Anne Heltzel

The Publisher Says: A girl would be such a blessing...

The last time Maeve saw her cousin was the night she escaped the cult they were raised in. For the past two decades, Maeve has worked hard to build a normal life in New York City, where she keeps everything—and everyone—at a safe distance.

When Andrea suddenly reappears, Maeve regains the only true friend she’s ever had. Soon she’s spending more time at Andrea’s remote Catskills estate than in her own cramped apartment. Maeve show more doesn’t even mind that her cousin’s wealthy work friends clearly disapprove of her single lifestyle. After all, Andrea has made her fortune in the fertility industry—baby fever comes with the territory.

The more Maeve immerses herself in Andrea’s world, the more disconnected she feels from her life back in the city; and the cousins’ increasing attachment triggers memories Maeve has fought hard to bury. But confronting the terrors of her childhood may be the only way for Maeve to transcend the nightmare still to come…

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: The opening scene...Maeve, locked in a closet (!), hearing hideous screams of agony and being quietly comforted by her cousin Andrea as they go on and on, had me riveted. And that is that! No more folk-horror goodness.

All the momentum drained out of the story for me as we went from following her child-self to the chase narrative laid on for adult Maeve. The reason? I don't like adult Maeve. She's either a bit simple or she's got The Most Trusting nature ever plopped in a human being. Either way I want to shout at her, shake her until the missing connections in her brain click together, until she sees the simplest manipulations are being used on her with appalling regularity and success.

In the story universe, Maeve is one of the girl children in The Mother Collective whose purpose is to control matrilineally all the money and power that men have always controlled. They're using that power and wealth as men always have, to oppress and abuse their opposite numbers. Maeve's rescued/kidnapped by the Patriarchy at the ripe old age of eight and, unsurprisingly, is a Survivor and PTSD sufferer for the rest of her life.

When we rejoin her first person narrative, she's a never-was in her thirties, making her meager crusts of bread as a fiction editor. She's naturally quite wary of relationships, having very few...until Andrea comes back into her life. Andrea, her cousin from childhood, is fabulously wealthy and living a dream life as the big boss of a fertility start-up.

If you've read horror novels, you pretty much know what's coming.

It occurs, over the course of some thirty chapters. I'd say if you don't already have a grasp on the end of the book it will come as a shock to you. It did not do so to me. I was along for the ride, though, because I started to want this idiot woman Maeve to suffer some more right here in front of me as Andrea manipulates and sets her up.

The actual ending of the book was pretty clearly telegraphed from the start. I kept hollering at Maeve, "just LOOK AT ANDREA for ten seconds and you will see it!" But she didn't, and I began to suspect her intelligence truly was subnormal.

When, at around the half-way mark, Maeve's friend-with-benefits pays one hell of a price for her vague, unconnected relationship to life, I was ready to say "sayonara." I decided to do something I don't usually do: I read the epilogue. There was another vile w-bomb aimed by Maeve, there was a moment of clarity for Maeve, and there was something so deeply schadenfreude-inducing that I had to get there step by step.

This is a horror novel for those, like me, who aren't in the Cult of Mother, and whose belief in the goodness of Woman is so frayed and chopped that it can no longer be discerned from a streak of extra-dark dirt etched on my skin. I think Author Heltzel has created a dark, dreadful mirror of the life men have forced, and continue to force, women to lead. There is nothing innate in the desire to Mother someone for many women. Uteruses are not always the only important organ in a woman's body, and her existence should never be presumed to revolve around that organ's use in any way.

If you can read this book and not see that the nightmare is very real, and that its fictionalization is merely cosmetic, then you're at Maeve's level. I don't think I know many folk like that. But if one reads this: Go back and look carefully at every decision Maeve makes. What that will tell you is all you need to know. show less

Thank you to TorNightfire for a galley of this title.

Mauve was separated from her older cousin when she was young, when the cult they were raised in was raided. She was adopted by a loving family, but many scars never healed, including the loss of her cousin and the trauma of her upbringing. When her cousin reappears everything seems perfect, they reconnect and immediately fall into their friendship. But some things are better left in the past, which Maeve starts to realize as her and show more Andrea's lives become increasingly entwined. Is there something going on with Andrea or is it all in Maeve's head? Just Like Mother brings a twisted modern gothic horror story about motherhood and what it means to be a woman.

I went into Just Like Mother not knowing what to expect - I heard modern gothic and was sold. There are many disturbing layers which get uncovered as you read. I personally was enthralled with the creepy story and it felt like each turn increased the unease. The story subverts the traditional ideas of womanhood by warping it to nearly unrecognizable in order to question the pressures and expectations of society. This book is beyond creepy - certain scenes depicted nightmares that gave me shivers. Anne Heltzel's descriptive writing brought the nightmares alive, some still mulling over in my mind.

Content warning: there are a couple explicit consensual sex scenes, but also trigger warning for r*pe. show less

There has been no shortage of great horror in the past five years. Just Like Mother is no exception. In fact, it's an encapsulation of what makes psychological horror so effective when written effectively. It's devastating and disturbing. It twists the knife more than it stabs you. That's what makes it an agonizing read, even if you guess the twists ahead of time. It's like watching a looming storm approach, knowing you're powerless to stop it.

Heltzel's prose is perfect here, too. As with show more some of my other favorite horror authors, like Zoje Stage and Alma Katsu, she manages to find the perfect balance of descriptive detail without slowing down the book's overall pacing. As such, the more gruesome scenes take on a haunting, vivid quality and barrel forward at the pace of an unmanned freight train.

I feel like a broken record saying this, but I am very excited to see what Heltzel writes next. Just Like Mother is a masterful work of horror, crafted by an incredibly talented writer. show less

This is definitely not a book I should have been reading right after my daughter gave birth to twins, but in spite of the creepy topic, I could not put it down. A mash-up of the Stepford Wives and a few other similar tales, this included an old house with hidden corridors, and was just too tempting to pass up.

Andrea and Maeve grew up in a cult called the Mother Collective. The women believe motherhood is the ultimate goal in life and that men are useful for only one thing—and that would be show more supplying the sperm. If that was all there was to it, maybe it would not have been so bad, but the Mothers took things to a horrific level. When the authorities discovered their secrets, Andrea and Maeve were separated and ended up in foster care.

Having been apart since they were children, they managed to find each other as grown women. Suffice it to say, Maeve was in a better place before she reunited with Andrea. Their entire relationship was odd, eventually proving to be dangerous.

The ending was chilling! I’m not much of a horror reader, but this was tame enough for my tastes. I do think readers who may be sensitive to anything related to childbirth, child abuse or a few graphic details may want to pass this one by.

Many thanks to NetGalley and MacMIllan-Tor Forge for allowing me to read an advance copy/. I am happy to give my honest review. show less