The Turn by Rachel Feder

Oh gosh, Idk why I didn’t think there would be actual monsters in this. I mean, the blurb is pretty straightforward about the book’s influences — primary among them being Henry James’ The Turn Of The Screw and J Sheridan LeFanu’s Carmilla — but I genuinely thought it would lean more towards a “did she or didn’t she see something?” psychological horror instead of being a straight up monster book.

And there’s nothing wrong with being a straight up monster book, as the second half ends up being. The first half, tho, is the gauzy MFA-esque writing that has the reader wondering how reliable this narrator is, really. The narrator in question for this novella is Baxter, a grad student who takes on a part-time nanny position in the mountain home of her gorgeous, talented professor Alison. As the novel begins, she’s been there for a while and now lives with the family, including Alison’s handsome scientist husband Seb and their two kids, Quinn and Thebes. The details are a little hazy, as is Baxter’s memory. She remembers that the pandemic hit and she agreed to move in, exchanging room and board and a small stipend for child-rearing duties and the close professional attention of one of her favorite teachers.

But there are uncanny lights in the yard at night, and Baxter keeps losing time. Her memories seem to warp as she sees things that can’t possibly be real. She keeps discovering inexplicable bruises on her body and her ex-boyfriend won’t stop texting, finally sending her a warning that she isn’t safe. Baxter figures that he’s just desperate for her attention, until Alison and Quinn disappear while Seb is on a research trip, leaving an increasingly disoriented Baxter alone with Thebes on the mountain.

That’s the first half or so of the book: in the second, things get even wilder. The transition between the two segments works well as a desperate Baxter rouses from her confused somnolence and interacts with the rest of the world in her search for Alison and Seb. But there’s a weird artlessness to both halves separately that this transition can’t quite fix. The first part is old hat to anyone who’s ever read a thriller with an unreliable narrator, while the second is more suited to an urban fantasy series featuring a kick-ass heroine. All of these parts are interesting and highly readable but form a sort of Frankenstein’s monster of a book in the end.

And perhaps that is fitting, given the Gothic influences at play here. I freely admit to loving oddities in my fiction, but I far prefer it when the odd goes hand in hand with entertainment value, which doesn’t quite happen in this novella for me. The Turn is, however, a valiant stab at establishing something new and interesting in genre fiction, and ends on a surprisingly positive note that satisfies.

The Turn by Rachel Feder was published July 15 2026 by Triquarterly Books and is available from all good booksellers, including