Rouge by Mona Awad

A large part of the book shows us how disturbingly cultish the beauty industry can be. It’s not a straightforward portrayal but surreal. Someone said it has a David Lynchian atmosphere and I agree.

The narrator Belle has been obsessed with much of her life. Now in the present she is addicted to Dr. Marva’s skin treatment videos. She returns to California after her mother dies from a fall from a cliff into the sea. She is barely hanging on as she tries to make sense of her mother’s and how she racked up so much debt. And what are all these red jars in her condo?

A woman in red is at the funeral and later Belle receives a mysterious video on her phone from ROUGE asking “Is grief affecting your skin barrier?”. The same woman from the funeral is in the video. Days later Belle is at her mother’s place and finds herself in one of her mothers dresses and wearing her mother’s red shoes.which seem to lead her along the cliffs to the gates of a huge manor, La Maison Meduse.

There she is apparently expected and welcomed as a special guest. Within the mansion is a tank passing below and through the upper floors in which jellyfish-like creatures swim. ROUGE promotes beauty treatments. Later Belle is offered a free treatment which makes her the target of envy among paying guests. Oddly, Belle is asked to select a jellyfish which is with her during the treatment. Afterwards, Belle's perceptions are confused, there are gaps in her memory, she mixes up words. But the treatments are giving her an unearthly beauty that stuns people.

After the treatments start, the story enters into David Lynch territory. The reader can’t help but be drawn into the dreamlike, surreal state along with Belle.

Lots of questions. What are the treatments and what is happening to her? Why is “her”jellyfish with her during the treatment? What was her mother’s connection with Rouge and why do the embrace her as her mother’s daughter? What is ROGUE's real goal and is it really to help you achieve your best self?

The ending is both stunning and imaginative and shows the true horror within La Maison Meduse. I loved and now need to read the author’s Bunny.

Natural Beauty by Ling Ling Huang

Natural Beauty is Huang’s first novel and this body horror is a banger of a start.

The first person narrator, daughter of Chinese immigrants who fled the Cultural Revolution, was once a promising pianist but a traumatic family event left her psychologically unable to play. While working as a dishwasher, a woman who saw her play invites her to come to a high end beauty and wellness clinic named Holistic. There she is offered a job. Working at HolistiK isn’t just a job, it’s a commitment to a way of life. The employees use the products  and are given regular tune-ups. The narrator is told “We don’t sell products. We’re selling a lifestyle. Desire.The possibility for them to become us.”

The exotic products and treatments are an exaggerated parody of what you can find celebrities promoting. For example, one treatment involves remora eels and crabs. Even as the narrator finds herself drawn deeper into the Holistic culture, she finds that the products and treatments she receives are having an effect. They aren’t merely cosmetic, skin deep as it were, but are gradually altering her body.

The narrator is recruited into a special program which deepens the mystery of what Holistik really is and is the start of the full on body horror she experiences in the second part of the book. The horror Huang portrays is nicely done and leaves the reader both repulsed feeling sympathy for those who succumbed to the lure of finding beauty.

Natural beauty touches upon self-worth, race and identity, and consumerism where Holistik creates a demand for their products and treatments with the employees serving as living advertisements to clients who desire the “natural” beauty they see. The more outlandish the treatment the more people with the means will embrace it.

I hope to read more from this author.

The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff

 If you enjoy an excellent, character driven novel that immerses you in a different culture giving the reader a vivid sense of place then this might be the book for you. It was for me.

You can approach it as a crime story but it is so much more than that.

The setting is contemporary in a small village in India where having a refrigerator and indoor bathroom are luxuries. Geeta is the main character. The villagers believe she “disappeared” her husband. Though innocent, letting people believe she murdered her husband has benefits. No one messes with her. Her hero is the bandit queen Phoolan Devi, a real person of the Dalit caste (i.e. untouchable), who exacted bloody revenge on the men who horrifically abused and tortured her.

Geeta is part of a female loan group that has taken out a small business loan. They meet monthly to make a payment to the loan officer. Her relationship to the other women is not at all friendly given her reputation, it’s strictly business. One of the group, Farah, often has difficulty making her payment due to her husband who bleeds her dress making business dry to fuel his alcoholism. This jeopardizes the loan which doesn’t make the other women happy. She approaches Geeta for help in disposing of her husband. Geeta isn’t a killer but finds herself reluctantly helping Farah plan the murder. When another woman sees Farah’s success, she looks to Geeta for her expertise.

The core of the story is the relationship that builds among the women. They find strength together in a culture of systemic misogyny and abuse. Geeta loses her aloofness as the women bond. The dialog is smoothly realistic and frequently wry, sly, witty, snarky, and funny, just what I enjoy. There are also scenes of thrilling danger and extreme peril but even there Shroff finds a way to inject humor.

Around this story of female empowerment and friendship is the structure of embedded misogyny and the caste system which is still in the culture particularly in small villages. I've never had a book pull me into a culture like this one does. The issue of caste is shown by through character Khushi, a Dalit widow who has a cremation business. We see her in public and the strictures under which she and her children have to conduct themselves. It both appalls and sparks empathy in the reader. But in her home, away from the higher castes, Khushi is a strong, assertive woman who isn't shy about putting Geeta in her place when she tries to "help".

I loved and cared about the characters and what happened to them. I enthusiastically recommended this book.

Ten Low by Stark Holborn

 

So you're looking for a really good space adventure? Have I got the book for you.

Our protagonist is Ten "Doc" Low, a medic, ex-convict, ex-soldier on the losing side of a war with PTSD and crippling remorse for what she did in the war. She's eking out an existence on the barren, arid moon Factus on the edge of the known universe.

She rescues a young girl from a crashed ship who turs out to be an augmented super soldier. Ten sees redemption in getting General Gabriella "Gabie" Ortiz to safety but to do so they have to cross a wasteland and dodging bandits, cult-like organ harvesters, military hit-squads, and bounty hunters. Along the way they pick up allies but numbers don't equal safety and the future is far from certain.

Holborn does a masterful job of world building. She doesn’t try to explain everything at once but shows us as the story unfolds. The reader feels the bleakness of Factus, its its low oxygen atmosphere and filthy hardscrabble life.

The characters are well developed and you come to care for them. Ten's remorse and torment for what she did in the and need for redemption is real and visceral. The author has fun with General Ortiz, only13 years old but a hard-bitten, hard-drinking, soldier who will kill without blinking or regret. The group that forms around these two are equally well fleshed out and their motivation explored.

The book is fast paced with action scenes that are well written and near unbearable at times: narrow escapes, tense standoffs, gunfights, it's all here. But the story and character development are not sacrificed to the action. There also is a mysterious force that seems to be guiding but I don't think it veers into magic.

Someone suggest that readers who like The Locked Tomb series (Gideon the Ninth is the 1st) by Tamsyn Muir will also like this book. While there is no similarity in themes I get the vibe since I also love that series.

There are 2 more books in this series and I will be reading them.

Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica, translation by Sarah Moses

 

First sentence: “Carcass, Cut in half. Stunner. Slaughter line. Spray wash.”

Tender is the Flesh is a horror story set in a world where an infectious virus has infected all animal meat  making the meat lethal to eat or even be around (supposedly). To adjust to this reality, the governments instituted the “Transition” which allows for the consumption of human flesh, euphemistically referred to as “special meat”. The meat industry has retooled itself to breed and slaughter human beings who are merely called “head”.

Marcos is a supervisor in a slaughtering facility who oversees the receiving of new head, processing, and making sure the breeders are delivering quality head. He is weary from dealing with family issues and tries to not think too much about what he does and maintain an emotional detachment. Then one of the breeders servicing his facility sends him a prime female head delivered to his remote home. Marcos begins to relate to the woman as a human being and treats her like one. This is forbidden and could result in Marcos himself being sent to slaughter.

This is my first book by Bazterrica and won’t be my last. She has a new book coming out in March 2025, also translated by Sarah Moses, which I have pre-ordered. Bazterrica and Moses are a good team. The prose is clean and sharp and flow allowing the reader to immerse themselves in the story.

There are two aspects to the horror within the book. The first is the treatment of humans like so many head of cattle and the acts of breeding, slaughtering, and packaging them. The second, and to me more horrible, is the way these acts are normalized, treated as an everyday part of life. I’m not exaggerating when I say that it was a “jam a knuckle in the mouth” reaction to the images brought forth by the matter of fact way the “special meat” industry is conducted. It is thought provoking and raises the question, could this become a reality in the face of climate change and threats to food supplies. I think of Tender is the Flesh as an extension of Soylent Green which I thought of as pretty horrible when the movie came out but this is much worse. Unfortunately I don’t now see it as a stretch to think consumers would quickly adjust.

The actual motivations and practicalities of institutionalized cannibalism are left to the reader's imagination.But could the governments really pull it off aren’t really important. Marcus himself has doubts that the virus really exists. He refuses, unlike everyone else, to carry an umbrella in case a bird should poop on them.

Tender is the Flesh is a well written work of horror that should repulse the reader that also makes the reader question if we could descend to this level. I loved it but would need to know someone well before recommending it to them.