"One Thing Seldom Asked Of Those On Whom Disaster Had Laid Its Hand Is What Their Future Plans Were Before

PARABLE OF THE SOWER & TALENTS by OCTAVIA E. BUTLER

quickly: diary of a young woman preparing herself for the collapse of american democracy and discovering a new faith in the process (god is change! / every neighborhood has its walls / r*pe, murder, cannibalism / burn the witch! / narcotics in utero / empathy is a weakness / bad cops / landslides, drought, fire, and famine / eat the rich, then the middle class, then the poor too / fascism dressed as christianity / no one can read, but everyone has a gun / pyromania in pill form / little fires everywhere / waiting for the end to come / survival of the most prepared / slavery sponsored by capitalism (just like old times) / survive, at all costs / heaven is in the stars)

The year is 2024. The climate has finally changed liked they’ve been warning us for years. The trickle-down economy has failed everyone but the rich, like we knew it would. Society has failed everyone but the 1%. Water costs more than gasoline, and food to feed one person for two weeks may cost you thousands of dollars. The government will kick you out of your home, and then arrest you for being homeless. Slavery has been reinvented by venture capitalists, and co-signed by a neo-confederate president. Don’t think about running off to another state or another country. You’ll probably never make it past the highly militarized state borders without being, r*ped, tortured, slain, or eaten. 

This is a stark depiction of what happens when humanity collapses under the weight of capitalism… OEB is not shy about the violence of a dying world.

At the center of this story is Lauren Olamina, a young black girl who has taken a critical look at the world she is coming of age in and deduces that The End is near. The religion, philosophy, and morality of her parent’s generations have failed her. She believes our collective destiny as a species was never to be stationed here on Earth forever. We were meant to spread across the Universe. To fulfill that destiny, humanity must undergo the difficult task of maturation. Our petty wars, religious debates, and moral shortcomings are the traits of an immature species. Only a mature species can build the communities and pool the resources necessary to leave a dying Earth and spread beyond our Solar System to build something greater. All Lauren has to do is survive long enough through America’s downfall to be able to convince the rest of the world of Earthseed’s philosophy.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ An outstanding survival guide, if read as the author intended.

“Oh yes, suddenly I realized what a good thing death can be, how just and fair, like a disinfectant, or a vacuum cleaner.”

Olga Tokarczuk, DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD

"Blake would say that there are some places in the Universe where the Fall has not occurred, the world has not turned upside down and Eden still exists. Here Mankind is not governed by the rules of reason, stupid and strict, but by the heart and intuition. The people do not indulge in idle chatter, parading what they know, but create remarkable things by applying their imagination. The state ceases to impose the shackles of daily oppression, but helps people to realize their hopes and dreams. And Man is not just a cog in the system, not just playing a role, but a free Creature."

Olga Tokarczuk, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

HIDDEN PICTURES by JASON REKULAK (REVIEW)

quickly: a recovering addict gets a new job babysitting a haunted five-year-old. (a young woman trying to live a sober life / a child with a questionable existence / homes that come with guest houses and hidden gardens / disturbed suburbian parents / physical and spiritual battles with sobriety / weird and quirky superstitious neighbors / wickedly beautiful artwork from the spiritual realm / gardeners who make you want to break rules)

not too shabby. not too complex either, honestly. the tone sits firmly in the mystery genre, for me. the ghosts in this story don’t scare or thrill me, but they don’t bore me either. stephen king is quoted on the back cover as saying “the language is straightforward”, and that is absolutely correct. not much poetry or soul to the writing, but it was a full story! it was compelling enough to pull me to the end, but not my favorite ending. it has the kind of ending that you find in most “B” level thrillers (which is no shade, i love b-movies). the ending is a resolution, but it doesn’t take my breath away.

★ ★ ★

more thoughts: SPOILERS!

Some personal context… after a reading sprint that began sometime in March, I spent the past few weeks with THE BOOKS OF JACOB. It is a tome of a book, 900+ pages, and the most time I’ve spent with a book in years. It was an interesting and detailed world to be in, but I couldn’t wait to get back to the thriller/mystery/horror genre, and HIDDEN PICTURES is my return. I read it in less than 24 hours. 

The artwork really pulled me in, and wasn’t as gimmicky as it could have been.

The story opens up with Mallory reflecting on a paid health study she participated in which involved her being blindfolded in front of a group of men. She was instructed to raise her hand if she felt eyes on her, testing her ability to sense the male gaze. She was insanely accurate, telling the instructor that she felt a buzz in her mind whenever she sensed looks. The instructor offers to do more research with her, but Mallory trades her phone for Oxy and the lady is unable to reach her.

After this, we are immediately thrown into the present where Mallory is now sober and has been for 18 months. She is preparing to interview for a babysitting job with The Maxwells, youngish parents living in an affluent suburban enclave. After an awkward and stressful interview that involves her pulling out a piss test to prove her commitment to sobriety, she is hired. Caroline, the Mom, says they believe in giving people second chances, but you learn fast that you can’t believe anything they say.

Soon enough, five-year-old Teddy has formed a close bond with Mallory. The creepy pictures he draws always seem to show an entity hanging around him that no one else can see (but Mallory can sense). Teddy’s mom brushes the pictures off and tells Mallory not to encourage him. After the quirky next-door neighbor tells Mallory about the ghost stories surrounding the guest house where she lives, she eventually convinces herself that her guest house is haunted and the ghost is speaking through Teddy. Half right.

Of course, her pursuit of this tightens the underwear of The Maxwells, and so she begins to investigate under the radar. She enlists the help of The Maxwells’ gardener whom she’s told that she was a local student (and not a recovering person being given a second chance to get her life on track). Fast forwarding past the awkwardness of living with a married couple whose marriage is a thin facade of happiness, the “hauntings”, the creepy photos with the Samura-like girl in them, Mallory trying to confront the super rationalist parents about the supernatural realm, and Mallory trying to make contact to the ghost by ouija board… eventually the ghost jumps into Mallory’s body while she is napping and causes her to draw all over the walls of The Maxwell’s pristine white walls.

The rest is a loud and gory climax with a small scoop of falling action on the side. The parents fire Mallory because of the “artwork”, attributing it to some sort of mental break caused by recovery, and they give her 48 hours to get out. Alex, the gardener, is told about her true background as a recovering addict (but still wants to help her). She miraculously solves the mystery at the last minute and proceeds to do the dumbest thing that characters can do in a mystery/thriller… confront the bad guys with no backup, collateral, witness, or weaponry. The Maxwells reveal their devilry… they are kidnappers who stole a little girl and made her disguise herself as a boy. The child’s real mother, whom Caroline Maxwell killed, is who has been haunting little Teddy.

Caroline Maxwell plans to kill Mallory by drug overdose, but she’s saved by Ted Maxwell who secretly hates his kidnapping murderess wife (but has done nothing but enable her). A delusional Ted is killed by Caroline, in the midst of some pipe dream of him running away to some foreign land with Mallory. A chase ensues, with Mallory running into the woods with Teddy and hiding in a tree. Just as Caroline has hunted them down, the spirit of Teddy’s dead mother possesses her, getting Teddy to kill Caroline with an arrowhead conveniently found earlier in the story. 

That’s how most elements of this story felt. Convenient. The end, while loud and gory, seemed staged. Like I could see the beginning from the end. All the little easter eggs stood out like they had billboards above them pointing out “CLUE HERE”, or “FORESHADOWING”. Yet, I still enjoyed it. Like I would an R.L. Fear Street book. Three stars, but a high three. 

ADDENDUM: seeing from other reviewers how this author's work includes, deceptively, various ideologies used to other and vilify trans children and their parents (which makes me think back to that errant Harry Potter reference). Unfortunate and gross. Knowing makes the work even cheaper than it already was. Keeping my same rating, which was written and determined before I found out. I will definitely be more critical in the future.

YOU LIKE IT DARKER by STEPHEN KING (REVIEW)

quickly: a perfect collection of stephen king short stories (men with unearthly talents / madness and murder / stolen lifetimes / psychic dreams and punished deeds / balancing bad luck and good / grandpa’s still got it / an unseen invasion / angels on airplanes / dogs are friends, gators are not / strollers full of rattlesnakes / gentleman scientists / a man with all the answers).

Well yes, Stephen, I *do* like it dark. What a delightful page-turning collection of short horror stories with a wide range of subgenres… detective suspense thrillers… sci-fi alien invasions… and even a couple of heartfelt dramas.

My favorites were Willie the Weirdo (a grandfather and grandson share a suspiciously strange connection), Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream (a nightmare gives an old man hell in real life), On Slide Inn Road (a family encounters a couple of hoodlums on an abandoned backroad), The Turbulence Expert (a man uses his perception to change fate), Rattlesnakes (a man on vacation grieving the death of his wife becomes entangled with a haunted woman), and The Answer Man (three encounters with a man who knows everything changes one man’s experience of life and time).

I’ll have to admit this is my first King read (and a perfect introduction) though I’ve seen all the movies, shows, and miniseries based on his work. On paper, like on-screen, the stories felt distinctly American™. Like the feeling of eating a double-meat cheeseburger and fries, then washing it down with a ridiculously gigantic can of Coke. Fast, but filling, and oh-what-fun my taste buds had (though my arteries may clog if I overdo it…).

★★★★★ So fun.

DEVIL HOUSE by JOHN DARNIELLE (REVIEW)

quickly: a true crimes writer moves into the building where the murders in his latest book took place (a writer questioning the ethics of his process / the past catching up with the present / lasting works of art / stories about stories / small towns outside of big cities / housing, drug, and mental health crises / mothers who love their sons / SATANIC PANIC! / swords, knights, and castle doctrines / the monsters are the people, but are the people monsters?)

This is not horror and hardly a thriller. There are no ghosts, demons, or spirits. There are indeed bumps in the night, but they come from the living. It’s a fresh take on mystery writing, but not really mystery either. It’s an exposition. We follow the main character, Greg, as he completes his latest true crime novel. The voices change throughout the story, so sometimes Greg is speaking to us, other times to someone else. The fun part of this story is the writing and the behind-the-scenes peek into the world of true crime. The not-so-fun part is the ending. 

John Darnielle’s writing spirals and descends. He takes his time moving around the subject, encircling it with details, getting closer and deeper at the end of every paragraph. Then, as you are rounding the last bend, the entire picture becomes clear from the inside out. It was like unraveling a beautifully woven ball of yarn, expecting a rare jewel at its center, but finding the end of a string instead. (Maybe, this is the entire meta point of this story… life is just a series of strings ending. Nothing special.)

★ ★ ★ ★

more thoughts: SPOILERS

Some personal context… I came across this one because I was scouring the goodreads tag for “horror” and looking for interesting things that came out in the past year or two. The cover got me, as they tend to do. I rarely check the reviews before I read the story, but I always check after, just to see what there is I might have missed. I think I liked it more than most. As interesting as this book was to read, it didn’t deliver the THRILL I thought it would. It read like a poet writing a Wikipedia page… an intricate balance between truth and perception and the philosophy of cause and effect.

I recently read TROOP, and one of my gripes was the dialogue for the young teens that the story centered on. It felt so outdated and inauthentic. The dialogue, actions, and inner monologues for the teens at the center of DEVIL HOUSE were immaculate. Perfectly nuanced, and varied. The sophisticated unraveling of emotions and motivations is moving. He totally encapsulates the angst of aging. Now that I think about it, I actually would’ve loved to have seen John Darnielle do a version of TROOP.

The story is divided into 6 parts, and they each have different voices.

1: Chandler

We open with our good friend Greg Chandler, whose family lineage of kingship becomes a recurring thematic element in this story. He introduces us, right off the rip, to who he is, what he does, and his latest project. His agent has hipped him to the story of a couple of people murdered in an old porno shop in Milpitas, CA, outside of San Jose. 

He walks us through his process… one of immersion, invasion almost, that requires him to be in the places where these crimes took place. He, again with a nudge from his agent, devises a plan to purchase ‘DEVIL HOUSE’, which has been renovated, turned from a shop into a home, and is currently for sale. As he goes through the process of buying the house and moving in, he takes time to expound on the details of the case. He gives us an introduction to necessary persons and places, and at the end of Part 1, he tells us that what he discovered differs from the story that is told. He also tells us that he does not want to write the story he was sent there to write.

2: White Witch

Here, the story changes abruptly. Now, our narrator is no longer talking to us. Now, attention is directed to ‘The White Witch’, and we have become the ‘White Witch’ being addressed. (An interesting use of narration perspective, though I understand how some could find it jarring and confusing.) Eventually, we will come to know her life… a high school teacher who murdered two students while they were invading her home. Part 2 is a grand spiral around the details of her life leading up to the invasion and murder. In the open, she was just a school teacher. In the end, standing on the beach with bags of body parts, she has turned into the satanic WITCH living in the hills. Both in some real reality, but also in the minds of those always needing a villain to blame the evils of the world on.

3: Devil House

Our narrator returns to addressing us, and the White Witch’s story is paused. Now the focus returns to Milpitas, to Devil House before it was known as such. We get a grand historical overview of the influences that conspired to make the porno shop possible. This includes the history of the land and the landlord. However, the bulk of this part of the story is about the last occupants of Devil House, before our narrator Greg. 

We go back to it when it was MONSTER ADULT X, a porno shop on the side of the highway where 17-year-old Derrick works, unbeknownst to his parents who only want to best for him. MONSTER ADULT X (I’ll refer to it as MAX from here on out), is in its last days as the owner Anthony Hawley can’t keep up the rent payments.

Hawley closes the place down, but because Derrick still has his key, it is open to him. He hangs out there drawing and sketching. Then his friend Seth starts joining him. Then their homeless friend Alex, who’s been missing for some time joins them and lives there. Just at the tail end of things, Alex’s friend Angela pops in for some of the fun. 

This is their paradise, away from the impending world of adulthood and all its anxieties and broken promises. Things are fine until the landlord starts showing the place, in preparation to sell.

4: Song of Gorbonian 

A short and unexpected chapter, written in Olde English. Obviously, this is an imaginative prelude for some of the story’s later motifs and actions. Yet, it could just as well be a short story written during a reprieve Greg was taking from writing Devil House… or a rambling from one of MAX’s occupants during its last days… who’s to say? The Song of Gorbonian is a tale of a young king’s promise to avenge his father’s death and restore the gods of the old world.  

5: Devil House

In this part of the story, Greg updates us on the stories of MAX’s occupants. He catches up with modern-day Angela, Derrick, and Seth, all living different adult lives far away from Milpitas, having escaped any punishment, (but receiving tons of blame for the murders). The only one we don’t get an update on is Alex, who has managed to disappear. 

6: White Witch

Now we are back to the story of the White Witch, but not like before. Instead of standing in her place while Greg speaks to her, we are instead placed in the shoes of Jana, Jesse’s mother, one of the kids killed by Mrs. Crane, The White Witch. We are standing in Jana’s shoes as Greg reads (or summarizes rather) a letter Jana wrote. In reading this letter back to her, we come to understand the forces that shaped the life of the home invaders we met in Part 2.

In between the breaths of this letter, Greg is restoring Devil House to its former glory… breaking glass and pulling up carpets. 

7: Chandler

The perspectives change again. Now we are standing in the shoes of Greg’s childhood friend, as we reconnect with Greg after several years and he expounds on the new project he is working on, writing about a murder in Milpitas where he (we?) grew up. At the close of Part 7, we learn that this has all been a fabrication. Derrick, Seth, Angela, Alex… not one of them was real. At least, not in the form that Greg portrayed them to be in his book. The real culprits were likely men living on the streets, squatting for the night, running into the landlord, and reactions ensuing. 

Greg reveals his grand philosophy on what the public expects from true crime, and how the true story of Devil House would not satisfy the psyches of the consumers. Then the book fades out in a hazy memory of childhood, where the days were spent playing games.

Before I could complain too much about the ending, I had to remind myself that Greg told us exactly to expect: “What I learned contradicts the account I first read, which I understand to have sprung from the need for a certain sort of telling, a hunger for known quantities.” In other words, the salacious story of teens murdering to defend their clubhouse is something cooked up by the collective psyche, not by reality.

More than a fictional true crime book, this entire work seemed to be a rumination of the big machine of true crime itself and how we respond to these violent acts as a society. What do we want from these stories? Who do these acts of violence affect? At one end of a story, a person may look like a demon, but if we trace back all the influences and occurrences, we may find this person may have been someone else at some point… and if it is true that they were someone else, how much responsibility do we place on all the option-less choices people are forced to make, and on the uncontrollable forces that shape the boundaries of our lives?

THE EMPUSIUM by OLGA TOKARCZUK (REVIEW)

quickly: a sickly young engineering student hopes to find healing in a scenic mountain valley village where mysteries abound (gentleman’s houses / noises in the attic / spying eyes / fear of being seen / sex dolls and shrooms / wine at dinner time / men who think women are a different species / obscuring the vision, to see more clearly / long walks around the park / those looked upon by venus and jupiter / the soul as the weakest point / the inferior superiority of men).

The story opens like a Wes Anderson film, set in 1913 Poland, in a valley between two mountain ranges with air that is mythologized to cure the infamous tuberculosis. Before our dear Mieczysław can be cured, the malaise of life at the Gentleman’s House (where men smoke cigars with their weakened lungs, and talk at quite some length about the “lesser” minds of women) becomes a mire of shadows and secrets waiting to be unraveled. As expected, this idyllic 1900s mountain town is more than it appears to be. At night, after many men have imbibed in the psychoactive “schwärmerei”, the landscape seems to stare back at the onlookers. Every fall, men die violent and mysterious deaths, as if the surrounding forest is eating them and spitting them back out. As the summer season ends, Mieczy’s anxious concerns of being ‘seen’ intensifies.

★ ★ ★ ★ Mysteriously seductive.

Slowly, just as calmly as summer gives way to the decaying color bomb of autumn, this slow burn of a “health resort horror story” ends in a flush of fire. What begins as a medical retreat for our anxious and gentle-spirited protagonist evolves into an awakening of sorts upon the discovery of a cure for an ailment Mieczy had long been prepared to disregard as a permanent inconvenience. Mieczy will discover something that no amount of men’s postulations could destroy, and it is fantastic to watch. The astrology tidbits are delicious, and always a delightful discovery to happen upon when reading Olga’s work (as in The Books of Jacob, and Drive Your Plow…). The world of this story is both scenic and seductive… like a carnivorous plant that slowly digests you as you are hypnotized by its beauty. 

You walk with Mieczy up the steep incline of a forested mountain, always wondering where the path is taking you, until suddenly you reach the peak and overlook the edge at the marvelous view down below. A soft, then hard, autumnal horror story with an ending that would make J. K. Rowling’s eyes bulge as she combusts and then evaporates. 

JULIA by SANDRA NEWMAN (A REVIEW)

quickly: a woman’s daring sex life in a totalitarian regime leads to confinement and freedom (this is a man’s world / cameras and monitors everywhere / facetime before Facetime™ / overalls and soot / a boot in the face / thought control / see nothing, say nothing / “no touching” / people disappear / yes means no / hate means love / Big Brother becoming Big Father / cheese like rubber, bread like leather / child spies / handsome airmen in handsome uniforms / dark windowless underground prisons / government-sponsored torture / nightmares turned reality / all regimes are the same).

This is a retelling of George Orwell’s dystopian classic 1984, from the perspective of the character Julia. Though the landscape was familiar it felt like there were so many new elements to explore, thanks to Newman’s refocusing of the story’s lens. The gray days, civil self-censoring, and grand governmental illusions are still there, but what Newman highlights is a world that is not just anti-women, but anti-Feminine. The daily assault on women and the collective feminine (those faculties we need dearly for introspection, intuition, reception, caretaking, community, and creativity) is relayed to us through Julia’s own story of growing up watched (and touched and used and forgotten). No women’s rights, but no poetry, thinking, feeling, remembering, loving, or caring either, says Big Brother, always watching. 

With this new view of the story, the smell of blood is sharper (on the street after a bomb tears off a child’s arm, or in the dungeons where they torture pregnant women and the elderly). The design of Big Brother’s Love (Hate) is clearer (double, triple, and quadruplethink… every relationship is a set-up). The heartbreakers are the moments when the wizard’s curtain is pulled back and the evil isn’t anything special… just a man. Made of flesh and feelings just like any other living thing. Subject to thirst, hunger, pain, aging, and death. How despairingly bleak it is to realize that the causes of your and the world’s tragedies are men who make decisions like kids fighting over toys on the playground. 

★★★★

MY DARKEST PRAYER by S. A. COSBY (REVIEW)

quickly: a formerly active marine is enlisted to solve the murder of a local preacher (men in uniform with anger issues / a woman all the men want / nosy old ladies / crafty and devious henchmen / blood-filled knee-breaking fist fights / hot and steamy hotel nights / churches with more money than god / local and state corruption).

this is a crime thriller that does the genre justice. it feels like a fast-paced car ride with that rowdy cousin who just can’t seem to stay out of trouble. i picked it up late one night and couldn’t stop turning the page. nathan, a man who used to wear uniforms but doesn’t any longer, tries to solve a murder without getting himself killed. the writing is easy without being simplistic. there are just enough characters and just enough character development to fulfill your literary appetite without being weighted down by words. it’s adult, graphic, and bloody, without overdoing it. for all the broken bones and grittiness, it maintains an earthy and realistic view.

★ ★ ★ ★

more thoughts: SPOILERS!

Some personal context… this is the first crime thriller novel I’ve read since my joyous reunion with reading began. I truly found it entertaining, and I am excited to read more by Cosby specifically. As a true fan of the genre, Cosby placed several cultural references throughout the story, with a large portion of them referring to other crime novels and writers… something to explore when I need something else to read.

Since it’s a crime mystery thriller, I won’t reveal too much in the commentary. It was fun to wonder what happened next. Which is of course, along with the sweaty must of inebriated masculinity, a key element of the genre. 

I hate to be shallow, but it was the cover that got me. 

The story opens with our action figure of a hero, Nathan: a marine who is no longer active in the service; and an ex-policeman who left the force dishonorably, depending on whose honor system you use. He is a man who is not a stranger to violence but is mostly a gentleman on most accounts. By day he works at his cousin’s funeral home. By night, he shoots pool down at the local dive. But sometimes, when vengeance calls, he moves in shadows to exact the justice and revenge law enforcement is incapable of. 

After the preacher of a mega-bank mega-church dies under mysterious circumstances, Nathan is asked by two old ladies of the church to do some further investigation. They believe his history and familiarity with the aforementioned law enforcement would allow him to see something the local cops may have been trying to hide. Thinking this will be a quick job and easy money, Nathan opens a can of worms that results in several deaths and broken phalanges. Some people, Nathan makes sure disappear, never to be found again. Others he leaves for someone else to find and draw conclusions. 

This detective is not a detective, but, his time in uniform has taught him how to ask questions and get answers. This portrayal of the classic tragic noir detective has all the blood, booze, and hot passionate sex that you need… and it feels current. Not like some vintage paperback I found at a book barn. It is of the time. 

Will certainly be reading more S. A. Cosby soon.

EYNHALLOW by TIM McGREGOR (REVIEW) 

quickly: a late 1700’s irish housewife has her humble island life disrupted by a strange and inimitable scientist from afar, dr. victor frankenstein: (anatomy as an art / unexpected arrivals and departures / empty graves and ocean caves / heartbreaking decision making  / ghosts are just faded memories / mysteries of midwifery / medical malpractice / overly tall people need love too / ogres, trolls, and monsters on the beach / sad sex with your drunk husband vs. empowering sex with a stranger / secrets in a locked room / stories of abandonment / sea salt and stone / telling your true love goodbye / true grief never dies / waiting on lost lovers by the sea).

Meet the overly tall, overly compassionate Agnes. Her father made her denounce her true love because he was poor. Then her evil stepmother orchestrated her marriage to an old man because ‘no one likes overly tall women’. That is how the young Agnes came to be Mrs. Tulloch, the island housewife of the drunkard idiot Mr. Tulloch, who spends his either time beating and berating Agnes, or trying to spoil her with more children.

Island life is hard. The wind blows cold, so Agnes keeps the hearth fire burning. Meals are often meager, but Agnes keeps the pot full (with four children and an oaf of a husband, mind you). She goes to church on Sunday, and she tends to her pregnant best friend Katie when she has the time. Her skill for keeping houses warm and fed (as well as being the only woman on the island not pregnant or elderly) makes her the prime candidate as a temporary cook for the strange new scientist conducting odd experiments on the island. One bowl of stew leads to another, and soon Mrs. Tulloch is entangled in the dark world of Dr. Frankenstein’s experiments.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Delightful!

This was such a DELIGHTFUL well-paced period-piece horror story, at only 174 pages, with overtones of romance, sci-fi, and mystery. It was part fable, part wormhole transporting me to a misty brackish island at a time and place far out of reach. Not to mention, the writing was full of charming 1700's-1800's slang. Agnes, our kind host, is warm and benevolent, reminiscent of the Beloved Piranesi. Unlike Piranesi however, her curtailment by men’s expectations will reach its limits. Her wrath will be the result of an irreversible change in her compassionate nature, and it will lead to irreversible changes to the island community itself.