To anyone who was wondering: we’ll be returning to our regular werewolf programming shortly. Just a quick note, though, in the older stories witches were often depicted working alongside shapeshifters and often the lycanthropes were witches themselves.

Has the man got you down?

Is the pressure to conform crushing your dreams?

Throw your inhibitions (and your clothes) to the wind and join a coven! Hex patriarchy and have fun doing it. 💀💀💀

15-year-old Fern has few options after getting pregnant in the pre-Roe South. Her parents are ashamed by their daughter and drag her to a home for unwed mothers, which lies deep somewhere in the sweaty armpit of Florida. Frustrated by being scorned by her family and controlled by a league of tyrannical adults, she’s drawn to an unusual librarian who proffers her a book of spells.

Fern finds herself forced between choosing to rejoin the status quo and seizing upon an unnatural power for herself.

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls is Grady Hendrix’s eighth novel in a relatively short amount of time. And I’m obliged to tell you it’s fucking fantastic….it’s the kind of book that you offer to make a sandwich for after you’re done reading it.

Hendrix’s main protagonist is painfully relatable in the sense that women and girls are brought up to be people pleasers and uphold societal values—the last type of person who jettisons a rural community into chaos. Hendrix develops this concept of identity right away, as Fern isn't allowed to use her first name upon arriving at Wellwood House. It doesn’t stop there, Fern finds her very identity challenged on multiple fronts.

The story also shows us some brutal birthing scenes. The girls in the house are subjected to suffer the experience alone, stripped of the community of wise women who once controlled the narrative on birthing babies. Indeed, modern birth is often anesthetized and void of female relationships. Hendrix is keen on this fact. The coven of witches, on the other hand, offers Fern a substitute for lost female camaraderie.

She must decide if the cure is worse than the ailment.

Leave a comment

Orbit (Hachette), NY: February 2025

Picture it: 17th century Britain. A witch, a goblin, and a verdant river hag named Jenny set off on an epic adventure. The quest: collect three magical trinkets in hopes of defeating an all-powerful foe in hopes of saving the heart of the British Isles.

As a Yankee unfamiliar with the likes of this particular British bogeyman, I feel obligated to explain that our eponymous hero Jenny Greenteeth enjoys a long history of being used by worried parents to scare their small children away from suspect bodies of water. Why so scary? This river fairy, with her green skin and teeth like a hacksaw, is said to have a penchant for dragging unwary children underneath the water’s surface and into her gore-strewn lair. Sounds pretty rad, tbh.

Debut author (yes, another one) Molly O’Neill is a British transplant to Aus and also happens to run a most helpful review blog, consisting of popular fiction, fantasy, and YA novels. This might not be my cup of tea but I admire her dedication in averaging 8ish books a month. Writing also appears to O’Neill’s Clark Kent, as she mentions being an Engineering Geologist in her book bio. (I don’t really know what that is—I’m just a public servant trying to hide from Elon...)

What really struck me about this story is its underlying theme of motherhood, which is appropriate as I’m writing this on Mother’s Day. The novel lightly touches on how femininity and motherhood intersect; is one still a good mother if she doesn’t fit into society’s view of a “good” woman?

To elaborate, our story begins with our witch Temperance (human) being condemned to death and forced from her village and away from her small children by an overzealous Proctor— one who appears to be hiding something particularly insidious. Jenny, though an unlikely ally she may appear to be, understands how Temperance must sacrifice everything to win against the Proctor in order to reunite with her children. Jenny is a mother herself and recognizes Temperance’s devotion within her own love for her daughter (also named Jenny).

You see, motherhood is a sisterhood—one that has a bond stronger than gorilla tape on a drag queen’s underside.

While there were some grisly bits in this novel that I enjoyed (I was looking for a MONSTER story, after all), I found it difficult getting enough motivation to finish the novel. Honestly, it was quite bland. I did appreciate the folklore, however, and it did pair nicely with my library copy of Rebel Folklore that I was tandem reading. Again, I was hoping for something that wasn’t there. Horror catfished pt. deux.

Besides my grumblings, I’m sure it is a fine fantasy/adventure novel for those who are so inclined, elves and unicorns included.

Next.

Why, hello there.

Coming back to Books that Bite after a year-long maternity leave feels like putting on a pair of shoes that no longer fit—wobbly and unsure of my footing. Admittedly, after the birth of my son I was unable to digest any of the new horror reads that I stocked up on in anticipation of some free time…

Read more

TORDOTCOM: October 2023

147 pages

Honest talk: how feasible is it to force a Restoration-period dark fantasy into a mere 100+ pages? Many reviewers are asking the same thing in response to Lina Rather’s newest release A Season on Monstrous Conceptions, which I saw positively covered in the current edition of Rue Morgue.

While the “magical girl” narrative i…

Read more

Tor Nightfire: May 2023

112 pages

As I reader, I often find myself in a rut of reading the same time of thing by the same type of author time and time again. I’m a conservative consumer and my time is valuable. So, when I initially read the premise of Cassandra Khaw’s sophomore novella The Salt Grows Heavy, I gave it …

Read more

Tor Nightfire: June 2023

288 pages

With the near-total domination that serial killer documentaries and dramas have over streaming platforms, it’s to be expected this premise would creep its way back into horror lit. The only rub here is most horror readers these days are too sophisticated for the trite “psycho white male” who stalks women all over town wi…

Read more

Zando: March 2023

327 pages

Opening any story with the death of a child ought to set a somber tone that steeps the plot in sadness and colors every following interaction. So, it’s highly unusual to have such a story that actually inspires hope. Debut novelist Gerardo Sámano Córdova (Go Blue!) spins a quirky tale that jumps from New York City to Mexico Cit…

Read more

Umbra Press: April 2023

166 pages

I love a good (or bad) monster story. Sometimes, the good guys win and sometimes they don’t, but no one really cares about that bit. It’s all about the blood-soaked visuals.

And the visuals in Matt Kurtz’s new book Shock Waves did not let me down.

This 100+ page nugget takes us back to the late 80s, to teenage putz and an…

Read more

In times as hard-pressed as these, it’s enough to be entertained without arduous social commentary or unconventional storytelling. And it’s when you get back to basics that we see the true masters shine.

Not just any master, but Word Horror Grandmaster and TEN-TIME Bram Stoker Award Winner Joe R. Lansdale recently released the 43-page nugget Shooting Star

Read more

HarperCollins: May 2023

400 pages

In the never-ending scramble to add to the epic TBR pile, one might eschew any retellings or spinoffs of canonical works. Well, I’m here to tell you to fuck that. Fuck it with a pointy stick.

Case in point: Our Hideous Progeny is the brilliant debut novel from C.E. McGill—the concept of which was conjured over…

Read more

I am hopelessly enthralled by the magical realism that’s been around for the better part of a century now. I’d never ask back the hours I’ve spent slavering over stories by Gabriel García Márquez, Haruki Murakami, and anything by Isabel Allende. If magical realism were a drug, I’d go full Stevie Nicks on it—rectal applications and all.

Likewise, reviewer…

Read more

Penguin Random House: January 2023

432 pages

There was a lot that used to scare me as a kid: fire, porcelain dolls, dogs, The Fly with Jeff Goldblum—all seemed to be gunning for my throat.  Now as adults, I think most of us would like to think we’ve overcome our childhood fears. The real kicker is, though, our aging bodies and extra responsibilities shoul…

Read more

I’ve been playing around with some ideas for a newsletter to supplement our monthly

werewolf content and the solution seems obvious:

Bite-sized Book Reviews for Recent Horror Releases!

To me, a “bite-sized” review is one that sits …

Read more