Nadia Bulkin

I love body horror, but haven't actually read much of it.
“The Night Belongs to Us” starts off slow, but develops the setting and characters well. The ending felt a little rushed, but I still enjoyed it. I love vampire stories and this was an interesting take on them.
"Acid Bath" not my favorite in the anthology, but it was still interesting and gross.
“Your Next Best American Girl” I like how it explored the stress of beauty pageants and beauty standards
Overall, I like how these stories explore relationships, class, gender.… (mer)

Many of us have deeply complicated relationships with our bodies. They are us, and yet they don't always reflect who we are, who we want to be, or who society thinks we must be. At the same time, they are both resilient and deeply, deeply fragile. The three novellas in Little Mutations all occur at the moment where people, their bodies, and the pressures of society meet, with brutal effect.

In Jess Landry's "The Night Belongs to Us", a young woman named Laura roughs it to a struggling city in the dead of winter, seeking her distant mother, Mary, who has finally fallen off the edge of the society she has been teetering on for a long time. In the bus stations and crowded shelters, she meets a person who may know what happened to Mary, pulling her into a darker, older power preying off those who won't be missed. This somber take on a vampire tale takes the metaphor of predation and exploitation to a logical place in late-state capitalism America, and questions if even mothers can be trusted.

Sofia Ajram's "Acid Bath" follows a trans man named Luca who has been fighting with his privileged upbringing by seeking any experience, including a long series of clinical trials for pay. When his film-making partner, Priya, starts to have strange changes of mood, body, and appetite, Luca is forced to acknowledge how he treats others, and himself. Not everyone makes it out whole. This may be the most challenging story in the anthology as our unreliable narrator is confronted with how he exploits those around him and is himself exploited. It is also has the most transcendently bloody moment that made me quiver and keep reading like my life depended on it.

Finally, always fantastic Nadia Bulkin explores how beauty standards and internalized self-abuse transform a young woman in "Your Next Best American Girl". What happens to Veronica as she struggles to stand out in a regional beauty pageant is surreal, heartbreaking, and feels like the tip of the iceberg of something much bigger. How much of herself can she lose until there is nothing left but light?

All and all, this is a solid and thought provoking anthology. It was easy to find connecting themes of gender, class, and self-autonomy throughout, as our protagonists struggle to decide if they are going to come out the other side of their trial the same person as they entered.

Thanks to Crystal Lake Publishing for an ARC via LibraryThing's Early Reviewer Program.… (mer)

The seventh installment in the Dark Tide series is an anthology of very unique novellas, which provide a wide variety of the title theme.
The first story reminds of ancient stories, but put in a very modern garment - quite literally, you might say. At first I was puzzled where the story would go, but once I got the gist it was quite intense.
The second story - well, let's just say it was not my cup of tea.
The third story was my favorite of the trio, it was bizarre, comical, satirical, sad, horrific - every page removed a new repulsive layer from a superficial core, while at the same time it twisted the meaning of beauty right around and developed into something unexpectedly awesome.
I am impressed how the Dark Tide series still manages to present something fresh with each book, and while I struggled to wrap my mostly practical mind around the sheer bizarreness of this volume, I was fascinated - again - by the originality of the stories.… (mer)