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Two Essays on The Count of Monte Cristo

I love The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. I have read the unabridged version more than once, and my most recent reread was in 2023. At that time, I wrote a couple of brief essays which I posted on Tumblr, one of which was about a canonically queer character and the other discussed a character who is often left out of the various adaptations. I present for you these essays with expansion and alteration, because I keep returning to them as pieces of writing and because I don't want them to be limited to those original posts. I'd like to thank longtime Patron Case Aiken, who receives a monthly shoutout, as well as new patrons DivineJasper and Sasha Khan. (Quotes are from Robin Buss’ English translation of Alexandre Dumas’ work.) Link to Audio Version. ----- Canonical Queerness in The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas You’d need to change surprisingly little of The Count of Monte Cristo to confirm Eugénie Danglars as a trans man (or a masc-leaning nonbinary person...
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Nothing But Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw

A Heian-era mansion stands abandoned, its foundations resting on the bones of a bride and its walls packed with the remains of the girls sacrificed to keep her company.

It’s the perfect wedding venue for a group of thrill-seeking friends.

But a night of food, drinks, and games quickly spirals into a nightmare. For lurking in the shadows is the ghost bride with a black smile and a hungry heart.

And she gets lonely down there in the dirt.

TITLE: Nothing But Blackened Teeth
AUTHOR: Cassandra Khaw
PUBLISHER: Tor/Forge (Macmillan)
YEAR: 2021
LENGTH: 128 pages
AGE: Adult
GENRE: Horror
RECOMMENDED: Highly

Queer Rep Summary: Bi/Pan Main Character(s).

*I received a free review copy in exchange for an honest review of this book.

NOTHING BUT BLACKENED TEETH is a chilling story with a classic setup: a very old mansion which the protagonists aren’t really supposed to have entered, and a variety of interpersonal tensions and allegiances which normally wouldn’t matter much to their daily existence but suddenly drive life-and-death stakes when the spooky stuff begins. The prose is exquisite, articulating the numb feeling of finding oneself the genre-savvy protagonist of a horror story but unable to change things. I love how it uses the hero’s trope-awareness to ramp up the terror and resignation as events play out to their viscera-laden conclusion. 

Short and spooky with an excellent ending, make sure this is on your horror shelf.

CW for cursing, sexism, misogyny, toxic friendship, sexual content, mental illness, depression, vomit, blood (graphic), gore (graphic), body horror (graphic), violence (graphic), murder (graphic), major character death (graphic), death (graphic).

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A woman in white with black hair and pale skin, her only facial feature is a smudge red mouth with a black void inside.


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