Slasher Girls & Monster Boys

When I saw this anthology in the library, the creepy cover art and promise of Slasher Girls and Monster Boys drew me in like a moth to flame. It promised psychological thrillers and spookiness, both of which are completely up my alley, and I took the title to mean that we'd get a variety of villains both female and male. A bunch of crazy chicks and deadly dudes? Yeah, sure, count me in!

Unfortunately, what the title actually must have meant was that slasher girls go up against monstrous boys. (Imagine if Alien vs. Predator were just called Alien and Predator.) Every single female is a victim in some capacity - be it of bullying, sexual abuse, or murder. Sure, most of them rise up somehow to get vengeance or save themselves etc., but it gets very old very fast having the same thing play out over and over under what I can only assume is some misguided notion of Girl Power. As such, I very nearly missed the due date for this book's return because I kept feeling mentally exhausted between tales to the point I needed to read other things first to cleanse the mental palate.

That said, I don't regret borrowing this book and reading it. Overall, it's a fairly solid collection and it delivers an average-or-better experience depending on personal preferences. Below, you'll find my rating and review of each story in this anthology. Please tread with caution for this review and the book itself if you have any triggers regarding rape, molestation, abuse, bullying, body shaming, or self-harm; these tales have occurrences of all such themes.

The Birds of Azalea Street - ???????????????

It's actually a bit depressing how relatable the narration is in this one. We get a frank account of what it's like in a town where the parents are almost willfully ignorant of the local ephebophile's leering attentions and inappropriate comments to their daughters. The girls are forced to interact with and be nice to him, since he's such a “good neighbor,” even to the point of one girl being sent alone to gather a recipe from him. It's here that we get the most hauntingly relatable explanation of why she didn't tell her parents about what happened:

We know our parents wouldn't believe us if we told them. Leonard was only instructing her. He was only being a kind neighbor, which in these times was a dying breed. That's what they would have said. They wanted us to have skills beyond phone-scrolling and one-finger texting, like knowing how to bake edible food in the oven and feed ourselves if they suddenly were dead.

But we believed Paisley right away. We knew he was too close. We knew how he pressed his front up against her to adjust her technique and how he breathed heavy, shaggy breaths against the nape of her neck. We knew how much he was enjoying this.

In the Forest Dark and Deep - ???????????????

I'm fairly convinced Cassidy did all the killing herself and was a little psychopath, but certain things don't entirely make sense. How could a small girl have strung up corpses and then herself, after all?

Emmeline - ???????????????

was

Verse Chorus Verse - ???????????????

Just the sound of his name made Kara's blood boil. She knew he'd been the one to leak those topless photos of Jaycee. Of course, Jaycee had been dumb enough to send them. [...]

So they'd booked the flight and Kara had tipped off one of the friendlier paps, and when Jaycee had arrived at LAX, the mob had been waiting at the luggage claim. [...]

“I've got fruit and quinoa,” Kara said cheerily. “Vacation's over. Time to get you fighting trim. You can have my chili and cornbread when you lose that little pooch.”

Hide-And-Seek - ???????????????

Final Destination

The Crow

Annie, are you okay?

loved

The Dark, Scary Parts and All - ???????????????

pffffftttttttthhhhh

The Flicker, The Fingers, The Beat, The Sigh - ???????????????

For Dummies

Carrie, from the bully's perspective.

Fat Girl With A Knife - ???????????????

hate

I fucking get it, you can stop now!

Which variety of mouse, though?

Sleepless - ???????????????

Nope.

Nope.

a date-raping child predator

Nope!!!

M - ???????????????

It was strange, what words could do. No one had spoken to her like that since she was a child, like she was a real person, a real girl, and not just a walking list of ailments and deficits.

justice

The Girl Without A Face - ???????????????

terrified

reason

A Girl Who Dreamed of Snow - ???????????????

so much

“She's a child!” he said.
“She's bled,” Sain replied. “And I will do with her what I like.”

extremely infuriating

sound

M

Stitches - ???????????????

On The I-5 - ???????????????

She is fourteen. An old fourteen, and for how many times she's heard that, she can almost believe it really was her fault.