“I’ll Take My Weird With Mushrooms, Please” – THE BEAUTY by Aliya Whiteley – Review

The Beauty by Aliya Whiteley
Genre: Adult SF/Weird Fiction
Publisher: Unsung Stories
Release date: September 2014
Source: eBook from Publisher
Pages: 104

The nitty-gritty:  A short but powerful story that will make you think about what “gender” means, but seriously, one of the strangest things I’ve ever read.

The Beauty were small at first but they grew, and they took all the best qualities of the dead. They sucked up through the soil all the softness, serenity, hope and happiness of womankind.

I’m not the sort of reader who shies away from anything odd or bizarre, and many of the books I’ve read and enjoyed can be described in just that way. I was anxious to check out Unsung Stories, a new UK-based publisher who “…are publishers of great weird fiction that defies categorization.” After some very positive experiences with other small publishers of the weird and uncategorizable, like Apex Books and Salt Publishing, I eagerly accepted The Beauty for review. And I can honestly say that, yes, this book defies categorization, and it most certainly falls under the genre of weird fiction.

So while this story was visually stunning and creative and strange, did I enjoy it? I guess up to a point I did, but then the weird kept escalating and ultimately became too much for me. (I can’t believe I just typed those words!) I do believe the author’s point to the story was to take a look at the way we define “gender” and turn that notion on its head.

But part of my enjoyment of fiction stems from being able to connect to the characters, to understand them and root for them and feel emotions right along with them. And unfortunately, I had a hard time with both the men and the women in The Beauty. Let’s set the scene for you, shall we?  The story takes place some time in the future after a horrible fungus begins killing all the women. People have moved out of the cities and set up camp in small groups, perhaps in order to better survive this virus. One such group lives in a wilderness area, and the wives, sisters, and mothers of all the men have died, leaving them alone, with no female companionship. The men are sad about this, but nevertheless they gather around the campfire each night where one of them, a man named Nathan, tells stories about their past, reliving the memories of the women they loved and lost, and generally trying to keep these memories alive for the younger members of the group.

But something strange is happening. Odd-looking mushrooms are starting to grow over the graves of the women, and one day Nathan falls into a pit in the forest and is attacked by a monstrous creature that seems to be made of mushrooms. When he regains consciousness, he takes the creature, who he calls “Beauty,” back to camp with him. The men are shocked by the Beauty’s yellow, spongy skin and strange, non-verbal way of communicating. But Nathan convinces them that she has come to make their lives better. Eventually, more of the creatures join the group and soon each man has his own Beauty. It’s almost as if their dead women are back again.

But not all the men are happy with the sudden arrival of the Beauty, and before long, dissent threatens to tear the group apart.

So what happens when a society loses its women? Well, aside from the obvious—no sex with women!—the society is in danger of disappearing, because hey, no more children. Whiteley takes her story in some unexpected directions with this idea as a jumping off point. I won’t tell you what happens, because that would spoil things, but I did like the way the men react to what unfolds after the Beauty join them. I love when peaceful groups of people suddenly turn on each other, and Whiteley’s story shines the most when the group begins to unravel.

Whiteley’s Beauties are strangely compelling creations. Although they don’t speak, they work out a way to communicate with the men. They seem to appear just when the men need them most, but the Beauty also have a violent streak that was quite shocking. To be honest, I liked them more than the men in the story, but only just.

I guess what bothered me most about this story was the oddness of the men’s feelings for the Beauty, who seem to come out of nowhere and mesmerize the men until they can think of nothing else but being with and having sex with these odd, mushroom women. I’m sure the author is making a statement or two about sexual role reversals, but by about the mid-point of the story, Whiteley takes the weirdness to a very unsettling level, and at that point I began to mentally check out.

Many reviewers loved this book—you have only to look at all the four-and-five star ratings on Goodreads. If Whiteley’s goal was to challenge the way we think about gender, then she certainly accomplished that task. Unfortunately, The Beauty had just a little too much “weird” for me to completely enjoy.

Big thanks to Unsung Stories for providing a review copy.

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This review is part of Sci-Fi November, hosted by Oh, The Books! and Rinn Reads!