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A review by alexauthorshay
Unspeakable: A Queer Gothic Anthology by Celine Frohn
slow-paced
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.0
"Moonlight" - more sinister, but also confusing? It takes almost the whole story to reveal what's going on and even then we don't get the whole context (it doesn't matter for the story itself, I suppose, but they are details I would have liked having.)
"I Am the Master of My Eyelashes" - read like a poem. Very particular with words and interesting for those choices, but in terms of concrete readability I was lost. I get the general theme/gist but don't really understand the specifics of what I read.
"The White Door" - Much longer than I expected given the few pieces before it, but at the same time not long enough. I'm not sure if it's merely a queering of Dracula or a sort of alternate version that changes who the three female vampires in the story are. It felt rushed and like the attachment between protagonist and Lucy needed much more time to deepen before the protagonist did a complete personality change.
"Doctor Barlowe's Mirror" - kind of a Superman phantom zone thing, not that original with the ending.
"Laguna and the Sirena" - I'm rarely a fan of stories like this. They feel vivid enough in setting and sometimes character but in terms of action and plot, such big and complicated words are used and are combined in such a vague imagery/poetry way that I don't actually understand what's being said. It sounds pretty, but I don't follow what it's supposed to be. The very last section also felt like a jump, like something was skipped (or I didn't catch something I should have).
“The Moon in the Glass” - probably the most traditionally gothic in feel so far, but for that the twist ending wasn’t really that much of a twist.
“Brideprice” - another Dracula retelling I think. This one with two women and a man instead of three women but otherwise fairly similar in vibes to “The White Door”.
“Lure of the Abyss” - pretty typical as monster-to-love-interest stories go.
“Hearteater” - the most full story-feeling work so far. I figured out what both characters were long before it was revealed and it didn’t feel like that unique of a story, but the characters still managed to have arcs in this piece and their relationship had time to develop.
“Quicksilver Prometheus” - did not end how I expected, for sure, but mostly because what felt like a ghost story shifted tracks midway through and the whole tone and focus of the story seemed to change.
“Homesick” - Gothic only for the ghostly side of things. Unusually joyful and fluffy compared to the rest of the works before it.
“Rodeo” - what a weird spot to end the story. Foreboding and ominous but also feeling incomplete or at least shorter or more rushed given the building expectation from the first pages of the story.
“Lady of Letters” - this one also felt way too short, particularly the time jump at the end that is a plot twist only because of how much time it skips. Interesting enough concept, but I found ‘Jade’ hard to figure out, how she exists and even came to exist. Which perhaps is at least partly on purpose and not the focus of the story, but was distracting for me because of that.
“The Ruin” - my absolute favorite. It’s dark, but I wouldn’t call it Gothic. Modern, post-apocalyptic vibes, a little serial killer thriller. Not only gay but trans. Lots to like in this one.
“The Dream Eater” - a unique portrayal of succubi/incubi, not as threatening and hypersexual as usual, made all the better for it deliberately being used in a pro-ace storyline.
"My Love Lays Split on Either Side" - Very bisexual, down to the use of color. Prose poetry, super short. But far too metaphorical and abstract for my brain to fully comprehend.
"Leadbitter House" - The MC is kind of a jerk, but the story itself was not too bad. But right at the end it goes from a haunting story to someone peeling out of their own body and it just dropped out of nowhere with no explanation at all, leaving me confused.
"Taylor Hall" - interesting that a 'haunted' house and the person living in it can have a relationship of sorts. This story was a lot fluffier in comparison to some of the others, and felt the most complete in terms of character arc(s) and the inclusion of an actual plot.