Fashionable fiction by women about women.
Mona Awad’s fourth novel “Rouge” continues her legacy of reinterpreting fairy tales into puzzles that require time and patience to fully understand. “Rouge” lacks the light humor of Awad’s breakthrough “Bunny,” but the 2023 release features poetic language that creates an atmosphere blurring the lines of what’s imagined, what’s reflected, and what’s real. Armed with…
Read More “‘Rouge’: Fever dream distorts what we see in the mirror” »
Psychologist Carissa Orlando’s “The September House” expertly blends mental health and domestic violence with a modern haunted house tale. The debut novelist fleshes out her flawed protagonist and her ghostly companions with humor, sarcasm, and genuine warmth. Unlike a traditional haunted house story where the main characters learn of the haunting at the story’s climax,…
Read More “‘The September House’: Family drama in a haunted house” »
Horror is often considered a male-dominated genre of fiction. But, women are making it their own with scary stories about the female experience that can linger in readers’ minds long after the trick-or-treaters have left. The eight assembled books focus on horror by women and include a beloved modern classic and some overlooked books that…
Read More “Horror by Women: 8 books sure to give you a fright” »
Alice Feeney’s newest novel builds on the familial relationships she set up in “Daisy Darker” from 2022. In “Good Bad Girl,” Feeney turns her attention to a cast of female characters who are uniquely miserable but share an unknown connection. “Good Bad Girl” shifts between the perspectives of Frankie Fletcher, Patience Liddell, Edith Elliot and…
Read More “‘Good Bad Girl’: A forgettable gothic story of motherhood” »
In 2022, reports of censorship in schools and libraries increased by 38% over 2021. The American Library Association found 2,571 unique titles targeted last year, resulting is a new focus for Banned Books Week 2023. “Our 2023 Banned Books Week theme – ‘Let Freedom Read’ – captures what’s at stake for our democracy: that the…
Read More “ALA opposes censorship during Banned Books Week” »
