ashley_dang096 's review for:

A Botanical Daughter by Noah Medlock

3.0

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Frankenstein meets Fungal horror with a touch of queer romance in this story about two Victorian gentlemen, a botanist and a taxidermist, who have hidden their relationship in a botanical garden and have begun to experiment on creating a "daughter". Simon and Gregor are unusual men, they live together in their own botanical garden, dividing the space for each of their own separate work. Gregor is a botanist who yearns to get a place in the Royal Horticultural Society and has begun working on a new plant... a plant that he uses on a recently deceased corpse... a plant that is growing and becoming "aware." Simon is Gregor's partner and a taxidermist who spends most of his time working on his art in a dark basement. Together Simon and Gregor craft together a "Daughter" from the corpse, they create Chloe, an experiment who is growing and flourishing at an alarming rate... yet there is a cost to this growth and the maintenance of what Chloe is, is only becoming harder. Can Gregor and Simon figure out how to maintain their new daughter and keep prying eyes away... or was it a doomed experiment from the start? This was definitely an interesting fungal horror take on Frankenstein with a touch of queer romance in it. The story definitely had a ton of potential on some parts but other parts were really lacking. I loved the fungal horror and the experiment a la Frankenstein story, but what I really wish was further worked on and fleshed out was the relationship between Simon and Gregor, they might be called romantic partners but they didn't even feel like partners, there was no romance, there was barely any real relationship shown between the two and I just don't think that it works out well in the story without a strong relationship. I wanted their story to be explored, I wanted their strained relationship, their ethical dilemmas and fatherhood mentality to be explored in their relationship, especially since they are two queer men having a forbidden relationship outside the bonds of regular society. I feel like the book definitely is a good read it just isn't a great one and it has potential and fans of Frankenstein should definitely give a go though!

*Thanks Netgalley and Titan Books for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*