The Rust Maidens by Gwendolyn Kiste

Journalstone. 2018

ISBN-13: 978-1947654440

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

If there’s someone out there who is unfamiliar with Gwendolyn Kiste’s gorgeous prose of the macabre, The Rust Maidens would be a great place to start. After last year’s stellar collection, And Her Smile Will Untether The Universe, Kiste steps out with her debut novel, which rattles the soul in a disturbing, yet beautiful read.

Set in Cleveland in 1980,  this tale unwinds in a muted, depressive state that feels utterly claustrophobic, brought to life by Kiste’s exquisite, yet unobtrusive, prose. A group of girls in the neighborhood has contracted an illness that defies logic and science. What begins as something relatively innocuous, dripping water from their bodies, becomes much more dangerous and frightening: skin breaking open, revealing glass-like shards and rusted metal where bones should be. The horror is quiet here, like the best of Shirley Jackson and Charles Grant, as Kiste dissects the rotting body of the area which mirrors the internal strife of the people who live within the crumbling town.

The dual narrative of our protagonist, Phoebe, past and present, is a haunting one, as she returns home to revisit the bones of what she escaped long ago. The mystery of what happened to her best friend and cousin Jacqueline looms large over both timelines. The true antagonists of this novel are vague, and should be: the women who strive to hold power of the lives on Denton Street, the government agents who appear to investigate, the Rust Maidens themselves, the self-destruction of the town.

To give away more would strip away the power of this beautifully written novel by one of the best new writers out there today, a tale both unsettling and gut-wrenching. Kiste wraps her story in a veneer that feels like a mix of rust with the dust that has settled over the dying town, and the emotional heft between the covers weighs down on the reader like the crush of a rust-riddled steel beam, suffocating in mood but resulting in a story that begs to be read and savored. Kiste is a star, and The Rust Maidens is a slam dunk as a finalist for this year’s Stoker Award.

Highly recommended for lovers of any any genre.

Reviewed by David Simms