Unnatural Creatures: A Novel of the Frankenstein Women - Kris Waldherr - ★★★★

AUTHOR: Kris Waldherr

NARRATOR: Barrie Kreinik

GENRE: Historical Fiction, Retelling

RATING: 4 stars.

In a Nutshell: The story of Victor Frankenstein and his monstrous creation, but coming to us from the point of view of the three female characters in the classic. As a retelling, this is outstanding. As a Gothic horror, decent. As a women-oriented historical fiction, quite good.

Story Synopsis:

You might already have read or have heard of Mary Shelley’s horror classic, ‘Frankenstein’. This novel tells us about life in the Frankenstein household before, through, and after Victor Frankenstein created “The Creature”, revealed to us from the thoughts of the three key women characters.

Caroline Frankenstein: Victor’s mother, Elizabeth’s guardian, Justine’s rescuer. The woman who loves her family and is ready to do anything to keep them safe, especially considering the current political climate. But she soon discovers that things are going out of her control.

Elizabeth Lavenza: Indebted to Caroline as the latter rescued her in childhood. Feels compelled to accept Victor as her husband to repay her obligation. But her heart isn’t Victor’s.

Justine Moreau (named ‘Justine Moritz’ in the original, if I am not wrong): Rescued by Caroline from an abusive mother. Devoted to Caroline and Elizabeth and ready to do anything for them, until one incident sets her on a different path.

The story begins in 1783 and ends in 1799. The book is divided into four segments, with the first three coming to us from the third person perspectives of Caroline, Elizabeth, and Justine respectively, and the final segment coming from both Elizabeth and Justine.

Bookish Yays:

😍 I love it when retellings stick to the essence of the original, while offering their own novel take on it. As a retelling, this book retains almost everything faithfully, except for a MAJOR twist. I was initially not sure how I felt about the twist but as Walton is missing from this book, I understand how it was needed to complete the story and appreciate that creative call. This also adds some interesting new elements (differing from the classic) to the final quarter of this book.

😍 In terms of ease of reading, the book improves on the original, at least as far as modern eyes are concerned, because it does away with those extended confessions in the original (courtesy Victor’s story being frame-narrated by Captain Walton to his sister through letters) and becomes more character-oriented in approach.

😍 If you’ve read the original, you might remember how passive and distanced the women characters are in that story. We don’t get to heard their feelings on Victor Franken stein’s work at all. (Which is quite sad as the classic was written by a woman writer, a pioneering one at that! But I am sure Mary Shelley was compelled to stick to the status quo when it came to female representation in fiction. Probably also why the classic was first published anonymously.) In this case, the women drive the narrative, either though acts of commission or omission. It was a nice experience to see the story from their eyes.

(Let me emphasise: the above point doesn’t make the story feminist. The women, with the possible exception of Justine in *some* scenes, are still constrained to their social situation and have to bend to the will of the men in their lives, just as in the original classic. This retelling is just a feminine-perspective retelling and not a feminist one.)

😍 This is one of the few novels I had read where multi-character perspectives don’t jump around across the characters. Rather, the four distinct segments focus on the voice of just one woman (two in case of the last segment), and this ensures that we get to know them well before we move to the other characters. This approach doesn’t always work, but in this novel, it was handled excellently.

😍 I loved the ending!!! I wish I could discuss it but as I don’t want to go into spoilers, I’ll just say it was true to the spirit of the original though the events of the finale were modified.

😍 The author makes great use of the prevailing socio-political climate in Geneva and France in other to highlight the motivations and actions of her characters.

😍 Every chapter begins with a quote from the original classic. This not only shows us how faithful the retelling is to the original in terms of events, but also creates a nice base to the events unfolding in that chapter.

😍 Just as in the original, this retelling also raises questions about ethics, scientific progress, and moral responsibility. This aspect is better in this retelling as the personalised third-person narration shows us the characters’ inner thoughts well.

Bookish Nays:

😒 If you read the original only for Frankenstein’s monster, you will need to wait a long time for him to come into the story. Because of the narrative viewpoint, we don’t get to see any on-page details about how he comes into being. The only clue we have about something bad happening is when we see Victor’s moral quandary through the eyes of the three women. As such, the horror element of the scientific miracle that Frankenstein achieved is quite diluted. This isn’t a negative, but more like a disappointment. After all, the horror in the original was not just the monster but in reading how he was created. So yeah, don’t pick this book if you want a horror story. It’s more like a dark historical fiction.

😒 The writing ought to have been somewhat more streamlined; it became a bit repetitive at times, especially but not only in the final section. Elizabeth’s giggles also were too frequent for my liking. The book also introduced an angle of foreshadowing, whereby we got to see a glimpse of the future danger through the women’s dreams. I wasn’t a big fan of this as it felt overdone.

😒 I could have done with toned-down romance elements. A couple of the relationships are almost instant, and one such connection doesn’t even make sense from the character’s perspective. Though there are no open-door scenes, the brief physical sequences also feel out of place in a classic retelling.

🎧 The Audiobook Experience:

The audiobook, clocking at 12 hrs 45 minutes, is narrated by Barrie Kreinik, voicing all three female perspectives. Sorry, but I only *liked* her performance and didn’t love it. She has a good voice, but her character voices are either non-existent or overdone. Her voice for the three main ladies sounded almost the same. For a couple of the male characters, she used a strongly British accent, which sounded quite odd for characters based in Geneva. She also doesn’t emote basic emotions such as crying or anger, choosing instead to narrate those lines in a regular manner. In short, the narration worked only to a certain extent for me. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either.

All in all, this indie book does a great job as the retelling of Frankenstein. (It’s so much better than the other award-winning retelling I read this month – Demon Copperhead!) But you will enjoy it better if you go into this with the right expectations. (Isn’t that true for every book though? 😊)

If you want to be spooked by the book, it’s not for you. After all, even the original isn’t scary if you are reading it in the 21st century. This book is more for historical fiction lovers who like darker or gothic stories.

Definitely recommended. While you don’t need to know the original story to read this standalone work, it would be of tremendous help if you are already aware of it, either through the classic itself or through some movie adaptation. Every retelling can be much better appreciated if we know what it’s based on, but this statement is all the more true for this novel as it relies on our already knowing what Victor Frankenstein did in Ingolstadt.

My thanks to Muse Publications LLC and NetGalley for the ALC of “Unnatural Creatures”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.