By Michelerossettiphotography

Deliciosa

list of feminist horror books for all my radblr horror fans!!

if you're sick of misogyny/rape scenes/sexualized murder in male written horror, these books are for you! all of these come with varying levels of trigger warnings, so i highly recommend looking them up before you dive in!

-Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is a classic. most people look over the clearly feminist theme to only remember the Creature, but it's a heart wrenching feminist book about autonomy, misogyny, with pretty significant religious misogyny undertones

-Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado will always and forever be on my all time favorite books list. it's a collection of short stories, but the first one is the absolute best, called The Husband Stitch. she's such a gorgeous writer, The Husband Stitch especially is so haunting and heartbreaking, telling the story of a woman's life marrying and having kids, and what her husband takes from her, and just generally a representation of married women's pain and oppression.

-Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth is addictive. also incorporates marriage themes and complex i cities but deals especially with female "paranoia" and "hysteria" (quotes bc we know those concepts are man made for women and forced onto us). it has this domestic aesthetic that's very creepy and also just very cool

-Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung. ohhhhh my. i'm in love with this author, she's so incredible. Cursed Bunny is a short story collection that deals with misogyny, generational trauma, aging as a woman, and even delves into being kink critical if you're keen at interpretation. she's from South Korea, and also deals a lot in Korean culture and Korea-specific misogyny. it is translated to english, so unfortunately i will always mourn the writing style of it in original Korean but it's still written so beautifully!

-Hangsaman and The Haunting of Hill House both by Shirley Jackson. i'm sorry to clump them both together but for the sake of space + time i will. they're both gradual-horror, they definitely build. a lot of female hysteria type stuff, female loneliness, just generally such a good, creepy vibe that culminates in a truly scary ending.

-Maeve Fly by CJ Leede. a lot of people here on radblr call for truly insane female leads. this is that book! the main character is truly just a bad person, a psychopath, and she isn't moralized or justified in any way. she is allowed to just be crazy and evil without being diluted because she's a woman. women don't tend to get to be evil--truly evil--in media like men do, so it's cool to see a true madwoman. it's very witty, very clever. it's also a love letter to LA in a way, which hit home for me lmao. it's really just a peek into the mind of a psychopathic woman and the crazy stuff she does. very entertaining. not for the faint of heart.

-Such a Pretty Smile by Kristi DeMeester is sooo good. i don't normally get too jumpy about my horror, but this one had me looking up every two seconds to make sure i was safe. genuinely very scary. it's got heavy mother daughter themes, it's primarily about the demureness and politeness expected of women and girls. the "pretty smile" thing is obviously a reference to catcalling, but also to the expectation that we should always be pretty and polite and content and demure. it's a lot of women just breaking free and going mad.

-A Guest in the House by EM Carol. i read this one online and then NEEDED to own it so bad i bought it immediately. it is a graphic novel so a slightly different medium, but the art is so stunning and moving. it's also got marriage themes, about repressed lesbianism, women's desires etc etc. it's so good and beautiful and moving

-Nineteen Claws and a Blackbird by Agustina Bazterrica is another short story collection. not necessarily all horror, but most. i had to read this one twice it was so good. it's harder to talk about short story collections because there's so many different plots and themes, but trust me, it's fantastic

-The Bad Ones by Melissa Albert. it's a bit more rudimentary writing, but it's so so so good. it captures girlhood so wonderfully, especially the whimsical, daydream part and equally the dark, insane, human-sacrifices-with-barbie-dolls parts of that makes any sense. it's about goddesses and monsters and dreams and girlhood and the trauma of growing up a girl and it's marvelous

-A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G Summers. not exactlyyyy a horror but kinda?? it's about a female cannibal who kills and eats her lovers. it's hilarious, like laugh out loud until the people around you stare hilarious. the main character is so witty and man hating and cool. she's a misandrist icon, just so suave and clever and ruthless.

i'll reblog with more books as i find and read them! :)

Really tired of people on this hellsite acting like being gay comes with political obligations

Homosexuality is apolitical. Sexuality doesn’t come with a set of beliefs or rules.

Gay people belong to a diverse array of beliefs, religions, and communities and yes that includes ones you disagree with or dislike.

Stop saying shit like “terfs can’t be lesbians” “so and so isn’t allowed to be a lesbian because of xyz” “he’s not actually gay because he is of a/b political group”

It makes it clear you think being gay is a choice and that it comes with a set of rules you need to follow to be ‘validated’.

Gay people are gay even if you don’t like them. Shut up.

"is xyz rape, is abc rape" is just the wrong way to approach discussing rape as a feminist. what you're doing when you're concerned about absolute parameters is centering what we should consider allowable by men. why center that. it's not that "everything" is rape, it's that you need to completely shift your paradigm. you need to consider what it means for women to move in a world where their sexual violation is essentially a given and up for negotiation. what does discussing rape actually look like when completely, one hundred percent centering the experiencing and feelings of violated women and completely disregarding what would be helpful for men to think is "only so bad."

a small reminder to questioning people that it’s okay to read opinions you don’t agree with. there’s nothing immoral about reading and considering what other people have to say. taking in information and learning is not in itself a transgression and your beliefs won’t be shaken by reading things unless you do, in fact, think that they are accurate, which is okay and you should be free to explore that further without anyone breathing down your neck. 

anyone who attempts to make you believe that you can’t read things said by certain people is trying to control you, because they know that alternative opinions could cause some people to stray from being under the influence of their own group, and they don’t care about these individuals’ well-being at all, only their own status and how many people will uncritically listen to everything they say. 

it’s always okay to question. there’s nothing you aren’t allowed to think about. 

Can reddit user "lesbianwithabeard" leave bisexuals out of their homophobic fetish?

Those fucks were the ones that pushed back any idea of bisexual confidence by screeching that bisexuality as a sexuality was automatically transphobic. They always latch on to actually oppressed groups to try and force others to feel sorry for them - and then immediately attack them afterwards for not grovelling enough at their feet.

No one owes anyone else dates or sex at any point ever. To claim otherwise is to be pro-rape. That's it.

Lesbians are more trans accepting than gay males yet I don't see tifs complain about "transphobic preferences" as much as tims do. I suspect it's because lesbians are more pressurized to be accepting than gay males are, and you know why.

I also hate that criticism of this is supposed hatred of bisexual women who have felt attraction to 99 women, but attraction to only 1 man ever in their entire lives, or like it's hatred of the same-sex attraction side of being bisexual.

It's frustrating because a lot of bisexual women have connected their sexuality to their activism, like falsely announcing that they're attracted to every single woman ever is somehow the same as being feminist.

Everyone with any sense knows those bisexual women are lying. Whether it's a lie to themselves to try and self-soothe over hating that they're bisexual, or whether it's to try and protect themselves from accusations of being male-centric in some way, it doesn't do anything but hurt themselves - and other bisexual women - in the long run.

Bisexual women who say "I'm attracted to all women and one man" are so cringe. It's just virtue signalling. And trying to compensate for the supposed negative of being male-attracted.

this might be a hot take but i think that most women do have some radfem beliefs but choose not to share them out of fear of harassment or don’t recognize them as radical beliefs because of how radical feminism has been demonized.

‼️Good news for today‼️

Polish trans people will no longer have to literally SUE THEIR PARENTS to get their gender marker changed!

This is huge!!!