A review by thereadingrambler
The Daughters of Block Island by Christa Carmen

4.0

I love a meta book, so I was absolutely delighted to discover this was a meta-Gothic novel. I’ve had a bit of a pet peeve for the past few years that “gothic” has been turned into an aesthetic as opposed to actually engaging with the genre and the cultural work it is doing. This book directly engages with the Gothic tropes and plays with them in such an interesting way. People who have read a lot of Gothic fiction (as in actual Gothic fiction, Bronte, Polidori, Radcliffe, etc.) will get an extra level of enjoyment, but even if you haven’t, this is still a solid horror-mystery novel with some delightful twists and compelling themes (definitely look up TW). The daughters from the title are both engaging characters in very different ways. The awareness of the story they’re in controls their actions in really different ways—in how they play into and against the tropes. I was confused for a minute about the prologue into the first chapter. We switch POV characters between the prologue and chapter one, but maybe I was just not paying close enough attention. I would definitely recommend this book if you’re into Gothic literature, female-front horror, and generally creepy vibes, but want a positive ending, not one where all the heroes are dead