Release August 25 2023
Wow! WHAT HAPPENED AT HAWTHORNE HOUSE just stunned me, rendered me speechless; and I 'm still pondering. This was my first encounter with author of the short-form Gothic, Hadassah Shiradski; surely it will not be the last. Now I've read some Weird Boarding School/Orphanage riffs [most recently Philip Fracassi's newest, BOYS IN THE VALLEY]; but Ms. Shiradski has managed a particular historical English Gothic rendering quite exquisitely. This is a take-no-prisoners variation which settles into one's imagination, burrows in. I recommend, do read the content warnings before commencing. Matron is awful, but the girls! Way worse! And of course, there's not going to be sweetness and light and an afternoon stroll in an English garden! This is Horror Gothic! And persistence beyond the veil! So beware!