The Henchperson's Guide to Unionizing 

by Marshall J. Moore 

My second Frankenstein retelling novel for this season is quite different from the previous one. Although they're both told by/about sidekicks rather than the doctor or his creation, this one is from the point of view of the misshapen laboratory assistant, Igor. And that is only one of the quixotic differences from the original and its many successors.

The set up is swift, with a pitchforks-and-torches mob advancing on the derelict castle while the doctor is in the final stages of his latest attempt to reanimate a cobbled-together corpse. Thanks to Igor’s forethought and recognition of inevitability involving the trajectory local villagers' suspicions, the pair escapes the castle with most of their laboratory equipment and supplies, abandoning their shocked but immobile experiment. They set up a new workshop in a distant region where the doctor has some claim on a long-deserted manor house with a suitable tower, not too close to a town but not too distant from a cemetery where fresh – relatively fresh – parts can be had for their next experiment.

The writing is swift and sure. Igor is a convincing and sympathetic character. The doctor is as much of a jerk as you might expect, but Igor tries to make the best of things. His commitment to his unremunerated job is one of his endearing qualities. He might be almost the perfect employee, willing to turn his hand to any number of grizzly tasks and swallow any number of degrading insults from his master. Kind of like Wormtongue is treated by Saruman, but with a much worse clothing allowance.

But sooner or later, every worm must turn. And it appears Igor is about to turn chief cook and bottle washer for a collection of unwanted housemates in the new abode. One consolation is that there are now other minions at hand, also being insulted by, respectively, their master or mistress. For the first time in as long as he can remember, Igor isn’t alone with his servitude. And in companionship comes common purpose, even, eventually, solidarity. 

The writing is competent, the voice of Igor flawless. The story unfolds at a clipping, but totally cohesive pace, with excellent characterization and goals that are easy to identify with, no mean feet considering they involve not only Igor and the doctor but a cat that is not a cat and a vampire with yearnings for a life beyond drinking blood. And … Something Else. 

You might think that this sets up a horrifying paranormal tale, but it’s actually a fascinating character study that explores consent and servitude, bullying and respect, ethical dilemmas and the choice to do good in a world where so many around you are bad.

I was sorry when this one came to a close. Even though the wrap-up itself was satisfying, I just liked these characters and wanted to spend more time with them. It's a story with a lot of heart, even disregarding those examples in the spare parts crypt.

 

 #TheHenchpersonsGuidetoUnionizing #NetGalley #Horror #SFF #humorous #cat #Igor #Frankenstein #sidekicks #vampires #demons #witches #werewolf #paranormal #cemetery #castle #lightning #HeartsInJars #brains 

Frankenstein Meets Wuthering Heights

 

Her Creation

by Jeneane O'Riley 

 This book has several content warnings at the front, and every one of them is earned. If any of them concern you, this is not the book for you. 

'Her Creation' is a feminine (not necessarily feminist) retelling of the Frankenstein story, in which young Victoria grows up with her eccentric doctor father in a run-down castle in a forest where he alternates between perfecting his surgical techniques on cadavers and stitching up the wealthy landowners' wastrel sons after their drunken reckless exploits. Victoria is dreaming of learning reincarnation to restore her much-missed mother, and assumes her father is working toward the same end. As with many modern retellings, there are female friendships to counter the traditional solitary-genius trope, nods to same-sex relationships that wouldn't be discussed openly in that era, and other nods to modern sensibilities that were not, for the most part, particularly intrusive or distracting (ymmv). 

The framing is of a female scholar signing on with a shipboard expedition to map the great northern wastes, when they find a very large, much-scarred man seemingly half-frozen on the ice. The scholar keeps a journal about her patronizing and patriarchal treatment by the crew that soon elides, after meeting the monster and his mystery-woman maker, into a recounting of how the unlikely pair ended up there. There are some philosophical musings from the aging Doctor Frankenstein about the nature of life, politics, morality, and the responsibilities of healers. Much of the language and atmosphere is redolent of the original text, though filtered through a feminine narrator..

The erotic fascination with the monster is writ larger upon the page than in any previous retelling I've encountered. The monster's obsession with her is also deeply explored. Think Wuthering Heights meets, well, Frankenstein. If you're reading for the slow-burn, dark, sexual energy, you won't be disappointed.

If you're not thus enamoured, the scholar seen so briefly at start and end may feel like the more interesting character. While the fiction of her recording Victoria's story continues in dated and located log book entries, the story and voice is all Victoria's (or, occasionally, the monster's) to carry. It starts too early in Victoria's young life and goes too long on too little forward motion beyond the passage of time, with too much interior musing between lines of dialogue or brief action sequences. Victoria's actions and reactions don't always seem credible. Too many pages in the first half are taken up with circular anguished emoting that leads nowhere, while the narrative largely glosses over her reaction/response to a very realistic and repeatedly traumatizing situation that is certain to be quite triggering for unwary readers. The writing is occasionally clumsy and self-contradicting, throwing us out of the fictive historical-seeming world with words like 'okay' and phrases about 'outing' someone dropped into the midst of scenes that should be the most immersive of all. It needed a sensitive copy-edit to keep the author's enthusiastic prose from charging past peak emotional and sensual impacts in a gush of weakening words and phrases.

And yet... there are moments, short speeches, a touch here or a gaze there, filled with love and depth and searing clarity that make it worth reading to the end. 

#ThanksNetGalley #HerCreation #FrankensteinRetold #DarkFantasy #erotic #sensual #scary 

Egyptology to DIE for!

 

The Pharoah's Curse Murders

By Melodie Campbell
 

April 2025
Cormorant Books 

What begins as a murder game to while away the hours aboard ship soon becomes all too real!

From the cover alone - sexy art deco with a curious scarab, you know you’re facing Egypt in the 1920s. That era in real life, as in this book, was aflame with passion for all things Egyptian. The tomb of Tutenkhamun was discovered in 1922, followed by a series of deaths among archeologists, resulting in a worldwide obsession with mummies and curses. 

Like the previous adventures of our heroine, Lady Revelstoke, and her indomitable maid, Elf, this one starts on a cruise ship. This time they are heading not across the turbulent wintry Atlantic, instead traveling sedately down the European coastline and along the Mediterranean to Egypt, the gateway to the Orient, the Nile, and all the mysteries of this ancient empire now being reclaimed from the smothering sands by eager archeologists from several nations. You can start with this one and not be irretrievably lost (although I'm sure you'll want to go back and read prior 'Merry Widow Murders' afterward - one is reviewed here).

The writing is elegant and multi-sensory, yet keeps the scene moving, and the characters blossom into real people, complete with just enough of their personal histories to ground readers in their personality and motivations. The necessary historical world building slides in so neatly it is almost invisible. Even the archeological politics of Egyptian excavations gets revealed to the reader in just enough detail, through ideally placed dialogue, that we almost don’t notice it is setting up a potential conflict between characters. Is it conflict enough to murder someone over? We'll find out...

Amelia Peabody fans will surely approve the Egyptology, and fashionistas of any age will adore the nods to flapper style and designers of the era. 

"a light apricot coloured sheath that covered her trim body in the most flattering way. Adorning her bobbed hair was a beaded headband with matching apricot feather at front."

"a magenta beaded gown by Lanvin— not my newest, but a favourite because of the hue. My brunette colouring works well with jewel tones. I set a modest diadem on my head and snatched up the matching wrap and evening bag left on the bed."

Delicious! Imagine owning a modest demi-tiara, that presumably keeps company in the traveling jewel case with less modest ones for more ostentatious events.

This author does a great job of setting us in the manners and social expectations of widowed aristocratic ladies, without beating us over the head with stodgy protocol. It is part of their gift to put us firmly in that era with all its prejudices and pretensions, sexism, and racism, and yet make all the characters accessible to the modern reader without resorting to obviously modern slang or behavior. 

 

Underpinning all the fashion, froth, and Egyptology, other, less pleasant realities get a mention:  

• that Egyptians were stripped of authority for self-governance by European colonizers, unable to stop the wholesale export of their cultural history to museums and private collections around the world, and 
• that women were shut out of most professions in the 1920s, and the few who got a chance to do anything approaching scholarship, in this case archeology, were regarded with suspicion as much by other women as by the men who believed in their own superiority at everything. 

There is even a reference to the vital role of Egyptologist Margaret Murray, training women in archaeological techniques at University College, London, which is explored in much greater length in this other review… 

The titular murders, like all those from the pen of this author, are complex, well plotted, embedded in the characters' personalities and relationships, and a pleasure to try to puzzle out as the story unfolds in all its fascinating, curious, fashionable historical wonder.

 #NewRelease #CormorantBooks #MelodieCampbell #MerryWidowMurders #MurderAtSea #CruiseShipMurder #Egyptology #AmeliaPeabody #Scarab #Pyramids #Death #jewels #AmateurDetective #AmateurSleuth #1920s #flappers #fashion #mummies #Canadian #BuyCanadian #CanadianAuthors

Noncorporeal IV - a haunting anthology full of twists

Noncorporeal IV: Phantom Dusk 

Creation as an act of vengeance… creation as a determination to reclaim the life that was lost or stolen...

Horrifying twists on ancient tales and urban legends fill this anthology of noncorporeal bodies that haunt the twilight hour. 

The settings span a broad expanse of time and space, from old American graveyards to a crevasse on a long-forgotten moon. These are tales of ghosts and memories, and even machine intelligences, with protagonists both corporeal and non-.  They range from simple small-town hauntings to complex multi-generational monster-hunts - or monster-hiding - from the distant past to the impenetrable future, each penned by one of USA‘s celebrated short story writers.

As often the case with collections, some of the stories are spellbinding, and others are a little less so. Some are homey and others are pure horror. But tastes vary and a story that I love might be one that a different reader shrugs and skims past. Let it suffice to say that there is excellent variety around the central theme. Something to satisfy almost every taste.

This 4th-in-series kickstarter anthology was crowdfunded in 2026 by Kevin A. Davis and produced by Inkd Publishing.

Noncorporeal IV: Phantom Dusk seeks to satisfy the reader who loves the spooky tales that will keep you reading late into the night.

Find Inkd Publishing on Facebook  and Instagram too for many crime and horror anthologies to browse and for submission opportunities.  

I’d like to thank Beverle Graves Myers, whose writing I have admired since the very first Tito Amato mystery, for hooking me up with the publisher and this review copy.

#NewRelease #anthology #horror #ghosts #phantoms #dusk #danger #monsters #clowns #haunting #halloween #reunion #teenagers #revenge #justice #UnfinishedBusiness #Inkd

Yesteryear: a maddening, absorbing read for women

Yesteryear

by Caro Claire Burke

Pub Date: Apr 07 2026

 

UPDATE:   ANNE HATHAWAY has the film rights! 

This novel is an exploration of the endless conflict between internalized patriarchal womanhood and feminist personhood: snarky, scary, and far too relatable for far too long. For who among us has not swallowed rage rather than feed yet another spousal argument that's going nowhere? Who hasn’t told herself lies about loving her children when she is so exhausted she hates the very thought of them? What woman has not donned her makeup like it’s armour, thick enough to keep her alive if not to protect her completely from the day that’s coming at her?

The writing is crisp, the characterization subtle and efficient. The story of one determined decision after another keeps up the pace. But be warned: those final chapters are a terrible and terrifying mind-bender for any woman. 

Depending on where you’re starting from in your own life, the first part of this book will turn you green with envy or make you so nauseous you could lose your lunch. It’s a look behind the excruciatingly curated life of a tradwife influencer, narrated by a woman so sanctimoniously godly you want to cheer each time a bit of human anger slips through. 

Soon, though, the cracks start to appear behind the façade of the perfect man, perfect marriage, perfect family, perfectly photo-ready home with all mod-cons hidden behind time-warp doors. I won’t spell them out for you; discovering them as they peep through is the necessary spice to keep you spooning up the bland Eden our narrator is very consciously selling (Spanish-made linen-finish stock pot $244 – not a direct quote). 

But when Natalie wakes up actually in those Good Old Days she’s been cheerfully - or desperately - re-creating for the camera, she’s far less equipped to cope than she should be. Because, it turns out, making soap in your kitchen aided by your adorable daughters is a whole different ball game when there’s no producer to get things set up, no nannies to tend the children, when your body’s wrecked by repeat pregnancies with no health care, and your husband is not only just as incompetent but a whole lot less tolerant of wifely suggestions. 

From there we cycle by turns through this disastrous new present and the pre-influencer years that turned Natalie into a woman ready to sell her entire personality for a few more clicks on her Instagram reels. A scholarship gets her into one of the US’s premier colleges, and that’s where we see Natalie as an intelligent, envious outsider rather than the center of her impeccably stylized world. The first time we see the life she constructed her own bridge away from. And then we watch as she deliberately paves a path forward that attempts to live up to the impossible standards of her patriarchal religious family and in-laws, not to mention her online followers.

Her wit and snark gets full play in the college scenes, (An artificially intelligent Eden: a warm, incubated landscape designed to keep the worst kids in America safe and warm and well-fed until they matured past the urge to peck each other’s eyes out.”) standing in sharp contrast to her ‘Good Old Days’ chapters where every misstep compounds the last disaster and the consequences of raising her voice to a man are far more painful than the mocking laughter of her college roommates was. 

Whatever you thought of her before, you can’t help pitying College Natalie almost as much as her Good Old Days disintegrating psyche. She’s so sure her narrow religious upbringing is all she’ll ever need, and she’s walking calmly toward what any reasonably aware woman can tell is unmitigated, soul-crushing disaster, brushing away all her forebodings with slogans and faith. And there are moments later when Natalie’s inner voice becomes her personal Greek chorus, repeating, rephrasing, foreshadowing as her beliefs-based choices take her ever closer to an inescapable doom. You really, really want her to wake up and see there are other paths.

#Netgalley #influencer #Christianity #tradwife #novel #NewRelease #feminism #childabuse #producer #familyfarm #manosphere #politics #PenguinRandomHouse #CaroClaireBurke #debutauthor #DiabolicalLies #sex #pregnancy #mentalillness #contentwarning #Yesteryear 

Death by the Dozen by D.B. Borton

Death By the Dozen

D.B. Borton 

 February 2026

There’s something inimitably cheery about a case in which both a kidnapped, pet pig and a set of gilded pigs with wings/urban art project feature heavily. It's delivered in a nice breezy, American-cosy style, with a main detective who is a grandmother. The dialogue feels very true to the age of most participants and the various careers and venues. There are many one liners related to pigs, inevitable references to pigs flying, and some "your mama" jokes for local Cincinnati color. And a hilarious parade of St. Patrick’s Day pigs! 

Just so you know, the first corpse hits the headlines quite a distance into the book. So don’t think you’re not getting your body’s worth in this cosy feeling mystery even though it takes a while to land.

While our main protagonist is a grandmother, there’s a slight resemblance to the Nancy Drew, archetype in her sleuthing technique, which is amplified when the teenager, Morgan, grandniece of the author ADA, joins in her sleuthing, and again when a secret in the old barn enters the picture. 

Then comes the possible mad woman in the attic, adding a literary overtone to the tale. It’s a bit of social commentary as well, because in the 1800s and early 1900s, women could be committed to insane asylum for reasons that had nothing to do with how mentally acute they were, and everything to do with whether they add inherited property that their husbands wanted to get control of. Or if they were being replaced with a younger model in an era in the reasons for divorce were limited. There is also a bit of a statement here about how easy it was for women to be erased from the historical record, by name changes on marriage and by death in childbirth, or simply by dying and being buried away from their home parish where people all their lives would have remembered them. Women as property, and as unremarkable property at that. Soon replaced, soon forgotten. Even when they were writers of children’s books and local news articles.

Another interesting piece of social commentary, not at all overdone, is how street people see their lived environment differently than the people who only come and go in it before heading off to homes and offices elsewhere.

Bits of Cincinnati’s economic and riverine history are embedded throughout the narrative, including excitement from river pirates going after the steamboats that were still a major source of transportation into the 20th century. Several of the suspects have roots in that history, making it a neat bit of authorly interweaving between factual and fictional events. Historical clues are equally important to solving the mystery as contemporary ones are.

Now the not so great: 
For one thing, there are a lot of characters to learn in the first couple chapters. And it’s sometimes hard to tell where characters are while they’re having their very interesting conversations, because the author doesn’t ground the reader in the setting, just mentions and moves along. The other quibble I have with this story is that it’s only mentioned briefly that it’s set in 1988, Cincinnati’s bicentennial year, the one time, at the very start. Periodic reminders throughout would have helped make sense of the ages of some of the participants, as characters who could remember the 1940s would still be youngish retired people in 1988, but would be very decrepit if not dead by the 2020s.

Overall a comfortable sleuthing mystery with interesting social historical commentary and some humourous pet shenanigans.

#NetgalleyUK #cosy #mystery #Cincinnati #riverboats #historical #pets #petpig #seniorsleuth #granny #womenshistory #insaneasylum #murder  

 

Two Strong Women from Inanna Publications

 In honour of small Canadian feminist publishing, here are two new (Autumn 2025) novels for your holiday reading or gift-giving:

Mad Dog and the Sea Dragon by Lisa De Nikolits 

and 

A Watch of Nightingales by  Catherine Walker

 ----------------------------------- 

Mad Dog, or rather Enzo, was raised to lead one of Ontario's multi-generational criminal gangs. Our narrator Jessica is his moll, latest in a long line of sweet but not swift cuties, who does as she's told and asks no questions. It's a precarious life, given that his previous molls all vanished when he got tired of them, and few know that better than Jessica's big sister, a respectable-looking accountant in Enzo's crime family, who is determined to make bank on Jessica's big eyes and bigger curves.

Jessica can cope with life under Enzo's strict rules; she's been under her sister's orders ever since she was old enough to sit still and listen. Her only escape was reading, living in her fantasies. At first, life with Enzo seems like all her fantasies have come true: unlimited funds for vintage clothing, gifts of jewelry, an extravagant apartment, even a chef who sends her meals tailored to her taste three times a day. And the sea dragon, Enzo's first gift to her: a frilly seahorse that lives in its own columnar aquarium. 

Gradually Jessica comes to understand how precarious her position really is, how dangerous her boyfriend and his family are, and starts to think that maybe her sister is right: she needs to build up an escape fund big enough to get her far far away before Enzo makes her disappear the way her predecessors did. But when Enzo's scary mother comes to visit her, that's when things really get crazy.

The writing is crisp and the pace dances along like a conga line: prim matrons and drunken revelers bobbing and flailing in several directions at once. There’s always something happening or just happened, and even though Jessica almost never sees anyone except her sister and Enzo, ever more of the world outside becomes ever clearer to her and to the reader. It's all set up for a big, zany, gangland finish, and yes, there's a twist at the end that I didn't see coming even a few pages before.

#Inanna #MadDogAndTheSeaDragon #gangland #mobsters #Canadian #CanadianFiction #fashion #vintage #seadragon #BuyCanadian #SupportCanadianAuthors @lisadenikolits @Inannapub #bookreview #crimefiction #RiverStreet

------------------------------

A Watch of Nightingales

 Anne of Green Gables meets Florence Nightingale.

This novel, set before World War I and written very much in the style of books from that era, is literary rather than action-packed, and delves into early nursing training of the late 19th and early 20th century. Beth, the village school’s valedictorian, has great plans for her future: she’s going to train to be a Nightingale! As in Florence Nightingale, the mother of modern nursing practice. She gets a place at a London training hospital, a room at a boarding house, and far more exhausting work than she dreamed of. 

 

The letters between Beth and her friend Tom, and later others, are an often touching microcosm of the daily life of that era. Intermittent quotes of poetry extant at that time are scattered through throughout, thought of by Beth in the night or mentioned by other characters, sometimes heading chapters to emphasize the theme. Little-known nursing history - and the origins of the order of Nightingale-trained nurses - finally gets its due through Emily's training, and via the thoughts, feelings, and actions of those around her in the field of medicine. The use of omniscient point of view may be distracting for readers more used to first person or close third. 

 

Between Tom's world and Beth's, readers get the outline of social unrest in England the time, amid discussion about the state of birth control and of women’s sexuality. We are also shown some of the psychological and emotional stresses of the nursing profession. The phrase “eating their young,” used back then, is still current in nursing today, where many older, more experienced nurses still hand younger nurses all the worst jobs, all the while scolding rather than encouraging, frowning rather than smiling, and generally making the workplace more exhausting than it needs to be. [This reviewer has also witnessed great mutual support among nurses in modern hospitals; if the times are changing in this regard, it's well overdue.]

  

With her training almost complete, Beth takes a practicum placement at a tuberculosis sanitarium and there meets the Canadian painter Emily Carr, a woman a bit older than herself, who is not yet famous and whose weakened body has betrayed her under the rigours of the British climate and her artist training. Their daily encounters cast light on the desperate and largely futile search for meaningful treatments for the dreaded TB, or 'consumption' as some still called it, and also on the continual emphasis on fresh air as a preventative against spreading the contagion to nursing staff or family visitors. There's a mystery around one  patient that can only be solved by combining Emily's knowledge of paints with Beth's comprehensive recording of patient symptom patterns. 

 

The novel's thorough nursing lore, both in England and amid the horrors of World War I's trench warfare, is a credit to the author, a longtime nurse and professor who has helped many a young student stay on course through the demanding training for the profession. 

Recommended for those who like social history and anyone who wondered about the barely told story of doomed Ruby in the Anne of Green Gables books.