Fairytales can often be thought of as the cautionary tales that tell us the consequences of certain actions. These stories are beautiful, hiding thorns that lie in wait to prick your fingers when you least expect it. Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart is a series of stories that seems to encapsulate the fever-dream feeling that the main character must be experiencing as they go through their stories and the increasingly outlandish situations. The stories are beautiful, but unsettling, reminding the reader that they might look like a fairytale, but these stories don’t have the simple happily ever after that Disney built their enterprise upon. The topics that are covered in these books are a little heavier than you might be anticipating, so if drug use, animal death, child abuse, gore, and body horror (to name a few) are something that might make you weary, I would approach this cautiously.
There isn’t a good way to summarise these stories without giving too much away. Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart includes fourteen stories that vary wildly, but each one is filled with emotions that are rarely spoken about out loud because they aren’t easy to explain.
Fantasy and fairytales are some of my favourite stories to read. When I picked up this book, I wondered what worlds I would delve into. However, these stories don’t start with “Once upon a time”, instead, GennaRose throws us into worlds where the reader has to make sense of things as they happen, and gives you this unsettled pit in your stomach. This is a book where nothing feels as it is supposed to be. For this review, I won’t be examining each individual story, but I will delve into some of the ones that gave me some incredibly conflicting feelings.
The very first story in the book Sundown at the Eternal Staircase is one of the stories that stuck with me throughout the book. Of all of the books, this one is the most bittersweet of the bunch, mixed with the longing for connection, but also the understanding that there are sometimes bigger forces at play that make the choices for us. When I finished this story, part of me wondered if I should digest this in smaller bites… I regret the choice to binge this novel.
These are definitely stories that you read and take a few days to think about.
A Diviner’s Abecedarian seems harmless to start, but this story has some wickedly sinister teeth. It doesn’t show up all at once, but the vibes to this story left me feeling anxious in my own living room. Definitely should have waited to read this book piece by piece. What fascinates me about this story is that while the horror unfolds before your very eyes, there are layers that are waiting to be delved in. This is most definitely a book that you would want to have some discussions about. I would read this one with caution, as it’s one with several heavy things going on.
Thread Boy was the one that nearly made me weep. To me, it was a sorrowful tale of what happens when you give parts of yourself away, and the idea that each person you connect with keeps a piece of you with them, regardless of whether you’re cherished by them or not. I connected with this one the most, and despite the fact that this is a fairytale, it felt like it could have easily been a true person that GennaRose Nethercott was writing about.
There are quite a few stories that I would love to talk about, but what I want to mention the most is the section in the book that delves into the Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart. In the middle of the book, there is a break between stories where you come up on this little compendium. The illustrations and descriptions are fascinating and give you some little bits about who might be writing these stories, and potentially how they might have impacted some of the stories we’ve read/might read ahead. I won’t give any spoilers on this part, because it truly is something I think people would love to read.
As I have been mulling over my review, I was nagged by the feeling that I had read a book that gave me the same vibes as this one. After hunting for a few days, I remembered the name: Betwixt by Tara Bray Smith. If you’ve read this book, that might give you a good indicator if you’ll want to pick this one up. While it is an incredibly beautiful book, I had a really hard time making sense of it all. Definitely pick it up if you’re into books that are more abstract!
Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart and Other Stories is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore.
Will you be picking up Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart and Other Stories? Tell us in the comments below!
Synopsis | Goodreads
From the author of the breakout fantasy novel Thistlefoot : a collection of dark fairytales and fractured folklore exploring all the ways love can save us—or go monstrously wrong.
The stories in Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart are about the abomination that resides within us all. That churning, clawing, hungry the desire to be loved, and seen, and known. And the terror of those things to be loved too well, or not enough, or for long enough. To be laid bare before your sweetheart, to their horror. To be known and recognized as the monstrous thing you are.
Two young women working at a sinister roadside attraction called the Eternal Staircase explore its secrets—and their own doomed summer love. A group of witchy teens concoct the perfect plan to induce the hated new girl into their ranks. A woman moves into a new house with her acclaimed artist boyfriend and finds her body slowly shifting into something specially constructed to accommodate his needs and whims. And two outcasts, a vampire and a goat woman, find solace in each other, even as the world’s lack of understanding might bring about its own end.
In these lush, beautifully written stories, GennaRose Nethercott explores love in all its diamond-dark facets to create a collection that will redefine what you see as a beast, and make you beg to have your heart broken.
