Sure, we all aspire to “love the skin we’re in,” but let’s face it: bodies can be unruly, embarrassing, foul-smelling, troublesome, gross, and even a little monstrous. Certainly, the powers that be now live in full-time panic about bodies they can’t control, ostracize, or regulate. So it’s fitting to see a collection of women writers inspiring new visions of body horror in their trembling readers.
From Tananarive Due’s unnerving tale of a grieving granddaughter who can’t stop dancing to Margaret Atwood’s amusing story of a snail reincarnated into the adult body of a bank service representative; from Lisa Tuttle’s startlingly literal mashup of the red states’ dual obsession with guns and pregnancy to Sheila Kohler’s sexy/gross take on the Bride of Frankenstein—these 15 stories evoke all of the weird ways in which strange bodies can make us shiver and heave. And some selections, like Joanna Margaret’s horrifying tale of a parasitic twin and artistic muse or Joyce Carol Oates’ all-too-real account of the tortures asylums once doled out to cure women of “hysteria,” will burrow under your skin and live forever in your darkest dreams.
Image via Akashic Books
