Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.51 AVERAGE
3.51 AVERAGE
More than a little TERF-y, super binary (men are men and woman are woman and anything outside of that is *super scary.* Men in dresses? GASP. HOW WRONG), and way too little world building. It very much gave cis white feminism. The body horror was okay, but also lazy and felt like a way to say look this thing when it's with men is GROSS. Unimpressive.
Spoiler
pregnancy
While the use of language in this book is both haunting and beautiful, I thought it was a bit too heavy handed and repetitive. Great use of some unique and brutal imagery, however, the story and metaphor(s) take too long to arrive at the destination, where we the reader was already waiting.
Very disturbing and then it just ends, leaving you to wonder what happens next.
I’ve been having trouble concentrating on fiction lately (well, concentrating on anything book-related, like even an essay collection takes serious effort to read) but I picked up this two-novella volume from Aliya Whiteley off my TBR yesterday - where it has been for years - and read it over two days.
Mushroom ladies? Absolute nightmare fuel. If you’re looking for something eco-horrorish after reading Mexican Gothic, the Beauty will scratch that itch if you were SUPER into that one chapter (you know the one).
The second novella - Peace, Pipe - is very much for fans of Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow in many ways.
I’m not going to say I’ve broken my reading drought but it was good to sink into fictional stories again.
Mushroom ladies? Absolute nightmare fuel. If you’re looking for something eco-horrorish after reading Mexican Gothic, the Beauty will scratch that itch if you were SUPER into that one chapter (you know the one).
The second novella - Peace, Pipe - is very much for fans of Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow in many ways.
I’m not going to say I’ve broken my reading drought but it was good to sink into fictional stories again.
Weird AF but strangely compelling. I don't think I'll ever look at fungi in the same way again
If someone is looking to get into weird fiction, I would absolutely recommend this novella and its accompanying short story, "Peace, Pipe." Although not set in the same universe as The Beauty, it's just as weird and disorienting while still being oddly human at its core. The Beauty could be categorized as body horror adjacent, but as someone who really struggles with body horror on a good day, I didn't have any trouble with this one. However, I don't know whether someone who's only casually into horror, dark fantasy, or sci fi would like this, as it's definitely out there. I loved it, though, and would love another novella or set of short stories set in the same universe as The Beauty.
I laughed out loud (in horror) at Thomas's enjoyment of his baby suckling on his side nipple.
challenging
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I was sixteen when they all died and I thought I understood this loss, but it comes to me that I didn’t know what women gave to the world. It wasn’t about their lips, their eyes or the gentle quality of their voices. It was about the way that all men are a part of them. And now we are part of nothing.
Women have long been gone, a mysterious disease being the cause of death for all of them. Now, the men that remain continue with their lives knowing that they're the last ones left. In a remote valley there is a community of boys and men, and our narrator Nate is the storyteller of the group, in charge of weaving tales to entertain. One day mushrooms start growing above the graves of women, bringing turmoil to the collective and altering their future.
If I had a nickel for every book I read where an isolated group, in which everyone is of the same gender, roamed a world where the opposite gender had disappeared for some reason or another I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice! I bring this up because I felt the same way after reading this than I did after reading [book:I Who Have Never Known Men|11996] by [author:Jacqueline Harpman|7620], just kind of ok? In the sense that it had no real impact on me. I didn't hate this but I also didn't enjoy it. At the same time it certainly was memorable. The problem I had with both books is that I got the sense that the authors were trying to say something but I never managed to divine what.
In The Beauty I felt the author attempting to make a point about gender, sexuality, perhaps even the binary?, but it was never a cohesive strong idea. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to gather from all that. Is it a reverse of gender roles and a way to show the ridiculousness of such system? Maybe something about rape culture? Gender essentialism and its pitfalls? Trans rights? The canvas was too crowded for me to get the full picture. Something was missing, maybe a couple more pages to this book.
When it comes to the horror of it all I wasn't too shocked or squicked,
Some TWs:
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy
Minor: Vomit
what a weird ass book horror authors really be writing anything