*This will spoil the entirety of the first story.*
I picked the short story collection by Eric LaRocca up after hearing some positive murmurings, and specifically a Reddit thread about ‘the most disturbing book you’ve ever read’. This novel appeared in one of the top comments with a couple of people stating they couldn’t make themselves finish it. So I picked it up, and read through the titular story.
I’ve got to say, I’m disappointed.
The premise is essentially that of two women (Agnes and Zoe) developing a very unhealthy sub/dom relationship involving animal cruelty, and culminating in the submissive in the relationship, Agnes, intentionally contracting a tapeworm to act as their ‘child’. Zoe realises she’s gone too far and that Agnes is seriously, dangerously mentally ill, and breaks things off, culminating in Agnes’ suicide.
One issue I found with the narrative is that it’s far too rushed. Within the tight constraints of a short story, the characters aren’t able to be fully fleshed out, and their relationship isn’t given time to develop believably. The jump in intensity from Zoe telling Agnes to act provocatively at work to becoming her slave to nurturing a pet salamander only to brutally kill it at midnight stretches the suspension of disbelief. Even if one is to argue that this foreshadows Agnes’ incipient mental decline, it still occurs too fast for that to really come across.
I can’t help but feel that the entire narrative would benefit from slowing down, giving things a bit more breathing room. Slowly showing Agnes going from independent to utterly dependent on Zoe, showing the extent to which she is subordinating herself to Zoe’s will, turning the dial up slowly and insidiously. Because the entire trajectory from meeting to “kill an animal for me” is so rushed, it feels shlocky and written for shock value rather than seeming like a natural, horrific extension of the direction of their relationship. The horror ought to come from knowing that this relationship is screwed up and getting worse and is going to inevitably lead to something horrifying. LaRocca skips that slow build up and intensifying dread and just jumps straight to the jumps are. It feels unearned and underwhelming.
I found the framing of the story to be quite novel, and enjoyed the idea that we’re reading through collated emails and chat logs, but aside from a framing device, LaRocca doesn’t really do much with it. It would be interesting if, say, the person compiling these messages were intentionally omitting certain details, or could perhaps be Zoe trying to demonstrate/construe that Agnes’ suicide was beyond her control; showing that even when dead Agnes is still under Zoe’s control. But, no, it’s just an excuse for the novella to be a bunch of emails and chat logs.
The prose itself is alright – of course with it being ostensibly a collection of emails and chat logs, it’d be odd for a bunch of purple prose to be in there. Subsequently, that means that the quality of the prose isn’t particularly great, nor does it really play with the fact that these are characters using instant messenger. There are no misspellings or hasty typos indicn t ing someione typ g veyr quicly, or even much distinction in typing styles
Agnes: like someone using punctuation fastidiously
Zoe: And the other person not. Or typing longer paragraphs because they have more time to focus on the conversation.
Agnes: and the other person maybe not
Agnes: or spamming
Agnes: or something like that idk
All in all, it felt like a half-baked creepypasta. It didn’t leave me feeling uncomfortable or dread, I just felt a bit disappointed.
Especially because I found a *lot* of similar themes, motifs, and techniques used to much, much greater effect in Brainwyrms by Alison Rumfitt. Her characters are much more fleshed out and three dimensional, and have a great deal more interiority. The prose is much more evocative and emotionally impactful. When one of her characters experiences something upsetting or deeply traumatising, it really resonates.
She gives her characters room to breathe, and for the trajectory of character relationships feels organic rather than contrived, which in turn makes the horror feel more real. Because nobody looks at a relationship between Agnes and Zoe and find it remotely realistic, whereas between Frankie and Vanya, that is a realistically, convincingly written toxic relationship.
It felt, in a word, more authentically written than LaRocca’s novel. More confidently written, with much stronger character writing and much more omnipresent horror.
I found the contrast between the two to be really marked, and as a result probably won’t read LaRocca’s collection any further. Does anyone feel similarly, or am I on my own here?
by jaythejayjay