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A review by b00kh0arder
Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
5.0
Carmen Maria Machado's 'Her Body & Other Parties' is a collection of stories that are as vibrant (and as subtly unsettling) as the neon green of its UK dust jacket. Stories that are: creative, experimental, dark, colourful, sexy (the women in these stories are fully in charge of their sexuality and sexual needs, so if a lot of sexual content isn't your thing, well, consider yourself warned), spooky, creepy, tender, poignant, sad, funny, queer (in both senses of the word), sharp and devastatingly on the nose.
The Husband Stitch:
A story about stories - the kind of urban legends that seem to, like Athena from the head of Zeus, spring forth into the world already fully formed - and how, even though you may give everything, some will always want more. (With some wonderfully barbed 'instructions' for if you hppening to be reading aloud.)
Inventory:
The story of one life told through a list of her sexual encounters, while an apocalyptic epidemic quietly devastates in the background.
Mothers:
Not my favourite story in the collection, which is not to say that it's bad (there are no bad stories in this collection), and there are some beautifully written passages that really resonated, of a life imagined, in such vivid and minute detail that it - almost - becomes real.
Especially Heinous:
The most experimental story in terms of form. Written as an episode guide for Law& Order SVU up to season 12, but with a more supernatural bent. So the story unfolds in a series of vignettes which, at first, appear random (although some are, as we can go from a lot of detail to seemingly out of nowhere lines like: "And Benson and Stabler don't play Monopoly anymore.") but as you read on, connections begin to form. Or do they? Is there a grand plan, a conspiracy, or is everything, as a certain doppelganger suggests, just one big treacle black cosmic joke at the detectives' expense? ;) Often very funny and occasionally genuinely spooky (there was a particular fourth wall break that, after I worked out what it was, made me double take), you don't really have to be an expert on or a huge fan of SVU to get the story (I'm neither). You only need to know what the show is (which only requires the cursory of internet searches) and remember that the rest is a satire on how violence (particularly against women) is served up for our consummation on prime time entertainment, how long-running shows increasingly resort to more bonkers and baroque story lines and TV cliches in general.
Real Women Have Bodies:
Possibly my favourite of the entire collection (which, if I didn't love the whole package, would be for the rapturous descriptions of the dresses alone). Women around the world are slowly, literally, fading away, for no apparent reason, and the dresses in a seemingly ordinary fashion boutique hide a tragic and eerie secret. The last haunting image, in particular, reminds me of the end of an episode of the anime Vampire Princess Miyu: women turned into mannequins as a result of their own desire, their helpless cries forever unheard behind their frozen beatific smiles.
Eight Bites:
Desperately sad. A women is haunted, in more ways than one, by the decisions she makes about her body.
The Resident:
A writer goes to an artist residence on a mountain near where she used to go camping with the girl scouts as a child. A spooky tale, with a snow bound hotel full of strange guests having a strong whiff of the Overlook, the eerie atmosphere contributed to by the frequent disease metaphors. A story about creativity and memory, reminiscent of autumnal campfire tales, for those of us who are proud to be the madwomen in our own attics.
Difficult at Parties:
(The title is a nice little link back to a throwaway line in the previous story.) A woman becomes convinced she can hear the thoughts of the actors in porn films, after what is hinted to be an incident of violent assault. An interesting concept with some stand out passages but I must admit that I'm not sure I understood all of its nuance.
Like the stories of tainted Halloween candy the mother in 'The Husband Stitch' worries over, these stories are gorgeous, dark and decadent desserts with sharp objects hidden inside. Or jewel bright sequins stitched onto the blackest of black fabric.
The Husband Stitch:
A story about stories - the kind of urban legends that seem to, like Athena from the head of Zeus, spring forth into the world already fully formed - and how, even though you may give everything, some will always want more. (With some wonderfully barbed 'instructions' for if you hppening to be reading aloud.)
Inventory:
The story of one life told through a list of her sexual encounters, while an apocalyptic epidemic quietly devastates in the background.
Mothers:
Not my favourite story in the collection, which is not to say that it's bad (there are no bad stories in this collection), and there are some beautifully written passages that really resonated, of a life imagined, in such vivid and minute detail that it - almost - becomes real.
Especially Heinous:
The most experimental story in terms of form. Written as an episode guide for Law& Order SVU up to season 12, but with a more supernatural bent. So the story unfolds in a series of vignettes which, at first, appear random (although some are, as we can go from a lot of detail to seemingly out of nowhere lines like: "And Benson and Stabler don't play Monopoly anymore.") but as you read on, connections begin to form. Or do they? Is there a grand plan, a conspiracy, or is everything, as a certain doppelganger suggests, just one big treacle black cosmic joke at the detectives' expense? ;) Often very funny and occasionally genuinely spooky (there was a particular fourth wall break that, after I worked out what it was, made me double take), you don't really have to be an expert on or a huge fan of SVU to get the story (I'm neither). You only need to know what the show is (which only requires the cursory of internet searches) and remember that the rest is a satire on how violence (particularly against women) is served up for our consummation on prime time entertainment, how long-running shows increasingly resort to more bonkers and baroque story lines and TV cliches in general.
Real Women Have Bodies:
Possibly my favourite of the entire collection (which, if I didn't love the whole package, would be for the rapturous descriptions of the dresses alone). Women around the world are slowly, literally, fading away, for no apparent reason, and the dresses in a seemingly ordinary fashion boutique hide a tragic and eerie secret. The last haunting image, in particular, reminds me of the end of an episode of the anime Vampire Princess Miyu: women turned into mannequins as a result of their own desire, their helpless cries forever unheard behind their frozen beatific smiles.
Eight Bites:
Desperately sad. A women is haunted, in more ways than one, by the decisions she makes about her body.
The Resident:
A writer goes to an artist residence on a mountain near where she used to go camping with the girl scouts as a child. A spooky tale, with a snow bound hotel full of strange guests having a strong whiff of the Overlook, the eerie atmosphere contributed to by the frequent disease metaphors. A story about creativity and memory, reminiscent of autumnal campfire tales, for those of us who are proud to be the madwomen in our own attics.
Difficult at Parties:
(The title is a nice little link back to a throwaway line in the previous story.) A woman becomes convinced she can hear the thoughts of the actors in porn films, after what is hinted to be an incident of violent assault. An interesting concept with some stand out passages but I must admit that I'm not sure I understood all of its nuance.
Like the stories of tainted Halloween candy the mother in 'The Husband Stitch' worries over, these stories are gorgeous, dark and decadent desserts with sharp objects hidden inside. Or jewel bright sequins stitched onto the blackest of black fabric.