ted's book nook

• author: agustina bazterrica
• genre: horror, dystopian, lgbtq+
• pages: 170

Someone is screaming in the dark. I hope it’s Lourdes.

The world has been submerged in water, and electricity, the internet, civilisation, is all gone. Somewhere, a Sacred Sisterhood protects and controls our narrator. As she and the other unworthy struggle desperately to climb to ranks to be Enlightened, a stranger appears within their walls, a stranger who forces the narrator to consider what really happens when one becomes an Enlightened.

From the author of Tender is the Flesh, we recieve another brutal and unkind dystopia, this time discussing the power of the cult and religion and the abuse of women within these circles. This book is full of cataclysm, rot, despair, but also the faintest glimmer of hope and love. Told through the sporadic writings of our defiant narrator, the story comes to us in bursts, witholding information and then relaying it in pieces, but ultimately this narrative structure speaks to the struggle of power and autonomy in our narrator. Beyond that, the atmosphere of this short novel is eerie and gritty, something that Bazterrica never fails to deliver.

It’s not for the faint of heart, and it’s a story that will certainly stick with me just as Tender is the Flesh did.