Dreadful Skin, Cherie Priest
I’ve been meaning to get round to Dreadful Skin for ages. I mean, the idea of a gun-toting nun chasing an actually scary werewolf across America has got to be fun, right? Particularly given that I enjoyed Those Who Went Remain There Still, which had a similar horror feel. This isn’t creepy, more grotesque, but not gratuitous either. It’s more Dracula in tone than slasher film, I mean. I didn’t realise it was actually three shorter stories collected together, telling the story via three episodes in the nun’s life.
There’s not really enough space — or likeable enough characters — to get emotionally hooked to this. Even with the first person narrators, they switched so frequently and sounded similar-ish, so I didn’t get hold of them. But I loved the Spring-Heeled Jack link, the setting, the way the werewolf acts and the way Priest uses the werewolf lore here. The middle story feels like a bit of an anti-climax; it does reveal a couple of things, but it doesn’t involve the main antagonist, and mostly just sets up the last story.
Interesting construction, etc, but I think I would’ve liked a more cohesive novel more.
I thought at first that I was going to like it when you mentioned nuns and werewolves but when you said it lacked cohesion and lacked likeable characters I decided it wasn’t going to be my kind of thing. Nice review and very useful!
Thank you! I do think you might still enjoy it — the characters aren’t unlikeable, particularly the nun, but most of them die too soon to get attached to them!