Nat Cassidy

Nat Cassidy’s highly commercial, debut horror novel Mary: An Awakening of Terror, blends Midsommar with elements of American Psycho and a pinch of I'll Be Gone in the Dark. Mary is a quiet, middle-aged woman doing her best to blend into the background. Unremarkable. Invisible. Unknown even to herself. But lately, things have been changing inside Mary. Along with the hot flashes and body aches, she can’t look in a mirror without passing out, and the voices in her head have been urging her to do unspeakable things. Fired from her job in New York, she moves back to her hometown, hoping to reconnect with her past and inner self. Instead, visions of terrifying, mutilated specters overwhelm her with increasing regularity and she begins auto-writing strange thoughts and phrases. Mary discovers that these experiences are echoes of an infamous serial killer. Then the killings begin again. Mary’s definitely going to find herself.

An Awakening of Terror

Mary

Christine Bruce

Mary is reaching middle age. Turning 50 in a few short weeks, she is dismissed as peri-menapausal when she goes to a doctor for help. So begins this very feminist, very familiar story. Mary is called home by her ailing aunt, and what she thinks is a quick trip soon turns into a life altering experience. Cults, ghosts, serial killers, This book really had a little of everything. 

I loved the themes of feminism and the inherent misogyny in society, how women are only ever valued in their usefulness to the men around them. The way it permeates from the youngest ages. To always be more pretty, and then when pretty is no longer an option to be more quiet and invisible. The healthcare scenes in particular hit such a strong chord with me, someone who suffer from chronic illness and pain. The way concerns are dismissed and ignored. When we say we know our bodies and know when something's wrong and its dismissed as hormones or in our head. It was so prominent throughout the book, and I felt honestly so seen. 

I will admit while I loved so much of the book, at the end of the day it was a bit overly long. At one point I thought I had to be coming upon the climax because there's no way anything else could happen. Only to find I was only around 20% into the book. And sure enough, the majority of new information from that point on was unnecessary. Then there was the mythology aspect that was.... I don't want to say pointless because it plays such a vital role in the end of the book. But it was not handled well and was poorly introduced/explained. A lot of this book had many points where the scenes served no purpose or could have been executed better and as a result fell flat and felt like a waste of time. Which is sad considering how great so many of the pieces were. They just fit together like a poorly made puzzle. Yea you can see the picture it was going for, and you might have even had fun putting it together, but at the end of the day it just doesn't quite work together. 

That said, I do want to read this again. There were so many amazing lines through the book, and the constant references to Kate Chopin's The Awakening (a favorite book and such a perfect book t0 be referenced here) make me really want to go through again to better appreciate the prose. I almost feel like I could write a thesis on the feminism and place of women in society just using this book. The fact that I feel so seen in a book written by a cis white man really says something to his ability. I just think it could have been better executed/edited. 

I'll end with my favorite line from the book:
"The real curse of womanhood is that we never get to forget we have a body"

Mary An Awakening of Terror

Reviews