#readatrix review

[readatrix]

I accepted an ARC of Our Share of the Night from Netgalley. This is my honest review. It's still January -- when I wrote this initially --

and I'm calling it now: It's highly unlikely I'll read a better horror novel in 2023. Our Share of the Night is an epic novel filled with body horror, trauma, friendship, familial love and hate. We meet Juan, a recent widower, traveling with his young son, Gaspar. Juan is filled with love for his son, but also anger, and the ability to hurt his son and anyone who gets in his way. Juan is a "medium" for an international cult that worships a dark, cruel god -- perhaps Darkness itself. He has been given no choice in this, having been purchased from his parents as a child. Juan has a heart defect that he knows will kill him sooner than later, and he knows this cult wants his son -- either as the new medium, or a new vessel for Juan. He's determined that neither will happen. The book encompasses a significant period of time, and a number of POV characters. Eventually we meet up with a slightly older Gaspar, who lives in an empty mansion with his father. He remembers little of the past. His father is often distant, and angry, and cruel. And sometimes perhaps insane. The reader is privy to much more than Gaspar is at this stage, seeing connections he can't, and the workings of the occult. He is unaware he's setting up a friend to be sacrificed. This portion of the book was extremely moving to me as Gaspar is abused by his father for reasons he can't understand. Juan commits a vicious act of cruelty and betrayal. I can only say that anyone who survived an abusive household will understand there are different types of horrors. One of those horrors is feeling unloved by a parent, and the shock when you realize you're not safe with them. Gaspar had a friend group that helps him through this time, and we follow their journeys almost as much as Gaspar's, as they learn to live with loss, and the pieces of the aforementioned other world that clings to them. The reader knows that Gaspar will eventually have to face the cult. Did I mention the cult is also family? Things you should know: This is a long book. Because I accepted a digital copy, I don't have page numbers, but depending on the source, it's between 600 and 730ish pages. It feels like the latter. You'll be spending lots of time here. If you just want the horror, and don't want to become involved, there are quicker books. The book has a lot of body horror, and general supernatural stuff, including doors leading to another very vicious world, but there are long stretches between these moments where it's more about a feeling of dread and various characters working through trauma. A number of times I would be jolted anew at how dark, and gross, the story could be. Our Share of the Night is a translated work from an Argentine author and is set in Argentina, and you will feel very immersed in this setting. The translation seemed smooth enough that I was rarely confused, but there were moments where I wondered if something was lost in translation.

Poets and poetry are mentioned A LOT! The almost constant backdrop is political unrest. I think a lot of what you need to know can be picked up from context, but politics do play a heavy role. The cult is run by rich people who exploit poor, often Indigenous, people. We spend time in London in the sixties, and Argentina the rest of the time, particularly in the 80s and 90s, and this portion has a focus on the AIDS crisis. The London portion might very well scratch a little bit of any serial killer itch you might have.  There's LGBTQ+ rep, but slurs and outdated terms abound. There are a two people who are called a couple, but also twins, who want to swap sexes, but there seems to be more of a supernatural/spiritual incentive than really being trans. At least 3 of the protagonists are gay or bi. An outdated term for people with Down Syndrome is used between friends. Not every question of plot point is wrapped up, and there's clearly room for another book. Which I would read! Our Share of the Night took me a couple weeks to read -- I read other books as well -- because I was so involved that I needed breaks from a very dark story. While most of the characters are varying degrees of evil, I did care about a few, and I imagine you will too. Others I wanted to suffer -- and suffer they did! I feel that I could read the book several times over and find additional layers and nuances I missed.

[readatrix]

"The blood is the life." ~Dracula, by Bram Stoker

"Marion! Marion! Come out wherever you are! The hounds would like to play!" ~House of Hunger, Alexis Henderson

I have loved this sort of book pretty much since I've been able to read. Spooky house or castle. Isolation. A love interest with questionable motives and morals. Fleeing in the middle of the night.

Marion is a poor young woman living in an industrialized urban area, think London in the Victorian era, working as a housemaid. She supports her drug-addicted, dying brother. She sees a notice in the paper for a bloodmaid, and ends of applying in hopes that after her terms of indenture she will obtain financial and personal freedom.

In this world, aristocrats feed of the blood of poor women, and they live on the moors in the north. There's no indication, that I can see, that the blood does them actual good, and it's certainly not great for the people doing the bleeding.

The moors/moors are a staple of gothic literature because they're wild, untamed, and symbolically cruel. In Seanan Mcguire's Wayward Children series -- first book if the series is Every Heart a Doorway -- one of the world they visit and revisit is called The Moors, and it's the embodiment of where vampires and mad scientists reign.

What would you give or gamble to change your life? Would you bleed? How much? Alexis Henderson makes no bones about how this is a form of sex work. Bloodmaids are mistresses, jockying for favor, making the best choices they can with limited options in order to some day be independent.

Marion is indentured to Lisavet Bathory. If you're a fan of vampire stories or creepy history, you might have heard of this character's obvious inspiration, Countess Elizabeth Bathory, a Hungarian noblewoman. What she got up to in her spare time -- both real and rumored -- well, I suppose due to the nature of the homage, would be a bit of a spoiler to share. However, whenever you see a quip about bathing in the blood of virgins to retain your youth, you have those rumors to blame.

Lisavet is beautiful, mysterious, demanding, and the people in her sphere fall under her spell, no one more than Marion, and the other 4 bloodmaids. The story is blood-drenched, and as meat is repeatedly described it's clear that the women in this house are another form of meat served up in a futile effort to sate the insatiable.

It IS the House of Hunger.

Every chapter starts with a quote from bloodmaid.

"We are all alike in the fact that our great life's work is deciding who and what we're willing to bleed for." "We bleed for those we love most." "It's a strange thing to go from hungry ... to the thing hungered for."

I don't want to say much more about the plot, so I'll say the author has given a lot of thought of the role of classism and sexism. Exploitation. Sex work and sex trafficking. There's talk of how important youth is and how vulnerable that makes girls.

"We're broken into submission, by grief and poverty, long before we ever set foot in this House. And then we arrive, on the promise of the first kindness many of us have received in years, and you take advantage of weakness. You cultivate it, to better exploit us."

It's fine to read this as a horror novel, and it works great on that level, but I appreciated the thought and symbolism, which only further engaged me.

The last portion of the book was pretty tense and pretty scary. And extra bloody in a book with no shortage of blood.

I had this at 4 stars, but I'm bumping it up to 5, because it honestly gave me everything I needed in this subgenre, and I bookmarked a million passages.

"Sometimes I feel like I've been building you a House out of my own bones. And still, you look at me with so much contempt and mistrust. You complain because there are gaps in the roof of my ribs, and you ask me to give more of myself to fill them. You want my hips to be the bowl you drink from. My shoulders, your bed. My arms, your walls. My legs, the very ground you stand on. You want your fill of my blood whenever you crave it. What more do you want from me?"

[readatrix]

(Scheduled to be released November 28, 2023)

I received an ARC of this title through Netgalley. The thoughts and opinions are my own. Godly Heathens is the first book in a series, possibly a duology, about gods cut off from their home world, and in a cycle of reincarnation that keeps drawing together -- largely to try to kill one another, using a magical knife. The main character is Gem, a nonbinary Seminole teen. (To give you an idea of the vibe, one of the chapters is There are no Cis Gods.) When we meet them, they're on the brink of discovery/remembering their divine identity. Those gory, but often erotic, dreams? Memories. They reunite with Willa Mae/Rory, with whom they've shared many lifetimes. We're told early on that the gods, even if they don't always consciously pursue one another, tend to end up in each other's lives, and so many of the people in Gem's life are, well, not people. Or not just people. Among the gods we meet is Poppy, who is a death job with a quirky fashion sense. Has that been done before? Yes. Do I still love it? Also, yes. Every lifetime she's a little more like an animated corpse, for reasons. Gem is a character dealing with a lot even without the whole god thing. They're battling mental illness, like their father, as well as a sex addiction. They were also preyed on by at least one adult. They want to be wanted/worshiped at all times. They're a teen, with all the hormonal stuff, and having a parent to appease. This is a YA title, and there's part of me that would have liked to see it as an adult title simply for the increased freedom and maturity. These characters are both formidable gods, and teens, which certainly can work but it makes them feel occasionally leashed. It reminds me of the scene in Buffy where Anya says, "For a thousand years I wielded the power of the wish. I brought ruin on the heads of unfaithful men. I offered destruction and chaos for the pleasure of lower beings. I was feared and worshiped across the mortal globe, and now I'm stuck at Sunnydale High! A mortal! A child! And I'm flunking math!" None of this is to say the book is tame. There's a lot of blood and gore. Murder and torture. Gem is promiscuous, and while not everything there is spelled out, we're talking at least PG 13. If it were an adult title, it might have been more explicit, but still these topics are mature and the author doesn't pull too many punches. TWs/CWs galore. These gods, even the ones we root for, have their villainous moments, and Gem in the events leading up to their arrival on earth was one of the most villainous of all. The gods connive, they plot, morality wars with expediency. I found myself initially less then thrilled at the (inevitable) revelation of a certain character, but Edgmon managed to win me over. All the gods have a point, even as they're trying to kill our main character. And Gem has a point in wanting to neutralize them. This is very compelling read, though. While I can nitpick some of the logic, or why characters didn't always due the logical thing, I was SO INVESTED! This book ends at a pivotal moment, and I need to find out how it shakes out. There's a god that allegedly is out of play, but are they really? I'm going to be recommending this title a lot!

See original review, and please follow me!

M.'s review of Godly Heathens (The Ouroboros, #1)

4/5: I received an ARC of this title through Netgalley. The thoughts and opinions are my own. Godly Heathens is the first book in a series

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[readatrix]

A collection of short stories, told non-chronologically, about an Indigenous (Penobscot/Panawahpskek Nation) boy/man who lives on a rez on an island in Maine. While there are moments of humor, the book left with me a sense of melancholy.

NotLR doesn't feature big wins or a lot of hope for a bright future, unless you could basic survival as these things. Maybe we should. The final story is set well in the future, so I suppose we know David survives long term.

What hit me the hardest is the lost potential for all the characters. The person who is doing the best is a dealer. Everyone else is looking for a twenty to buy cigarettes, or beer, or pills.

The beer hit as quick as I’d drunk it. The fire was warm. Fry bread was on my mind—they’d be selling it at Community Days. Maybe I had enough change in my room to get some. Maybe Paige had some extra change somewhere, under her bed or in a drawer. Frick might have some too, in his truck. Although last time I checked he had nothing but pennies and a two-dollar bill that was too cool to spend. Mom had no money, and I knew better than to look. What money she ever came into she blew. Money—it was everywhere but nowhere.

But the writing flows, moves, and the characters give of the little they have. A meal or a pill or a bed or a shed. A full cigarette, or a butt. I think people give out of love and friendship, but I think they also give to feel rich. If you can share, that means you had something to begin with. If someone gives or shares with you, that means you're not alone.

I'd love to read more by this author -- more short stories or a novel.