3.75 stars. Took me forever to read some stories. The writing and imagery was super lush and atmospheric. ( )

Just read the first story (The Bloody Chamber) itself but wow it's really powerful and scary and sinister with an incredible atmosphere of oppression and withheld violence and a lot of suspense even though it's likely you know what's going to happen from the start. What stood out to me was a bit in the middle which breaks open the suppressed violence when she opens the book of art showing sadistic, violent, murderous paintings - the description is suddenly very explicit. I feel deeply creeped out after reading it, it's really good

None of the others blew me away quite like the first one did (although to be fair it's the longest story in the collection) but I definitely enjoyed them a lot. They're either retellings of or strongly influenced by fairy tales - for most of them it's obvious what it's based on very quickly but it's either told very well bringing out undercurrents and ideas in the original stories you wouldn't have thought about before or with a different take on it. The only odd one is "The Courtship of Mr Lyon" which seems like a really straight version of Beauty and the Beast but I'm probably missing some stuff with that. The themes of misogyny, objectification of women, virginity, etc crop up a lot. The stories generally have a sinister/gothic/surreal vibe except for Puss in Boots which is humorous and bawdy. Her descriptions are really good at evoking an atmosphere although she uses a lot of really obscure words and I was glad to be reading on an ereader so I could look stuff up easily heh. Sorry for kind of shallow review but I liked it ( )

I liked about half of the stories in the book, the ones that read more like Gothic horror. However, even in the stories I preferred they seemed to get bogged down with a tangle of language especially in the Erl-King. Considering the book's only about 150 pages long it took me quite a while to get through it though I'm glad I read it as some of the later stories in the book definitely had a grim-fairy-tale-dream type of atmosphere (particularly The Lady of the House of Love and the Company of Wolves). I can't say I'd recommend it to anyone but I would say it IS worth reading. ( )

Angela Carter has a new fan in me. Amazing stuff and I can’t believe it took me this long to find her. ( )

I enjoy finding a foundational text for a subtype, a classic that would never have been included on the 'classics' lists from my college days. So while this wasn't my absolute favorite book, I enjoyed reading it. I really like how committed the author is to the style, atmosphere, story; it does very much set a type and never shies away from that. The most interesting part was thinking of all the authors who've been compared to Carter in reviews and marketing blurbs, and seeing how different they are. All that's needed is a woman examining stories, a woman who creates an atmosphere... a woman, writing. I'm not sure I've ever seen an author highlighted in a blurb that really makes sense as a comparison in a meaningful way, so no I'm not surprised. But it's gratifying to know that even within this delimited type, there is a great variety of voices. ( )