Girls are caterpillars while they live in the world, to be finally butterflies when the summer comes.

how are there any straight women left with Carmilla on the prowl?? I love a gothic novel, and this one scratched the itch: strange illnesses, locked rooms, pacing shadows, coffins full of blood, mad barons… I think the only thing keeping it from being a five-star is that the heroine’s interiority is increasingly displaced by exposition towards the end, though the (absolutely stunning) closing lines almost make up for this.