This ARC was provided for review, but in no way affects the following impartial and unbiased review:
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3*
Pros: Spooky and enthralling tales of magic and mischief. Beautiful descriptions and writing style. Features fierce women that search for justice and rightful revenge. A focus in Jewish folklore and myths.
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Cons: Overall lacking cohesion and failed to captivate me.

It's rare to find a writer who can transmute history and myth into entirely new creations, but Schanoes has a gift for alchemy. The bones of many stories collected in <i>Burning Girls</i> are pulled from fables and tales that many readers will find familiar, yet Schanoes constructs from them fantastic visions that will burn themselves into your memory. These are not pretty stories. These are not easy stories. But they are often important stories.

Two of these tales in particular are incandescently good. The opening <i>Among the Thorns</i> and the titular <i>Burning Girls</i> demand to be remembered and dwelled upon. While the remainder of the collection is uneven, every story contains at it's heart an interesting spark. Often drawing on real women or historical events, over the course of the collection Schanoes spans centuries of time to visit phantasmagoric visions upon us. From Emma Goldman sitting down to tea with Baba Yaga to a woman calling up a revenant for revenge in a gentrified SoHo, every story is surprising. It's rare that women get to bare their anger, their passions, their divine and ugly facets in the way the characters in these pages do.

This collection is worth a read through. And personally, I can't wait to see what Schanoes writes next.

Average Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️.8

I knew nothing about the author or this collection itself when I requested an arc of this book. All I saw was that stunning cover and title, and I knew I wanted to read it. And it didn’t disappoint. While there were a couple of misses, this is a beautifully written collection of stories about women - resilient women who have to find the strength within themselves to overcome very harsh circumstances - they might not always succeed but they never give up. The writing itself has a very fairytale-esque feel to it and it made the whole experience quite magical but also horrific at times. Definitely worth a read if you enjoy short stories with feminist fairytale themes and lots of Jewish religious and cultural elements.

Among the Thorns

Featuring a mother goddess and young girl full of grief, this is a story about antisemitic violence across centuries, how it has affected so many families, and what might happen if someone decides to take revenge. This is also the tale of a mother's love and her abundant capacity for compassion, even in dire circumstances.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead

This was too short for me to form a concrete opinion about it. But its about what lengths you will go to for the one you love and while its an interesting theme, the story didn't live up to it.

⭐️⭐️

Alice: A Fantasia

This seems like some kind of a retelling of Alice in Wonderland, but the second half was very confusing after a fascinating first half.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Phosphorus

Set against the backdrop of unskilled workers strikes for better wages and working conditions during 19th century London, this is a poignant tale of resilient women doing everything they can to survive their brutal circumstances and unimaginable suffering.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Ballroom Blitz

CW: gore, depression, self harm

Another story where I might not have completely understood the point, but the depiction of rage, despair, helplessness and depression through the writing was very on point.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.5

Serpents

This was quite frankly very weird because I am terrified of snakes and this story was full of very vivid descriptions of snakes as well as other creatures.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Emma Goldman Takes Tea with the Baba Yaga

An excellent mix of history, politics and fairytale - this is a story about the promise of revolution; particularly the Bolshevik revolution; but how ultimately it turned on its own principles and its people, becoming a dictatorship that oppressed everyone. Despite the hopeless tone of the story, it’s also a call to remember that revolutions may not be kind, but the present regimes are equally cruel.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.5

Rats

CW: body horror, self harm, drug use, mental health issues

This was a difficult read and the story was very bleak, but it’s also about the futility of self harm and how so many young teenagers across the world are dealing with drug abuse and mental health issues, and how they need more support instead of recriminations.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Lost in the Supermarket

CW: animal mutilation

Ironically, I was also lost in this story and not in a good way. It was interesting to read but I just couldn’t figure out what it was meant to signify. Or atleast the bit that clicked for me was about how our supermarket aisles are filled with varieties of every item and some of us find it hard to even choose, but there are so many others who still go hungry. Vividly written but probably it just wasn’t for me. The numerous pop culture references (which I had no clue about) didnt help either.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

Swimming

This was another weird story but I have to give it to the author, the descriptions here were very impressive and amusingly grotesque. And I think I understood the idea of losing ourselves so much in our ambition to achieve something, that we forget why we started out in the first place and that’s why it’s important to keep our feet on the ground always.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.5

Lily Glass

The story of two young women trying to find their identity and come into their own, this was beautiful, emotional and bittersweer.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The Revenant

CW: child abuse

This was another difficult read and the author truly captures the loneliness and troubles of a young girl who just needs someone to listen to her but life isn’t fair. The author explores trauma in a speculative manner and I thought it was very well written.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Burning Girls

The author ends this collection with another story that sets off against the backdrop of antisemitic violence, which forces two young sisters to move to the New World, and fight both human and supernatural demons in their struggle for survival. It is exquisitely written, full of emotion and wonder and pain and I can’t think of a better conclusion or titular story.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Among the Stars - 5 stars
"A man will confess to anything when he is being tortured."
Ittele's father has gone into an unfriendly city for trade, and was forced to dance in thorns by the townspeople. Years later, she accepts help from a Matronit, or Hebrew goddess, in order to take out her revenge against Herr Geiger and the entire city. I love a good revenge story, and I absolutely loved this one.

How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead - 4 stars
This is one of the more speculative stories in the collection, with a mixture of fairy tales used to bring someone back from the dead. I remember enjoying it, but I don't remember much about it. It was one of the shorter stories in the collection.

Alice: A Fantasia - 3 stars
"Something had been lost in the translation from girl to woman, but then, something always is."
Ina is a sullen girl, the older sister of Alice, who is more peppy. Alice cannot see her own reflection in reflective surfaces. Only those around her know what she truly looks like. This is another one I had a hard time with, but I may revisit it at one point.

Phosphorous - 5 stars
Lucy is a matchgirl for the Bryant and May match company. She makes Lucifer matches, and soon develops Phossy Jaw--a disorder that causes her jaw to rot out of her face, caused by horrible conditions in the factory. Her grandmother, a witch, helps Lucy help her fellow workers in the factory. This one is probably my third favorite story in the collection. It's based on a true story, as most of these stories are, and doesn't allow the history of the matchgirls to die.

Ballroom Blitz - 5 stars
Ballroom Blitz and the last story, Burning Girls, are probably tied for my favorite story in the collection. A family of 12 boys is stuck forever in a bar, reliving the last night they spent there, forced by Cynthia the bartender. In order for the boys to leave the bar, they must dance for 101 nights with 12 sisters, consecutively. Isabel and her sisters begin dancing with Jake and his brothers. It's a very sad story, and unfortunately one I can relate to pretty closely. A lot of tears were shed with this one.

Serpents - 4 stars
Charlotte is following the Land of Pins when she discovers a rabbit, which leads her to the subway station. This is a mix of a couple different fairy tales as well, and it was a confusing story, but generally a very enjoyable one.

Emma Goldman Takes Tea with the Baba Yaga - 4 stars
"This is the nature of time--it dilates during suffering and also during joy, rushes through our fingers into the sea when we seek to hold it tight; when we are depressed, the hours open up indefinitely as we are condemned to endure yet another day of consciousness, and then, and then, we look up and realize that we have lost weeks, months, even years to the sticky-fingered destroyer of joy, never to be regained."
Emma Goldman is an anarchist who really existed. She eventually meets Baba Yaga, who wants Emma to take her place. Emma realizes she has to overcome her personal issues to help the people she's been trying to save all this time.

Rats - 5 stars
"You can't stay high all the time."
A man and a woman are desperate to have a baby. They finally conceive Lily, but she is cursed to always be in pain. This causes her to develop a heroin dependency. This entire story had me in tears.
"The effort it takes just to open her eyes in the morning (afternoon), just to get dressed is too much and if she could feel desire anymore, if she could want anything, all she would want would be to stop fighting, stop moving, to sink back and let herself blur and dissolve under warm blankets."

Lost in the Supermarket - 3.5 stars
A woman is faded into the supermarket after being separated by her friends. The Queen of Hearts is soon after her. This one just kind of went over my head, but I enjoyed the ending.

Swimming - 3 stars
A woman is engaged to Adam, the son of architects (?) who have built an extremely complicated house. She doesn't want to live there, and I believe neither does Adam, and she takes things into her own hands. Super confusing, and if there was a hidden message in there, I missed it.

Lily Glass - 3.5 stars
Leo meets Lily, who is actually named Rose. She soon falls in love with her stepdaughter in this slightly Snow White retelling.

The Revenant - 4 stars
"Trauma is suffering that will not stay in its temporal position."
Unfortunately, I didn't take notes for this story, but I remember enjoying it.

Burning Girls - 5 stars
Schanoes really saved the best for last. Deborah was born knowing exactly what her position in life is. She apprentices under her grandmother, a witch. She helps babies be born, she helps women who don't want their babies to be born. Unfortunately, her grandmother has secrets. Soon, her grandmother is killed during a raid of her city. After plenty of trauma, Deborah and her sister soon have to move to America to join the land of the free and plenty. Their grandmothers secrets soon come to haunt them, even in America. This is another story based on a real story, and I absolutely loved every minute of it. It's one of the longer stories, and I was able to immerse myself into it, and I was completely attached to every single character in the story.

Overall, Burning Girls and Other Stories is a sold 4 star short story collection. There's Jewish mythology, feminist idealism, witchcraft, mental illness, and even though based in fairy tales, a lot of the stories were very realistic as well. I definitely recommend this collection to anyone who loves fairy tales.

Burning Girls and Other Stories features dark, relatable stories of girls and ladies I both connected and identified with.

I love stories that kind if defy genre, particularly that feature strong female characters outside of the mainstream. Themes of vengence, the immigrant experience, escaping situation, and danger abound. If you enjoy contemporary fiction with notes of fantasy and speculation, you might enjoy this collection, too. It’s out on Marxh 2nd.

I did it partly in print and partly via audio. Narrator Cassandra Campbell does an excellent job bringing many different characters to life. She keeps the fiery spirit of the girls constant throughout but offers nuanced readings to make each story stand out and their characters shine.

This one is out on March 2nd, so keep an eye out for it if you, like me, are looking to add more short story collections to your reading routine.

I'll be honest, I didn't understand all of the stories, but oh man, did I enjoy them.

These short stories are MAD. They are dark and creepy and they made me say "what the actual fuck" out loud several times. I felt all kinds of emotions reading this book, and now I have to go and find more work by Veronica Schanoes

copy + pasted from my goodreads.

Rated 4/5.

What an absolute delight this was to read. Emotionally difficult at times, which is why I had to take breaks between the stories, but wonderful nonetheless. I am a queer woman, and a feminist, and this obviously makes me biased when going into this collection of reimagined fairy tales, retellings of horrible real life events with a sprinkle of dark magical realism, stories of vengeance and justice for the women who have been wronged. The writing is both lyrical and uncomfortably graphic, in a way that is compelling; something I have seen other writers try to pull off with varying success. In a few of the stories, it got a bit overbearing, but on the whole it definitely gave another layer of just rage and hopelessness getting turned into hope, and back again. Yet I finish this collection with a feeling of resignation, something resting in the pit of my stomach, quietly resonating with the plights of the women portrayed in these stories. Definitely a read I would recommend you to pick up!

I recieved this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Although I have liked several of these stories at the time, I think I will not remember them all. But I do have to say that the first and last were my favorites and I will remember them fondly.

We can see how the Jewish people have suffered just because they are Jews, I liked the fact that this is not written with hatred, it has been written intelligently so that we can sympathize with the characters and love them for being like are.

The issue of discrimination is very big and here it shows us how unjustified hatred can lead to misfortune. We all have good and bad things, nobody is perfect.

I really enjoyed this collection of stories. I will read any kind of fairytale retellings/mash ups and this really hit the spot. Like most story collections some stories work better than others, but overall this is a really satisfying collection.

*This rating is based on my personal enjoyment of the stories and not the authors ability to write. *

The subject matter just wan't my thing and neither is speculative fiction. To be honest I clicked-on "Request" by mistake but thought I'd give it a go because I loved the cover. I know everyone really loved these stories - I must have missed it. I'm a huge reader, this just was not that interesting to me.

***Please note Veronica Schanoes is a wonderful writer I am just the wrong reader for this collection.

This collection of strange and fantastical stories was a mixture of feminism, Jewish magic and folklore, and a dash of queer elements. However, as with most short story collections it was a little bit hit and miss. I really enjoyed "Among the Thorns", "Phosphorus", "Rats", and "Burning Girls." Some of the others were good, or at the very least interesting, but for me these were the standouts. At times the really short stories felt a little aimless. The author used some more experimental writing styles that pushed the boundaries of my concentration as a reader, which ultimately left me putting the book down and straining my enjoyment of the collection. Overall, I would recommend this for lovers of slightly more experimental short story collections, those how are interested in Jewish myth and magic, or stories centered around pain and feminine strength.

Thank you to Tor.com and Netgalley for providing me with an e-ARC of this short story collection, however, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Schanoes blends contemporary and historical fiction with a fine layer of folklore-flavored fantasy in Burning Girls and Other Stories. These stories made me shiver, made me thrill, made me think; I really enjoyed spotting the references to punk classics in them. I really enjoyed this collection so much that I would happily recommend it to fans of Angela Carter and Daniel Mallory Ortberg, who like to write on the dark side of folk tales.

Some of the standouts in this collection include:

“Among the Thorns.” This story leads out the collection with a heart-breaking tale of long-burning revenge. The protagonist of the story hears that not only was her father murdered by villagers while on his peddling route, but that those same villagers gleefully retell the story of the murder to show their anti-Semitic cred. I love a story of Jewish revenge.

“Rats.” Writing about addiction is hard, especially when writers want readers to empathize the addicts. Here, Schanoes turns the torment of addiction into a story of a girl born with rats clawing at her from inside who eventually meets a boy who also has rats inside. This horrific modern folk tale is further blended with a true crime story that punk fans will instantly recognize.

“Emma Goldman Takes Tea with Baba Yaga.” In another story that blends actual history with folklore, we see the anarchist Emma Goldman fight against despair in post-revolutionary Russia. She had agitated all her life for change, workers’ rights, and free love—but she never made much headway in the United States and the revolution had gone sour by the time she was exiled to Russia. One day, after going for a ramble in the woods, Goldman is offered an extraordinary deal by Baba Yaga. Will Goldman give up hope for a kind of shadow power?

I really enjoyed this collection, even if many of the stories were downright frightening. I will certainly keep an eye out for future collections from Veronica Schanoes.

I’m judging a 2021 fiction contest. It’d be generous to call what I’m doing upon my first cursory glance—reading. I also don’t take this task lightly. As a fellow writer and lover of words and books, I took this position—in hopes of being a good literary citizen. My heart aches for all the writers who have a debut at this time. What I can share now is the thing that held my attention and got this book from the perspective pile into the read further pile.

“But my father’s eyes laughed at the world, and I have instead my mother’s temperament, so I was a solemn child.” Stunning prose.

A collection of stories heavy with Jewish folklore, feminism, and anti-capitalism. I have been looking forward to reading this since it was first announced, and it was even better than I could have hoped.

Some of the stars for me: "Among the Thorns", a Jewish girl seeks revenge for the heartless killing of her father; "Phosphorus", a haunting tale involving the London matchgirls' strike of 1888; "Emma Goldman Takes Tea with the Baba Yaga", exactly what the title infers; and the pièce de résistance "Burning Girls", a Jewish girl tries to protect her family from both human and supernatural evil.

A few of the stories were a bit too abstract and/or overly whimsical for my taste ("Alice: A Fantasia", "Lost in the Supermarket", "Swimming"), but these were few and far between. They weren't necessarily bad, just not something I enjoy. Maybe I just didn't "get" them. If you find yourself in the same boat, I encourage you not to put the book down; just skip to the next story.

This is bound to be one of the best short story collections of 2021, and I highly recommend it. I look forward to reading more of Schanoes in the future.

This was a really delightful book of speculative, experimental short stories. I think some of the stories are more successful than others, but overall, I was entertained and engaged throughout, even if I didn't end up loving a given story. I will say that I think the first story in the collection, "Among the Thorns," is a true stand out, but I also really enjoyed the titular story and a story about a never ending house construction project. If you're looking a collection of speculative short stories that have heavy doses of Jewish magic & feminist themes, with a dollop of queer elements, this is for you!

This book is not for me. I understand why people would love it, but I really struggled with the writing style right from the beginning. I don't know if maybe I just don't jive with the author or if it was the stories themselves.

This is a collection of intense, powerful, historical, and very strange stories. I'm rating it 3 stars because there are more very VERY strange stories - so strange they are more experimental meditations on something that I couldn't quite grasp - than there are stories I could connect with and feel pulled by. The ones I couldn't get into were more stylistically strange, attempting to be more stream of consciousness conversations with the reader than stories being told, and I just don't care for that kind of story. But of the ones that were really powerful and strange-yet-actual stories, my favorites were:

"Among the Thorns," "Phosphorus," "Ballroom Blitz," and "Burning Girls"

I really enjoyed how the author so seamlessly wove in historical moments, such as the matchgirls' strike of 1888 in London in "Phosphorus." I will forever be haunted by the visual of jawbones rotting from the faces of these poor women and girls.

I DNFed this book.

I got to read the first two short-stories and started on the third one.

The first story, "Among the Thorns", really grabbed me, it was fast-paced and intriguing and I read it in one go. However, the ending disappointed me. Even though it was shocking, I was expecting more - a more direct message, a more conclusive ending, an actual reasoning to all of it, something that would stay with me in my mind and which I could tell others around me as "uh I remember this sad story I once read...". If I were to try to do this in a conversation with this story, I'd be left with no answer, with the other confused on what the point of me telling them this story is.

I moved on to the next story, "How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead", and it hit me again with the same disappointment, adding to that a mixture of confusion about what I had just read.

Started doubting if I should keep reading, so I went to check for some of the already given reviews, and saw some readers saying that "How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead" and "Alice: A Fantasia" had been their least favorite short-stories, falling a bit on the weird side.

Tried to skip them, gave a try to "Phosphorus" but I was feeling the same disappointment coming, and then I decided I'd DNF this book.

As a common reader, no professional in the topics touched by these short-stories, I felt some struggle to grab the book and read after seeing that these stories wouldn't exactly educate me more on the subject. It felt a lot like just pointing out what's already out there known by others, and letting the reader take the message he/she wants from it.

I was expecting less abstract short-stories, bold plotlines. I grabbed this book with different expectations.

Still, the quality of the writing and storytelling is very recognizable, and it's always great to have some representation of these serious issues and struggling minorities in the world - hence I'm reviewing it with 3 stars.

Thank you NetGalley and Tordotcom for the early access, and wishing all the success to Veronica Schanoes!
I apologize my DNFing.

This is an intriguing collection that plays with genre and skillfully blends folklore, myth, fantasy, and history into strange and fascinating configurations. There were some stories that hit me more than others, but the whole collection is memorable and powerful. I recommend this for fans of feminist fairy-tale re-tellings, historical fantasy, experimental fiction, and feminist fiction.

It is a breath of fresh air to read a collection of short stories. I hope 2021 revives the art of the short story. The Burning Girls contains a range of fantasy, historical fiction, and feminist representation. I especially enjoy the feminist spin on fairytales the author beautifully tackles difficult subject matter such as immigration and mental illness. Well written, a beautiful blend of fantasy and fiction, past and present. This collection will appear to a wide range of audiences. Thank you to Net galley for allowing me to review this ARC in exchange for my honest review