, but I could so deeply relate to this quotation, as I am not fluent in any of my parents' native languages, yet the sharing of cultural knowledge that was inherently sexist and misogynistic hits so close to home.
“To accept death is to accept your own nothingness — not the act of dying in itself, but the fact that death resides in you, the fact that you will, eventually, be dead. To be in this state of perpetual otherwise. Accepting death is the understanding that consciousness is the shell of experience, not its inner sanctum — and death becomes a pilgrimage outside the golden cage of our material existence. I don’t mean this as an encouragement of death, rather a call to understand that you, too, are nature, and nature loves above all else transmutation, and impermanence, and creation. We do not protect life by denying death’s existence, yet our capitalist and colonialist structures are based on this denial. We do not protect anything through denial.”
Grief formed her new reality, her new understanding of time, an invading force that occupied land and bodies in equal measure. Her memories were colonized by trauma.
It had taken me over a year to realize that I suffered from PTSD and wasn’t bad at grief — mass culture is just that deeply avoidant about both death and trauma... Everywhere you turn in a capitalist society there are sweet and numbing routes to escapism, clichés about love, products determined to sanitize and smother in nostalgia every disorienting and uncomfortable part of the human experience. (author's note/acknowledgements)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Grief, and Animal death
Moderate: Body horror, Death of parent, and Blood
anyaemilie's review against another edition
4.0
This took me a while to read (my fault, not the book), but I really liked it. Super creepy climate horror novella, with metaphors for grief and musings on identity and connections to culture. If your brain is cooperating it should be a quick read for you because it’s just over 100 pages 😊
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body horror
Minor: Gore and Vomit
archaicrobin's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
A beautifully written literary horror novella tackling grief, depression, and trauma through the tale of an indigenous artist’s haunting experience at a secluded cabin near a large pond near her recently deceased father’s former land.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started this one but was pleasantly surprised by the depth of this novella. If you’re looking for a literary horror novella with eerie imagery and psychological horror elements blended with creatures and malevolent nature then you’ll love this one!
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started this one but was pleasantly surprised by the depth of this novella. If you’re looking for a literary horror novella with eerie imagery and psychological horror elements blended with creatures and malevolent nature then you’ll love this one!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Suicidal thoughts, Chronic illness, Grief, Mental illness, Blood, Panic attacks/disorders, Body horror, Death of parent, Terminal illness, and Toxic relationship
rorikae's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
'Green Fuse Burning' by Tiffany Morris is a reflective horror novella steeped in one artist's grief.
After her father's death, Rita is wallowing in her grief. To help her, Rita's girlfriend Molly applies for an artists residency for her. When Molly surprises her with the accepted residency application, Rita isn't completely sold but she decides to go anyway. Alone in the forest by a large pond, Rita delves into her grief through her painting but her feelings threaten to overwhelm her, especially when she starts to see strange things.
This is an excellent, evocative novella though it comes with strong content warnings for grief, loss of a parent, and suicidal ideation. Though we only spend so much time with Rita, Morris does an excellent job of helping us to understand her grief and how it is affecting her. She accomplishes this through a mix of beautiful and horrific nature writing with a slightly supernatural aspect. Rita is deep in her grief and since we are seeing the world through her eyes, it's unclear what is just a hallucination and what is real. One of my favorite aspects of the story is that each chapter starts with looking at one of the paintings that Rita created during the residency. These paintings help to inform our view of Rita's experience and how she is coming to terms with her grief.
Morris' writing is lush and horrifying at the same time. I will definitely be looking to pick up more of what they write next.
After her father's death, Rita is wallowing in her grief. To help her, Rita's girlfriend Molly applies for an artists residency for her. When Molly surprises her with the accepted residency application, Rita isn't completely sold but she decides to go anyway. Alone in the forest by a large pond, Rita delves into her grief through her painting but her feelings threaten to overwhelm her, especially when she starts to see strange things.
This is an excellent, evocative novella though it comes with strong content warnings for grief, loss of a parent, and suicidal ideation. Though we only spend so much time with Rita, Morris does an excellent job of helping us to understand her grief and how it is affecting her. She accomplishes this through a mix of beautiful and horrific nature writing with a slightly supernatural aspect. Rita is deep in her grief and since we are seeing the world through her eyes, it's unclear what is just a hallucination and what is real. One of my favorite aspects of the story is that each chapter starts with looking at one of the paintings that Rita created during the residency. These paintings help to inform our view of Rita's experience and how she is coming to terms with her grief.
Morris' writing is lush and horrifying at the same time. I will definitely be looking to pick up more of what they write next.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Gore, Grief, Suicidal thoughts, and Animal death
Moderate: Body horror
cantfindmybookmark's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
This novella packs a punch. The prose and imagery are both heartbreakingly beautiful and deeply unsettling. It is a horror story that is also a meditation on grief, identity, and community. Its a love letter and apology to nature and the havoc that has been wreaked upon it. It's what Thoreau wishes Walden was.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Suicidal thoughts, and Body horror
spicycronereads's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
This book is really beautiful. It’s also really hard to read. Not because of the way it’s written, but because the weight of the main character’s grief, for her father, and for the planet, is so heavy. But it really is quite beautiful in the end.
Rita, the main character, is really the only character. She goes to a remote cabin to spend an artist residency for which her girlfriend has applied for her without telling her. So we do see a little bit of her girlfriend from time to time and in flashback, but she’s really almost a tertiary character. The environment is like a secondary character with Rita being the main character.
Tiffany Morris’ writing is really poetic and lyrical. I found myself highlighting tons of passages because they were just so beautifully written.
If you were looking for a horror story, this is pretty unconventional. There is no gore, no killers, and no hauntings or violence, other than that of the landscape, and what is done to the landscape by people. Part of the narrative convention, which I found really neat, is that parts of the story are told by artist reviews of Rita’s paintings. And so we very closely see the relationship between art, ecology, and life in the novel.
In terms of diverse representation, Morris is a queer, indigenous author, and Rita is an indigenous character of the Mi’kmaw people. It’s not clear whether her mother is also indigenous, but there is a lot of emphasis in the narrative about her father and her connection to her indigenous background through her father.
Overall, even though it’s a pretty short book, it took me quite a while to read, because the depth of the grief had to be taken in slow doses for me. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Rita, the main character, is really the only character. She goes to a remote cabin to spend an artist residency for which her girlfriend has applied for her without telling her. So we do see a little bit of her girlfriend from time to time and in flashback, but she’s really almost a tertiary character. The environment is like a secondary character with Rita being the main character.
Tiffany Morris’ writing is really poetic and lyrical. I found myself highlighting tons of passages because they were just so beautifully written.
If you were looking for a horror story, this is pretty unconventional. There is no gore, no killers, and no hauntings or violence, other than that of the landscape, and what is done to the landscape by people. Part of the narrative convention, which I found really neat, is that parts of the story are told by artist reviews of Rita’s paintings. And so we very closely see the relationship between art, ecology, and life in the novel.
In terms of diverse representation, Morris is a queer, indigenous author, and Rita is an indigenous character of the Mi’kmaw people. It’s not clear whether her mother is also indigenous, but there is a lot of emphasis in the narrative about her father and her connection to her indigenous background through her father.
Overall, even though it’s a pretty short book, it took me quite a while to read, because the depth of the grief had to be taken in slow doses for me. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Grief, and Panic attacks/disorders
Moderate: Body horror, Fire/Fire injury, and Sexual content
nerolireads's review
challenging
dark
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
With her words Tiffany Morris paints pictures as vivid and uncanny as the paintings the fmc paints in this novella. Morris creates a tense, unsettling swampcore aesthetic in which the queer fm struggle with the loss of her father, the disconnect from her Mi'kmaw culture and her mental health. Definitely a must read!
Thank you Netgalley and Stelliform Press for this arc!
Thank you Netgalley and Stelliform Press for this arc!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief and Body horror
bookishcori's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Grief, and Body horror
obscurepages's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
"Life was a like a language I couldn't speak."
Wow. I dove into this book not knowing much other than it's an Indigenous horror novella. What I got now is a brilliant character study of a woman struggling with her mental health, insecurities, Indigenous identity, her drive to create art, and her reconciling nature with life and death.
I have to say, the imagery and the prose in this book is something else. Something entirely its own.
Overall, this was an incredible mix of both unsettling and profound.
Wow. I dove into this book not knowing much other than it's an Indigenous horror novella. What I got now is a brilliant character study of a woman struggling with her mental health, insecurities, Indigenous identity, her drive to create art, and her reconciling nature with life and death.
I have to say, the imagery and the prose in this book is something else. Something entirely its own.
Overall, this was an incredible mix of both unsettling and profound.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Animal death, and Gore
Moderate: Death of parent and Grief
Minor: Body horror and Sexual content