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Rust Maidens
Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
8 posts | 10 read | 14 to read
Something's happening to the girls on Denton Street. It's the summer of 1980 in Cleveland, Ohio, and Phoebe Shaw and her best friend Jacqueline have just graduated high school, only to confront an ugly, uncertain future. Across the city, abandoned factories populate the skyline; meanwhile at the shore, one strong spark, and the Cuyahoga River might catch fire. But none of that compares to what's happening in their own west side neighborhood. The girls Phoebe and Jacqueline have grown up with are changing. It starts with footprints of dark water on the sidewalk. Then, one by one, the girls' bodies wither away, their fingernails turning to broken glass, and their bones exposed like corroded metal beneath their flesh. As rumors spread about the grotesque transformations, soon everyone from nosy tourists to clinic doctors and government men start arriving on Denton Street, eager to catch sight of "the Rust Maidens" in metamorphosis. But even with all the onlookers, nobody can explain what's happening or why--except perhaps the Rust Maidens themselves. Whispering in secret, they know more than they're telling, and Phoebe realizes her former friends are quietly preparing for something that will tear their neighborhood apart. Alternating between past and present, Phoebe struggles to unravel the mystery of the Rust Maidens--and her own unwitting role in the transformations--before she loses everything she's held dear: her home, her best friend, and even perhaps her own body.
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blurb
Beachesnbooks
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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October TBR 🔮👻🧛🏻‍♀️🧙‍♀️🎃🐺🍂

JamieArc I really liked You, Again. Despite being a little chunkster, I read it really quickly. 13mo
23 likes1 comment
review
Michael_Gee
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Bailedbailed

From the plot to the main character to the writing itself, this was a drag. It‘s a book club pick but we are just not interested in continuing with it. There is no discernible interior logic to the book, the narrator Phoebe is intolerable, and the plot sets up moments for drama and then under delivers.

khooliha Yeah, we read it for our horror book club and it was an early anti-fav. It simply doesn't give me what I want from body horror. 4y
Michael_Gee @khooliha Yeah, it was a disappointment. My parents live in Cleveland so I hoped it would be kinda fun to read a horror book set there but...well. 4y
Reggie This is a bummer. 4y
See All 6 Comments
Moray_Reads Ah, it sounds great as well! Always so disappointing when a good idea is delivered poorly 4y
sprainedbrain Damn. I bought this last year and still need to read it... 3y
Michael_Gee @sprainedbrain if you do, I want to know what you think! 3y
15 likes6 comments
quote
Michael_Gee
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Cleveland. It‘s the same as I left it: cold as a broken promise, and just as cruel. This is a city that remembers everything, even what‘s best forgotten.

(Photo: Lonnie Timmons III for The Plain Dealer)

Cathythoughts I like the quote 4y
Reggie I always hear good stuff about this book. 4y
Michael_Gee @Reggie I have mixed feelings so far. 4y
17 likes3 comments
review
khooliha
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Panpan

Woof. Okay.
I think the central metaphor is interesting, and there are moments that work, but overall this was not for me, which is a bummer because I love body horror! But the way this is written drove me crazy - so much telling about how everyone is with no introspection. It's constant.

khooliha Also (and this is a me issue), but the heterosexuality of this tale feels very pasted on? (Never mind stridently cis body horror, which my enby self is less taken with.) 4y
3 likes1 comment
review
heatherspoetlife
Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Mehso-so

This was a strange little horror that I picked up for #readharder this year. It kept me interested enough to finish but I didn't devour it like so many other books this summer this far. The end was just right but also a little disappointing by the time I came to it.

review
AudiobookingWithLeah
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Pickpick

MY RATING⇢ 4 STARS | GRADE B+
FEATURING⇢
Profoundly Disturbing Storyline
Horror-if-ic
Depressive Tone
Decay & Rot Transformations
Ghost-Like Apparations
This is super creepy and kind of deep at the same time.

See my review here⇢ https://leahsbookishobsession2.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-rust-maidens-by-gwendoly...

Maureen Love Kiste‘s writing style! 3y
AudiobookingWithLeah @Maureen it was an odd little story... But sometimes I like odd. 3y
8 likes1 stack add2 comments
blurb
SconsinBookyBadger
Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Dog niece Shandy lending a paw to day 3 of #7Covers7Days #CoverCrush.

@Zach1Risling would you be interested in the book cover game? Post a book cover you like for 7 days. No explanation or review of book. Tag someone new each day.

review
ohyeahthatgirl
The Rust Maidens | Gwendolyn Kiste
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Pickpick

I'm on a horror binge before I attend StokerCon and this is a nominee for a Stoker Award so I picked it up with a quickness. It balanced a nice emotional heft with some truly chilling scenes. What happens when your daughters grow up to be something unexpected, something you can't control?

15 likes1 stack add