Nathan Ripley

Real Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: It's 1900, and Louise Wilk is taking her dying husband from Manhattan to the upstate orchard estate where he grew up. Dr. Edward Wilk is wasting away from a mysterious affliction acquired in a strange encounter: but Louise soon realizes that her husband's worsening condition may not be a disease at all, but a transformative phase of existence that will draw her in as much more than a witness.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. show more THANK YOU.

My Review: Beautiful sentences, emotionally evocative imagery, a genuinely affecting story, give this body horror novella all its stars. The quiet emotional truth of loving a person who has wronged you, who will never know their own interior well enough even to know they have wronged you, would have earned it more stars. What I disliked was the truly horrifying body horror. My friend E, who's a horror writer, was even taken by surprise by how affecting these images were. Let him tell you about it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GV_NskzBfAw

A bridge too far for me, and very sad to say it. This is a creative talent indeed; I'll seek his non-horror work out, see if I can stick that.

Undertow Publications asks a minimal investment of $4.99 for the ebook. show less

At the turn of the 20th century, Louise Wilks is caring for her husband, Dr. Edward Wilks, who is ailing from a mysterious wasting disease. And I do mean wasting, as his body is gruesomely melting and falling away. Not always a faithful husband, it is assumed that he has contracted a syphillis-like disease, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

There's a lot of atmosphere in this slim volume, all very Gothic and dripping in body horror. I'm not going to pretend to understand show more everything that takes place here, and that's ok. Really takes the idea of a marriage and the term, "till death do us part", to a whole new level. show less

Never before have I been struck by a story's beating heart -- both its gruesome, decaying meat and the bloody romance within. But Ruthnum manages to craft a compelling, gothic, and oddly sweet story with Helpmeet.

A wonderfully disturbing surprise.

Why would dedicated family man Martin Reese be so obsessed with murder that he would spend his days picking apart crime files? And his nights "camping" so that he could find the remains of women killed years ago? He believes that he is helping the victims families. Doing something that the police could not.....bringing their girls home for closure. He also taunts the police for not doing the same thing in voice distorting messages and specific instructions on where to find the remains. He show more treats each burial site with dignity and respect, but takes photographs to keep in a digital 'scrapbook'. One of the women he hopes to find.....Tinsley Schultz, who just happens to be his wife Ellen's sister. The police call him The Finder.
Detective Sandra Whittal is not impressed. In fact, she's pretty certain that whoever is doing this was a part of the acts from the beginning. So when Reese's daughter, Kylie, is kidnapped, Whittal's not entirely sure that Reese didn't have something to do with it himself. But the real killer's accomplice, the Ragman, has a bone to pick with Reese for destroying all of the careful work done decades before. show less