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A review by themermaddie
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
4.0
i think more women should be weird in public
this book is surreal, bizarre, thoughtful, and raw. it's weird bc this book feels like it's about everything and nothing all at once; it's a very thematically driven story and so a lot of events require a bit of suspended disbelief.
technically the whole story requires suspended disbelief, since the mother was transforming into a dog and all. i'm a big fan of feminine rage being expressed in a weird physical way, especially when it taps into something primal and animalistic. the mother's repression about motherhood and being a modern working woman could have been just a standard virginia-woolf-style contemporary novel, but instead she channels all those unladylike feelings into being a dirty little creature in the nighttime, snapping necks and bloodying her hands.
nightbitch's canine transformation was as delightful as it was cathartic, especially as her son thrilled in it too. i was expecting her marriage to take a sharp downturn as well, since so little of her husband's actual personhood is revealed, but i ended up being pleasantly surprised by the resolution of their relationship after she starts speaking up about what she needs (something something self fulfilling prophecy of repression). there is just something to satisfying about nightbitch's release in the night, but also that it's accompanied by her paranoia about the other dogs/Jens so that her canine side can never fully be divorced from her human/wife/mother side. i'm not sure if this counts as magical realism but the whole wanda white thing definitely tips it into more of a fantasy realm (to its benefit). i am SO intrigued by the guide; i would love to read a copy of it just for the lore. it expands nightbitch's universe just enough to give us a peek, but then we have to imagine the rest of it ourselves.
the thing is, i have no idea how to describe/sum up/review this book. it's definitely weird and a little bit of magical realism body horror, but also very concerned about its thematic message about the repressive nature of modern motherhood. i will admit i have no idea what the MLM angle is supposed to represent, except perhaps that corporate pyramid schemes are filling the space where SAHMs need meaningful relationships with similarly minded people? i'm not entirely sure. i liked that nightbitch eventually was able to see past her perceived sameness of all the mommies, and find that they all have this shared experience of repression and impossible societal standards to unite them. it's a book that would fit right in on a feminist theory 101 syllabus, because i could see many papers being written about any number of things here, but i'm not going to do that rn. so for now i'll say that i mostly Get It, but i could definitely Get It more if i wanted to really dissect it.
if you liked this, i would recommend Pig Tales by Marie Darrieusecq and anything by China Mieville, but specifically this made me think of After The Festival, one of his short stories in his collection Three Moments of an Explosion.
this book is surreal, bizarre, thoughtful, and raw. it's weird bc this book feels like it's about everything and nothing all at once; it's a very thematically driven story and so a lot of events require a bit of suspended disbelief.
technically the whole story requires suspended disbelief, since the mother was transforming into a dog and all. i'm a big fan of feminine rage being expressed in a weird physical way, especially when it taps into something primal and animalistic. the mother's repression about motherhood and being a modern working woman could have been just a standard virginia-woolf-style contemporary novel, but instead she channels all those unladylike feelings into being a dirty little creature in the nighttime, snapping necks and bloodying her hands.
nightbitch's canine transformation was as delightful as it was cathartic, especially as her son thrilled in it too. i was expecting her marriage to take a sharp downturn as well, since so little of her husband's actual personhood is revealed, but i ended up being pleasantly surprised by the resolution of their relationship after she starts speaking up about what she needs (something something self fulfilling prophecy of repression). there is just something to satisfying about nightbitch's release in the night, but also that it's accompanied by her paranoia about the other dogs/Jens so that her canine side can never fully be divorced from her human/wife/mother side. i'm not sure if this counts as magical realism but the whole wanda white thing definitely tips it into more of a fantasy realm (to its benefit). i am SO intrigued by the guide; i would love to read a copy of it just for the lore. it expands nightbitch's universe just enough to give us a peek, but then we have to imagine the rest of it ourselves.
the thing is, i have no idea how to describe/sum up/review this book. it's definitely weird and a little bit of magical realism body horror, but also very concerned about its thematic message about the repressive nature of modern motherhood. i will admit i have no idea what the MLM angle is supposed to represent, except perhaps that corporate pyramid schemes are filling the space where SAHMs need meaningful relationships with similarly minded people? i'm not entirely sure. i liked that nightbitch eventually was able to see past her perceived sameness of all the mommies, and find that they all have this shared experience of repression and impossible societal standards to unite them. it's a book that would fit right in on a feminist theory 101 syllabus, because i could see many papers being written about any number of things here, but i'm not going to do that rn. so for now i'll say that i mostly Get It, but i could definitely Get It more if i wanted to really dissect it.
if you liked this, i would recommend Pig Tales by Marie Darrieusecq and anything by China Mieville, but specifically this made me think of After The Festival, one of his short stories in his collection Three Moments of an Explosion.