CR-16-013(Weird West)
Mar. 7th, 2024 01:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreadpiratekelLone Women
Victor Lavelle
“On Tuesday, Adelaide Henry had been a farmer. On Wednesday, she became a fugitive.”
This is the story of Adelaide Henry who in 1915 takes off from her home in California in possession of a steamer trunk that has something trapped inside it. Her parents are dead, and Adelaide is headed to Montana, planning to be a “lone woman” and going to homestead for two years before earning the land she has made viable for herself. But the something in that trunk is going to make her plans challenging and also impact the people of the community that she ends up settling in.
Is this book, a horror novel? Or maybe a Western? A Thriller? Historical Fiction perhaps? The answer to all of those is yes. It is those and a lot more. I picked this book up because I thought it was a more straightforward horror story. It is not, but I was not disappointed by its many layers at all. To be clear, there is horror. The thing in the steamer trunk is (minor spoiler alert) not really human. There are ghosts (which may or may not be figments of various characters' minds), and there are villainous people, being villainous for no other reason than because they can. And oh yes, because of racism.
This story centers on female characters, and in particular female characters of colour, who for various reasons have found themselves trying to eek out a living in Ohio. Besides battling the elements, they are also at a disadvantage because of their skin, and their “lone” women status (no men in sight). At first, I was a bit surprised at the lack of … well monsters in the book. Monsters in the typical, claws and teeth way. But there are a lot of people who are, well, for lack of a better word monstrous.
I don’t read many Westerns outside of times Westerns have happened to crossover with horror, or with science fiction so I can’t really speak if the book contains the conventions of that genre. I can, however, confirm it takes place in the Frontier of Ohio in 1915, and it felt “Western” enough to me that I did start at the inclusion of a car in the plot, and then had to remind myself that this was a little later than the cowboy set movies I have watched. It does however feature people (women really) versus the elements, various gangs of outlaws, and people fighting to hold on to what is theirs.
Overall it is an amazing mashup of genres, horror, found family, women out there doing it for themselves, the poison that is racism, and the many ways that family can seriously mess you up …. Okay so some of those aren’t genres, so much as themes tackled in this book. Rarely have I been so pleased to pick up a book that I thought was one thing (horror!) and found it to be so many other wonderful things.
CBR 16 link
Victor Lavelle
“On Tuesday, Adelaide Henry had been a farmer. On Wednesday, she became a fugitive.”
This is the story of Adelaide Henry who in 1915 takes off from her home in California in possession of a steamer trunk that has something trapped inside it. Her parents are dead, and Adelaide is headed to Montana, planning to be a “lone woman” and going to homestead for two years before earning the land she has made viable for herself. But the something in that trunk is going to make her plans challenging and also impact the people of the community that she ends up settling in.
Is this book, a horror novel? Or maybe a Western? A Thriller? Historical Fiction perhaps? The answer to all of those is yes. It is those and a lot more. I picked this book up because I thought it was a more straightforward horror story. It is not, but I was not disappointed by its many layers at all. To be clear, there is horror. The thing in the steamer trunk is (minor spoiler alert) not really human. There are ghosts (which may or may not be figments of various characters' minds), and there are villainous people, being villainous for no other reason than because they can. And oh yes, because of racism.
This story centers on female characters, and in particular female characters of colour, who for various reasons have found themselves trying to eek out a living in Ohio. Besides battling the elements, they are also at a disadvantage because of their skin, and their “lone” women status (no men in sight). At first, I was a bit surprised at the lack of … well monsters in the book. Monsters in the typical, claws and teeth way. But there are a lot of people who are, well, for lack of a better word monstrous.
I don’t read many Westerns outside of times Westerns have happened to crossover with horror, or with science fiction so I can’t really speak if the book contains the conventions of that genre. I can, however, confirm it takes place in the Frontier of Ohio in 1915, and it felt “Western” enough to me that I did start at the inclusion of a car in the plot, and then had to remind myself that this was a little later than the cowboy set movies I have watched. It does however feature people (women really) versus the elements, various gangs of outlaws, and people fighting to hold on to what is theirs.
Overall it is an amazing mashup of genres, horror, found family, women out there doing it for themselves, the poison that is racism, and the many ways that family can seriously mess you up …. Okay so some of those aren’t genres, so much as themes tackled in this book. Rarely have I been so pleased to pick up a book that I thought was one thing (horror!) and found it to be so many other wonderful things.
CBR 16 link
