A cursed New England boarding school, a century of dead girls, and a horror movie that might be awakening something that should have stayed buried.
About This Book
A cursed New England boarding school links two timelines: in 1902, two students who are lovers and devotees of a real, scandalous feminist memoir form a secret society, then die together in a swarm of yellowjackets, the first of several strange deaths that haunt the school and its headmistress, and more than a century later, a young author whose book chronicled those events finds herself on the set of the Hollywood horror film adapting it, alongside two actresses, as the boundary between the old curse and the present production grows terrifyingly thin. Danforth writes a long, playful, gothic horror-comedy that is also a sapphic love story and a satire of Hollywood, complete with a wry, intrusive narrator, black-and-white period illustrations, and a recurring, skin-crawling motif of yellowjackets. The tone blends genuine eeriness with camp and romance, layering a story within a story within a story. This suits readers who want an atmospheric, queer, metafictional gothic with dark humor, slow-building dread, and a distinctive voice. It fits less well anyone wanting a fast, frightening read, since the book is over six hundred pages and its horror is more atmospheric than terrifying. The detail that the same swarm of yellowjackets that killed the two lovers in 1902 seems to haunt the modern film production gives the book its unsettling connective thread. Whimsical, eerie, and distinctive, it rewards patient readers who enjoy queer gothic. Those wanting brevity or scares may find it long and arch, but its blend of curse, camp, and romance is exactly what makes it singular.
Who This Is For
Best for readers who want to be immersed in a world: mood and setting as important as plot. This is a book that asks something of you. Dense, layered, and best read slowly. The pacing is balanced, time to breathe between moments that matter. Plot-first readers may find the pace too slow and the ambiguity too deliberate.
Best Read When
Best read when you're in the mood for something atmospheric and mysterious, and a read that's balanced and absorbing.
What It Explores
Plain Bad Heroines explores identity and the gap between who we are and who we pretend to be, love in its most complicated forms, and growing up and what gets lost in the process.
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