Plain Bad Heroines audiobook

HAPPY PRIDE MONTH!!!********************************oooh, goodreads choice awards finalist for best horror 2020! what will happen?********************************SPOOKTOBER NEVER DIES!!********************************when i first heard about this book; that it was a gothic-toned victorian private school story set in RHODE ISLAND with lesbians and mysterious deaths and stories-within-stories, i knew it was a must-read for me. and once i got my hands on it, i fell into it like it was everything i was told it was gonna be, but also more, becoming bigger and more meta, the story splintering in ways i hadn't anticipated. and while i was reading it, i absolutely loved it, but i'm not really sure what i took away from it, if that makes any sense. i loved the journey of it, but it feels unconcluded (which is a different thing than something being inconclusive), and i'm not certain it left me with anything other than the experience of completing a long, fun book. which is not a bad thing, but it makes it difficult to consider the book as a forest instead of a series of perfectly nice trees. this novel is long and layered. it's a book about the making of a film adapted from a book about a book, during which process the film itself becomes a film about the making of a film. set across three time periods, it's full of women in love: the doomed teen romance between clara and flo, the slightly less-doomed romance between alex and libbie, and the "it's complicated" modern romance between merritt and harper, with audrey on their periphery. there are also plenty of supporting characters and a footnote-mad omniscient narrator commenting on the events, inserting their own jabby asides along the way. (view spoiler)[confession: i'm not sure i ever understood who the narrator was—did i miss something? there was a coy reference to their identity in one of their footnotes, but was it ever definitively revealed? (hide spoiler)]there are wasps and jealousies and seances, there's obsession and truman capote and the price of fame, there's a perilous staircase leading to a middle finger of a tower, there are secrets and secrets and secrets. also: there's some artwork. so, you see, it is a lot. and it's entertaining as hell, even though it doesn't really resolve into anything beyond an enjoyable romp. which is enough, especially these days. it's a fast read to fall into, and only medium-spooky unless you have an insect thing, in which case you'll be terrified. a personal note about Mary MacLane, whose book I Await the Devil's Coming features prominently here. i remember seeing her book at st. marks bookstore when it was reissued as part of melville house's neversink series, but i ended up buying something else because i'm not super into nonfiction, which i now regret because it's out of print and st. marks is closed and everything ends and i guess i'm partially to blame. *update: it's still available through melville house, so support 'em if you can, and if reading this book made you curious about reading her book. but if you're "an impressionable female," bewaaaaaaare! come to my blog!["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>

Oh holly hell!Claustrophobic haunted school theme dances with queer gothic! This is one of the best unique, heart pounding and addictive concept! But I honestly have to admit as soon as I saw the page numbers of the book, I want to drop the book and run. Don’t get me wrong: normally long paged books are great challenge for a person for me who read Stephen King’s Stand three times which weights more than a bundle of encyclopedias! Actually my main problem was about working too hard lately and my head is so close to get explode because of extra usage of grey cells. But literary gods answered my prayers because this book worths every grey cell I fry! There are some books look long but when you get into story you don’t count the page numbers, you just get lost in the chapters and you wish it never ends! Thankfully this book is one of them and I was so pleased to enjoy each stories and multiple characters. It takes place in two time lines which was challenging thing to combine the stories and varied characters’ sub stories with perfect balance but the author did a marvelous jobOne of the stories sets in Rhode Island’s Brookhant’s School for girls: centered around Flo and Clara who are obsessed with Mary MacLane’s memoir- the young girl who were electrified when she was only 19 and named her memoir as “I await the devil’s coming”, founders of the badass and dangerous girls’ club named Plain Bad Heroines Society. And at the present time, two young queer actresses making movie about the school and honorary members of club: Flo and Clara as an author joined them whose book written about the school has been adapted into script. Well, I have to admit I loved the haunted, gothic high school and bad girls’ club theme more than the filmmakers’ present time chapters. If this book has been taken place in 1902 and it could be only about the creepy boarding school, I never hesitate to read even though it was more than thousand pages. That story carries fantastic horrifying Halloween theme and I scared, I jumped and I screamed during those parts! It was scary, smart, entertaining, mind spinning queer gothic meets dark comedy book which I loved more than I expected! I wish there were more Brookhant’s parts so I could give five stars. But I’m still giving four impressive boarding school theme, unputdownable, great choice for Halloween week stars! Special thanks to NetGalley and Harper Collins Publishers/ William Morrow for sharing this reviewer digital copy with me in exchange my honest thoughts.

this was actually not the dark academia story I expected upon starting, but it was something even better: the spooky sapphic story of my dreams (or nightmares, you choose). full review to come - there's so much to discuss within this solid 600 page tome. also thank you to this book for filling the gaping black hole left by the haunting of bly manor . . . by providing me with more horror and bucketloads of sapphic content > 4.5 stars this was a buddy read with Kelsea but she betrayed me and read the entire 600 page book in two daysthank you to the publishers for gifting me with a copy in exchange for an honest review!

Enjoyable and creepy and meta. It was like reading a season of American Horror Story, but one of the seasons that was just good rather than great. I expected more of the end to tie up the storylines and I'm not sure that happened, or if it happened and I just missed it because it was subtle? Still, I like it.

For the past two weeks, I’ve been haunted by a lesbian ghost story, and I hope its ectoplasm hangs around for a long time.“Plain Bad Heroines” is a shapeshifting novel by Emily M. Danforth. A hot amalgamation of gothic horror and Hollywood satire, it’s draped with death but bursting with life.The book opens by calling forth the restless spirit of Mary MacLane. Though now largely forgotten, MacLane electrified America in 1902 when, at the age of 19, she published a shocking memoir originally titled “I Await the Devil’s Coming.” (Until further notice, all double entendres intended.) In this luxuriant confession — what she called her “record of three months of Nothingness” — MacLane announced herself as a kind of female Walt Whitman, bouncing between egotism and eroticism. “I know I am a genius more than any genius that has lived,” she proclaimed, giving voice to frustrated teenagers everywhere. “My strong and sensitive nerves are reeking and swimming in sensuality like drunken little Bacchantes, gay and garlanded in mad revelling.” Looking across the world’s literature, MacLane saw few figures like herself. “I wish,” she wrote, “some one would write a book about a plain, bad heroine so that I might feel in real sympathy with her.”More than a century later, “I Await the Devil’s Coming” is still a gobsmacking book. At the time, it was an instant bestseller and, of course, instantly condemned by the usual powers that be. One can only imagine how young women must have thrilled to read MacLane’s outrageous descriptions of sexual longing.And that’s exactly where “Plain Bad Heroines” begins. “It’s a terrible story,” Danforth writes with . . . .To read the rest of this review, go to The Washington Post:https://www.washingtonpost.com/entert...

Brookhants School for Girls has a troubled past littered with myriad unfortunate ends that befall the females who dwell there. Over one-hundred years later and both the horror and allure of this eerie spot still holds it sway. This is especially true for Merritt, who has penned a fictional account of all that historically transpired, and the actresses, Harper and Audrey, who are to star in her movie adaptation, both set and filmed upon this doomed spot.Whilst the initial story-line was intriguing enough alone, I can only stand back in awe and applaud all the divergent narratives and side-plots that Danforth managed to pack into these 500 pages. Not one single character knew the whole truth of what was occurring and the reader too was forever kept just short of pulling together the threads for the abundant mysteries featured here. This convoluted style of storytelling became even further muddled with the ever shifting character focus and chronological order. I had a tricky time obtaining and then keeping the few facts Danforth reluctantly allowed the reader, and so have no idea how she managed to so cleverly construct and link them all!Asides from remaining mesmerised by the complexities for all that occurred, I also adored how diverse this cast of characters was. I had no idea who to root for when every single female was so fierce, independent, and just an all-round good, plain bad heroine. Sapphic, wonderful, brilliance!The horrifying elements and eerie atmosphere remained light (which was the aim but not what I had anticipated from not looking into the genre tags thoroughly enough) and there was a point, around the central portion of the novel, where I longed for an increase in the pacing. These were minor shortfalls and, for the rest of this chunky tome, I remained enamoured, intrigued, mystified, and delighted.I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to the author, Emily M. Danforth, and the publisher, The Borough Press, for this opportunity.

Since I've been reading more 19th century fiction in the past year I have been hungering for a contemporary writer to utilize the particular kind of authorial voice often found in these classic books. I'm sure this has been done in other recent novels but going into Emily M Danforth's “Plain Bad Heroines” I was thrilled to find it includes a narrative voice that self-consciously interjects and steers the story. It only shows up occasionally so as not to be intrusive but it does add another dimension to the story and there's something so playful and comforting about this “dear reader...” style of telling where we all agree to sit down to lose ourselves in a riveting, imaginative tale. Of course, it's a technique that's most commonly and potently used in ghost stories and gothic tales so it's ideally suited to the content of Danforth's creepy and darkly playful novel. The text is also beautifully illustrated with evocative drawings making it feel even more like a Victorian novel. This book is partly a historical novel about a fictional New England boarding school for girls called Brookhants which briefly existed at the beginning of the 20th century. A number of girls are found dead amidst mysterious circumstances which gives rise to rumours and local legends. Interspersed with this tale is a contemporary story about a Hollywood film being made about the deaths of these girls and the supposed curse upon this school. As the book progresses and we move slyly between the past and present, there are numerous twists and turns in the plot which skilfully tread the line between the supernatural and the realistic. The story thrillingly shows how certain characters utilize or exploit this grey area for their own purposes. It's such a richly immersive read for its atmospheric detail that gives the spooky ooky factor while also making me desperate to know what happens next. Read my full review of Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M Danforth on LonesomeReader

**4.5**Reading Vlog: https://youtu.be/uxymoWMr3QEI adored this. It is so long and I kept entertained and committed the whole way through which I was not anticipating.The queer representation in this book blew me away. I swear every single character that got a name was queer in this book in some capacity. And it's POLY??? Yes! You heard that right. Polyamory. We truly love to see it.The illustrations in the book are stunning. The prose are stunning. The narrator is so quirky and intelligent and fun. It felt like an adult version of Lemony Snicket.

This book left my brain buzzing so much it's hard to know where to start. It is a big fat doorstop of a novel with multiple storylines spanning over a century, a horror novel about a curse that follows a certain kind of independent-minded woman, a Hollywood novel with a behind-the-scenes feel, and a book where almost every single character is queer.A big doorstop of a horror novel should have a few plots and several characters to help drive the momentum and this book mostly does the trick. It stalls out in certain sections, but having another timeline to jump back to makes up for much of that. Meandering is pretty much inevitable in the big doorstop, it is baked in, the important thing is whether you want to keep coming back to it and I always did. What's particularly impressive is that I wasn't really reading to find out the Why, which is usually the horror novel way. I just wanted to see what happened to these characters, how they would crack under the intensifying conditions. (You do get the Why, but Danforth wisely doesn't dive all the way into it, you have to leave a little mystery and I think she gets the balance just right.)Readers who are not usually that into horror will find a lot to enjoy here, though the book is not trying to be sneaky about what it is. It starts right off with a rather gruesome pair of deaths (and it tells you that is what it's going to do, who will die and how is right up front, as is the unique voice and style of the unnamed narrator) and this is clearly Just the Beginning. But while there may be a Big Unspeakable Evil, there is so much more. I am sure queer readers will approach with both excitement and caution. Several queer women die in this book. So let's just get that right out in the open. And there is queer suffering in this book, but there is a lot less of it than you expect. Mostly it's from our early 1900's storyline, a time when girls are allowed to fall in love but only while at school with other girls and then they must go off and marry men. The book starts with a man being mad at a woman for not being womanly enough and indulging in general sapphic inappropriateness, but that first chapter is about as much as you'll get for the rest of it. The general difficulty of being a queer woman in the early 1900's is certainly a part of the story, but actually our protagonists of the time have a pretty good situation for themselves and are able to live basically how they like. You get plenty of indulging in happy early 20th century lesbians along with the horrors a horror novel promises. And then we have the contrast with our modern protagonists, a trio of young queer women including "celesbian" Harper whose queerness is almost never a hindrance to their lives. My critiques are pretty minor. Our present-day trio, Harper, Audrey, and Merritt, each get shortchanged in slightly different ways. (We get so much of Merritt's prickliness and frustration that we get none of her identity as an artist. Harper almost disappears part way through the book for structural suspense reasons but the loss is felt. And Audrey, having to do so much of the latter half's plot, becomes flat on the page, so consumed with the plot that we lose her as a person.) But with critiques this specific, you have to actually be good. With many horror novels I don't get to know characters well enough to get anywhere near this kind of criticism. The horror relies too heavily on the same few cues and the premise of the present-day storyline removes much suspense and the growing dread I would have liked. But I can't be mad, I didn't want to worry that much about the safety of the characters, honestly. The narration is also worth discussing. It is its own character, even if it doesn't make it clear exactly who it is. It is definitely someone, there is far too much happening in the text and the abundant footnotes for it to be omniscience. Good horror knows when to let you relax and laugh, and this is one of the ways this book is smartest.I wasn't sure what to expect from this book, but it definitely exceeded my expectations, both as someone who loves queer fiction and as someone who loves horror.

I received an ARC of this novel from a Goodreads Giveaway hosted by William Morrow. All opinions are my own.Plain Bad Heroines is Emily M. Danforth’s adult debut. I had not heard of this book before finding it listed for a Goodreads giveaway. The description sounded right up my alley, so I decided to try my luck at entering for an ARC. I was so shocked when I won, but it was really exciting, especially since it would only be my second time winning a physical ARC. When I say this book had hooked me right from the start, I mean it. This book is pitched as gothic horror comedy like The Haunting of Hill House meets The Favourite. This was enough to have my attention, but the premise itself takes that a step further. The story weaves from 1902 to over a century later to focus on a cast of characters who are all connected to the seemingly cursed Brookhants School for Girls. In 1902, the school is run by Libbie Brookhants. Two students, Flo and Clara, attend this school when they become infatuated with Mary MacLane’s writing and each other before their tragic deaths, leaving Libbie to deal with the aftermath and the school’s eventual closing. The novel explores Libbie’s own backstory and relationship with her partner Alex as well. Over a century later, Merritt Emmons writes a novel titled The Happening at Brookhants, which is then set to be adapted into a film. Actors Harper Harper and Audrey Wells are cast as Flo and Clara, which finally sets up the multiple timelines the novel explores and opens the doors to Brookhants again. Plain Bad Heroines was such a fun read for me. I love when novels have nonlinear timelines that weave together multiple other stories. This book is like a story within a story within a story that features novels within a novel and a film within a film as well. It seems like a complex concept that may be hard to follow, but it really was not as daunting as it may seem. I think the narration and writing of the novel helps avoid possible confusion. I really like how the novel actually addresses readers. It employs a lot of footnotes too, which I thought was really cool. The pacing and flow are excellent as well. Danforth definitely plays up the humor aspect but expertly pairs it with darker and creepier moments. Brookhants is very atmospheric, and it was really interesting to see all the stories there. I loved a lot of the characters but especially the main trio: Merritt, Audrey, and Harper. Many of the characters featured in this novel are sapphic, but Danforth also includes a budding sapphic polyamorous relationship. It was beautiful to see how this relationship developed and played out. I also just want to mention that Sara Lautman absolutely killed it with her artwork. It was incredible and definitely helped with emphasizing the atmosphere Danforth was creating. The cover and illustrations within the novel are stunning. Emily M. Danforth impressed me so much with this book. Her writing draws readers in, and the story itself is just so fascinating. I honestly cannot wait to pick up a finished copy, and I’m hoping to collect both the US and UK editions. I would highly recommend this to anyone who likes sapphic dark academia!! Thank you to William Morrow and Goodreads for giving me the opportunity to read and review this novel before its release on October 20th, 2020.*Content warning: insects, death, queer suffering, forced institutionalization*

I picked up Plain Bad Heroines based on the recommendation of a coworker since she ais pretty much my reader advisory in all things horror as I am still relatively new to the book genre. The prospect of actually starting the book was daunting since it was over 600 pages long, but pages filled with illustrations and footnotes covering a large number of pages made it more than bearable. Even though the book was long, there were not many boring parts other than a few chapters with certain POVs that dragged. Let me just say that after reading this book, I do not look at yellow jackets, hornets, and wasps the same way anymore.The premise of the story was interesting, and the prose was quite fun to read. The narrator was unreliable and went on tangents yet was so engaging to read. The footnotes left by the narrator explained parts of the story that the narrator just didn’t care to put into the meat of the story that helped build the universe the novel took place in. I liked the author’s writing and liked the two separate timelines with one timeline taking place in the present following the making of a movie based on the other past timeline’s events. Each character in this book was written uniquely with their own flaws and ambitions where most had great characterization. I disliked some of the characters, but eventually I came around to like most of them except for one or two characters. My favorite characters were Alex and Audrey since it was fun to see their character growth while each having interesting backgrounds. The inclusion of multiple LGBTQ+ characters was interesting to compare the two different eras in how they were treated and how they acted based on societal constraints. I also liked how some things were left open ended with the reader supposed to fit the pieces together on what was not said. Some problems I had with that though were unexplained motivations by some characters or less important mysteries that got swept under the rug.I guess my biggest fault I had with the book is how it is ordered. So many times, are POVs changed or cut off with every chapter alternating its POV. One instance of this occurring vexed me since the POV stopped on a major cliffhanger and didn’t get back to it until many pages later. There was also a lot of jumping around time skip wise where it felt disjointed at times. I don’t mean just jumping between the timelines, but an event would occur, and we wouldn’t get back to the characters until weeks or even months later. I didn’t dislike the character Harper Harper, but I felt she was more shallow than other characters where her POV characterization didn’t really fit with how her character acts in other characters’ POVs compared to how she is supposed to act in her own. I liked the ending enough even if it felt a little empty. I could see certain mysteries and other things coming relatively early on so the twists didn’t come as much as a surprise.Overall, it was a fun book with a unique premise. It reminded me a bit of books by Simone St. James story structure wise in ways as well. I would not mind a video adaption of the story even if I might not be the target audience for said adaption. Bring on the yellow jackets!Find this book and other titles within our catalog.

Plain Bad Heroines is like a labyrinthine wasps nest- intricate, patterned, with moments that will fly out and sting you. (also wasps are a heavy motif throughout the book, so it only seems appropriate) It is unabashedly sapphic with creeping horror and interweaving plots and characters. In some ways it is a love letter to unlikeable "bad" women, to women who love other women (now and throughout history), and to storytelling. (It is, after all, a story within a story, within a story.) It also includes some of my favorite tropes. Like being set at a girls boarding school with dark secrets, and having a gothic sort of horror.This is one that is worth going in knowing little, and while the audiobook is fantastic (thank you to Libro.FM for the audio review copy!) I am also very glad I had a hardcover copy to read along with. It's filled with beautiful and creepy illustrations, even in unexpected places. I had a feeling I was going to love this one, and I certainly wasn't wrong. In brief, here are the stories in question.1) A queer, "bad" young woman wrote and published a diary of sorts, filled with her intense feelings and unconventional thinking. A book which was published with a red cover and....2) Was passed around a girls boarding school circa 1902, by young women who began the Plain Bad Heroines Society, some of who were involved with one another intimately. It also became connected with the violent deaths of some of these young women, and affected the lives of two middle aged women in a sapphic relationship, working at the school with secrets of their own.3) In the modern day, a young woman has written a book about what happened in 1902, and now that book is being made into a film. A horror film, with queer actresses and disturbing things happening even before they begin the shoot.Suffice to say, this was beautifully written, unsettling, with moments of more disturbing horror and strong, distinct female characters woven throughout every era of storytelling. This emphasizes the (very real) existence of queer women in history, and the ways that queerness today can sometimes be approached in a voyeuristic manner. There is a quote about how the film focused on the young women who died, because no one cares about middle-aged, domesticated sapphics. Which sadly isn't wrong in Hollywood much of the time. It's smart, haunting, and intricately written. I loved it.

I received this book for free from the publisher (William Morrow Books) in exchange for an honest review. This was such a unique read! The best part of this book was definitely the overall vibe and aesthetic. It had a slightly creepy and gothic feel that ran throughout the entire book, even the present day parts. There was also a fair amount of humor and satire that worked well with the gothic vibes and made for an interesting juxtaposition. The structure of the book was very clever. The story within a story element was well done and very engaging. I also liked the footnotes. They were very entertaining and added even more humor to the story.The story started out very strong, but I was a little disappointed at the end. It didn’t live up to my expectations. I was expecting more of a big reveal or an “a-ha” moment. There are still some things that I am a little confused on. This book is classified by horror, but many other reviewers say they find it to be very light on horror. I agree with that and I would say that it is more of a gothic horror. The horror is more of a gothic creepiness than any sort of gore or violence. The book also has illustrations throughout the book which I found to be a nice touch. There is even a map of the school which made navigating the story easy. Overall, I enjoyed the aesthetic of this book the most. I recommend it if you’re looking for something a little different to read.