This fantasy/horror novel was a mixed bag. I thought the concept of the monster, Shesheshen, was unique and interesting, and it was the main reason I finished reading the book. I haven't encountered any other monster that had such an alien physiology, which was compelling. However, the alienness of Shesheshen's body was not matched by her inner thoughts, and this disconnect was jarring and frequently took me out of the story. Her thoughts were too human, even if they weren't "refined" or "filtered" like most humans' thoughts and speech would be. I especially didn't buy her falling in love with Homily. Everything was just too convenient, and I found myself rolling my eyes a lot. Additionally, the story itself started to get very repetitive and stagnant by the last third or so of the book. Ultimately, there were no surprises and I was disappointed by the end.

Thank you to NetGalley for the free ARC.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for letting me read this madcap story as an ARC.

This book is weird, gross, and darkly funny love story. If it had been *just* that, I would have had a good time, but there’s a sprinkling of serious psychology in here as well. Homily’s relationship with her family is pretty messed up, and I think will have elements that a lot of survivors of abuse will recognize.

Explain to me why I got choked up about the romantic overtures of a flesh-eating goo monster? Probably because I found Shesheshen’s social anxiety pretty relatable. As someone who’s queer and neurodivergent, I empathized with “the wyrm.” I think a lot of readers will.

Also: Laurent is a small part of this book but I loved his weird little brain. Wiswell has a weird brain and I liked getting to experience his thoughts in book form.

Most people want love, a sense of connection and community—for a lack of a better term, family. This may be the case even when those people are sort-of gelatinous, tentacled creatures who kill and eat animals and humans and then fashion themselves internal bone structures out of their remains! Part horror, part exciting action-adventure story, part romance, all heart (ironic for a main character with no circulatory system?!). I really enjoyed this by turns incredibly gross, sweet and moving, and climactic tale of a monster trying to start a family in a world run by terrifying humans.

It was Essa Hansen who recommended this book to me and I jumped on it immediately. The blurb gave off the cozy horror vibe I was looking for. I don’t do well with most horrors due to trigger warnings, body horror being one of them. This book is filled with body horror but the light tone and not extremely graphic writing style made it work for me.

Shesheshen’s voice is unlike any I’ve read so far. Maybe because she’s a shapeshifting monster who eats humans instead of spending time in conversation with them. You see this change over the course of the book as Shesheshen grows closer to Homily. I love the tenderness between the two of them, how gentle they are as they find out more horrific things about each other. There’s no judgment, only acceptance and support.

Halfway through the book, I was thinking about who the real monster of the story is (it’s clear who the villain/antagonist are, but ‘monster’ can be interpreted in different ways). Sometimes it’s not about what you are but about what you do, that makes you a monster.

I didn’t foresee where the book would end up. It takes wild turn after wild turn, and kept me on the edge of my seat in the last quarter. So much is happening and you can’t stop reading. all the subplots get wrapped up leading up to the climax, giving power to those that need it, and when you think you know everything, new information comes to light which made me rethink half of the book.

I can’t recommend it enough if you like horror but want something a bit more cozy, with a great ace romance.

The monster Shesheshen is awoken early from her hibernation by monster hunters and forced to into a fight that leads her straight to Homily. Homily is a kind woman who helps Shesheshen recover from her wounds with secrets of her own. As Shesheshen begins to develop feelings for Homily she has to learn what it means to be human and to be monstrous.

This was is a fantasy horror told from the perspective of the monster, who learns monsters aren't the most monstrous thing in this world. It was full of twists that I really enjoyed, and I loved Shesheshen's perspective.

Someone You Can Build a Nest In, John Wiswell’s debut novel, is hyper-aware of how trauma can twist even good intentions. From her removed point of view, Shesheshen (the “monster” of our tale and our point of view character) is able see the cruelties perpetrated by humans on each other and is very willing to call it out. Even as she’s being relentlessly hunted, she finds love an acceptance with Homily, a very damaged woman.

"Romance was awful. She couldn’t even do something as simple as murdering rude people anymore."

I liked the first half of this book more than the second half. There is a twist that complicates matters in ways that are good for plot and character development, but I feel that the consequences of the twist aren’t given enough time to breath amid the necessary action beats.

This is a fantasy novel with a good dollop of body horror. Are all novels with shape-shifters like this? It’s a subgenre that I’m not terribly familiar with. I was surprised by the gloopiness of it; I’d love to see this book adapted into a movie by David Cronenberg! It is also really funny. Shesheshen is very deadpan in her observations even when she’s not trying to be “human.” The humor is necessary for balance. Things would be pretty dark without it. I’ve been a reader of John Wiswell’s short fiction for a while and this is not a book I would have chosen to read without faith in the author.

<B>The Publisher Says: Discover this creepy, charming monster-slaying fantasy romance—from the perspective of the monster—by Nebula Award-winning debut author John Wiswell</B>

Shesheshen has made a mistake fatal to all monsters: she's fallen in love.

Shesheshen is a shapeshifter, who happily resides as an amorphous lump at the bottom of a ruined manor. When her rest is interrupted by hunters intent on murdering her, she constructs a body from the remains of past meals: a metal chain for a backbone, borrowed bones for limbs, and a bear trap as an extra mouth.

However, the hunters chase Shesheshen out of her home and off a cliff. Badly hurt, she’s found and nursed back to health by Homily, a warm-hearted human, who has mistaken Shesheshen as a fellow human. Homily is kind and nurturing and would make an excellent co-parent: an ideal place to lay Shesheshen’s eggs so their young could devour Homily from the inside out. But as they grow close, she realizes humans don’t think about love that way.

Shesheshen hates keeping her identity secret from Homily, but just as she’s about to confess, Homily reveals why she’s in the area: she’s hunting a shapeshifting monster that supposedly cursed her family. Has Shesheshen seen it anywhere?

Eating her girlfriend isn’t an option. Shesheshen didn’t curse anyone, but to give herself and Homily a chance at happiness, she has to figure out why Homily’s twisted family thinks she did. As the hunt for the monster becomes increasingly deadly, Shesheshen must unearth the truth quickly, or soon both of their lives will be at risk.

And the bigger challenge remains: surviving her toxic in-laws long enough to learn to build a life with, rather than in, the love of her life.

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

My Review</B>: I really hoped that I'd find something that recalled for me the affect and effect of <I>Mrs Caliban</I> in this book.

Not so much.

This being the twenty-first century, I get it; that kind of quiet exploration of repressed rage and thwarted love is not the way this louder, more boisterous time copes with Life. Also, the author's an ace man. We aren't much for writing quiet women unless they are silenced by our power and privilege over them. (Look at the mind-numbing abundance of male-authored "thrillers" centering sex crimes against women sometime.) What this book does, then, is entirely unlike what I was prepared for.
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2QHqsrpSB72martUb1oKu8UW9Y0IFk3zlmIQhKJkXLFm7EFOWOX_R5utoAr4KDudwKQGD9dI8hoBSzNfO9mdrP1lzQo539kLzZN2woFyrQ28dawLfE9ipAJC_4KZ61slQsH4QWlPgkxRNwVWEi6uoJxpBeDEcLyQ5a4UenT_lFbCAqNMGmAVpC7orxMx8/s1500/Organ-stops.jpeg"width=400>
This is a large pipe organ's keyboard. The stops, those round thingies, are the way the organist chooses the kind of sound...brash blaring trumpets, quiet soft woodwinds...the instrument will send into your ears. Author Wiswell pulled the "Strange" stop on his book's keyboard all the way out and then used the loud pedal.

The idea of this being reproducing in the same unspeakably horrifying way that wasps do is nightmarish enough for me. I absolutely abominate wasps. But then to be confronted with Shesheshen, the wasplike alien's, twisted psychology...finding its parasitic fatal-for-Homily (her intended victim) reproductive strategy LOVING!...and I thought, "that's me out!"

And then...

The reason I kept going, pushing past the extreme horripilation induced at the mere notion of this, this travesty on Love was the strength of my horror. If I am this repulsed and infuriated, the author is saying something loud and clear, and however much I don't *like* hearing it I should listen. I am honestly surprised to say I am glad that I did.

Female-presenting monsters are having A Moment, it seems...Alasdair Gray's <I>Poor Things</I>, a book I did not like but a film that was a note-perfect adaptation of it most recently....and Author Wiswell's more SFnal take on it surpasses that deeply strange story. In imaging an alien just trying to exist, as "Bella Baxter" does, as Frankenstein's monster does, but in such a revulsion-evoking way, Author Wiswell makes his readers stop and think: "where is my horror coming from?" Survival by consuming one's host is appalling! When one is the host, yes; but really, are we any different? We are using up the planet, we are complicit in the slave labor that provides us the benefits of food to eat, as well as the devices you're reading and I'm writing this on, and that offers the laborers nothing but early graves.

Some people who reviewed the book on Goodreads had some reservations about the nature of a man writing a love story between a woman and a female-presenting alien, when the love was not sapphic but asexual. To me, this felt like a feature, not a bug (!), because the point was asexuality. That was something I found moving, once I wrapped my head around it; the lovers are genuinely in love and they cannot deny or repress their feelings, nor are these feelings physiologically expressed through sex. If this is something you are unfamiliar with, I recommend reading the excellent <I>Ace</I> by Angela Chen. It was that book that, for the first time, presented me with information about the experience of asexuality, by an asexual person; it is extremely illuminating for someone not asexual.

The attentive have noticed my rating lacks a star despite my laudatory comments. This is not due to its sexual challenge to the allo overculture. It is due to the frankly peculiar pacing, too slow then zooming through character-building opportunities; it's due to the amount of body horror exceeding my personal limits; it's due to my very old-fashioned purseylipped response to the amount of lying Shesheshen does to Homily, that never causes any comment or evokes any sense of betrayal, nor causes Homily to require some assurance that she *can* trust Shesheshen.

Also I kept reading her name as "Hominy" and, considering she was being assessed as a meal by Shesheshen, it made me giggle most immaturely.

None of my minor crotchets should stop you from getting this deeply affecting and very peculiar story into your eyeholes. Soonest.

Like many people, I am sure, I fell in love with John Wiswell’s writing when I read his story “Open House on Haunted Hill”, which blew me away. So I was thrilled when I found out he had a debut novel coming out, and even more excited when DAW gave me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I adored this book. It is the story of a monster who falls in love, but it is so much more than that. Shesheshen, the monster, doesn’t have a human idea of love or relationships, yet she comes across as eminently relatable. Her romance of Homily is truly wonderful, and her pet bear Blueberry is a delight. Shesheshen’s worldview, while somewhat bloodthirsty, is refreshing and feels very true.

This book kept surprising me. I honestly did not see the plot twists coming and every single time I was like “no way!” when, in hindsight, I should have seen the foreshadowing.

Everyone who loves love or monsters should go buy this book. It was that good.

Thanks to NetGalley and DAW for an Advanced Reader Copy - pub date 4/2/2024. Just as the tagline says - Shesheshen has made a mistake fatal to all monsters: she's fallen in love. So, yes, this is a romance but it is so very much more. Wiswell takes any preconceptions you might have going into something so neatly described as "a love story told from the point of view of the monster" and chucks them out the window. This is not Angel and Buffy (or even Spike). This is messy and primal and the stuff of the original dark fairy tales but gone even deeper into the forest. This is also a book about how very human monsters can be and how very monstrous humans can be.

Which sounds a bit pretentious but we all know it is true.

Shesheshen starts the book as that primal, gelatinous lump of sleepy shape-shifting monster that you find under your bed but she grows and develops into so much more. Her arc towards better self-understanding (of her nature, her desires, her needs) is truly impressive. At no point did I felt like I was getting off easy. I was with her in her mind and trudging through both her own layers and those of the humans around her. As she became aware of the difference in humans, in caring about or for others, in how human civilization can work and not work - so did I. It felt utterly naturally despite the alien gloss and knowing that, yes, this is a monster's head we are riding in. Sometimes it takes an outsider to really see the world and upset the status quo and Wiswell gives that to us with Shesheshen who, as she upsets herself, also upends the world around her.

Then there is the human who started the confusion, the love interest who is so much more than that. Homily has her own powerful character arc independent of but still entwined with Shesheshen's. We see her through the monster's eyes and what we see is sweet and kind and giving and attractive. It is only as the story unfolds that we (and Shesheshen) discover that there is more to her, that sometimes behaviors are learned in painful ways. Homily will break your heart in about twelve dozen ways and then she will offer to fix it because that is who she is. The perfect nest and yet... Shouldn't a relationship be consensual?

Speaking of consensual, Homily's family? Are not. Let's just say that there are a lot of types of monsters in the world and not all of them have supernatural powers. Be prepared to hate with the fire of a thousand suns.

Lines that made me put down the book and stare into space, questioning EVERYTHING...
- Underlook had made a mess in their celebration of her death, and then used their fear of her still being alive as an excuse to not clean up after themselves. That lack of accountability was typical to humans.
-Romance was awful. She couldn't even do something as simple as murdering rude people anymore.
-You could not excrete memories. They could not be surgically removed. It was unjust.
-It was easier to comfort than argue. Arguing was the hardest version of talking. You could have reasonable points and try to show as much empathy as possible and lose miserably.
-There was no deception to keep her safe from whatever Homily thought of her. If she wanted to be in love, then she had to grow used to it.

And a lot more. Damn, this book was amazing. I'm going to have to go and buy it now. Drat.

Warning : As you might have guessed, this book is pretty full of heavy themes and fairly graphic descriptions of violence, gore, and mental/emotional/physical abuse. Tread gently and be kind to yourself as you go but I hope and believe that, if you read it, it will be worth every bit of your effort.

Shesheshen woke up early, and is understandably upset. Her hibernation in her lair was interrupted by a trio of would-be monster hunters, and she was only able to kill and eat one of them before the others escaped. Using some of the dead hunter’s remains (and other bits of the ruins where she lives), the shape-shifter is able to build herself a bit of human-like body framework so that she can sneak down into the nearby town to see what’s changed since she was last awake. Borrowed bits of flesh and bone give her body more of the appropriate shape, allowing her to fake her way through some interactions. When her disguise fails in the middle of a festival celebrating her imminent death, she’s chased back out of town. The crowd, including the two survivors of the raid on her lair, pursue her until she falls off of a cliff.

Upon her next awakening, she’s startled by the presence of a human woman who has treated her wounds, wrapped her in blankets, and stoked a fire. The woman, an outsider not from the village, introduces herself as Homily. Before the monster can really focus on what’s happened, she’s being fed soup and entreated to rest by a woman who is clearly oblivious to Shesheshen’s monstrous nature, taking any oddities about her as symptoms of having just fallen over a cliff. Homily loads her into a cart and strikes off back to town. Soon, she’s in Homily’s room at a local inn until she can finish convalescing. A couple of things strike Shesheshen, then. First, the people of the village seem terrified of Homily. Second, she is beginning to feel… feelings. An odd sort of mutual attraction seems to be blooming between Homily and the woman she knows as Siobhan. Homily feels a genuine attraction to the monster she’s rescued, but she has no idea what Siobhan actually is.

As the two are getting to know each other and growing closer, though, the reason for Homily’s presence in Underlook comes to light. She’s the daughter of the Baroness Wulfyre, one of the family that rules the isthmus where Shesheshen lives. She’s also a master monster hunter in her own right, and had come to the village to assist her brother in hunting down the Wyrm of Underlook. Unfortunately for her, her brother Catharsis was the monster hunter that Shesheshen devoured before she and Homily met, and all of her remaining relatives believe that Shesheshen has cursed their line. Now Shesheshen is torn. Does she continue her charade or reveal her monstrous nature to Homily and hope that she can be forgiven for who she is? She’s finally met someone who might be a suitable host for her eggs, but if Homily figures out her identity, siding with her admittedly toxic family means Shesheshen’s death.

John Wiswell has released a brilliant debut novel with Someone You Can Build a Nest In. It’s a delightfully bizarre fantasy romance told from the perspective of a monster, and I’m utterly entranced by it. His descriptions of Shesheshen’s odd morphology and attempts to human are charming and disturbing simultaneously, and the Wulfyre clan (barring Homily) are suitably horrible. All in all, it’s an unconventional love story that will leave you questioning what relationships can be, and whether we can grow to become more than what our parents expect us to become.

My utmost thanks to NetGalley and DAW for an eARC of this title in exchange for a fair review. Someone You Can Build a Nest In is out in stores today, 4/2/24. Check it out.

This review originally appeared here: https://swordsoftheancients.com/2024/04/02/someone-you-can-build-a-nest-in-a-review/

The body horror is phenomenal. This story uses the body horror in a very purposeful way; not only is it integral to Shesheshen’s character and the world-building, but it’s also used in a way that has an emotional impact on the reader (other than just being grossed out). The romance is also a delightful slow burn, and there’s a lovely twist near the end of the novel! This book made me an immediate fan of John Wiswell's, and I'll keep my eye on his work from here on out.

HELL yes.

"Someone You Can Build a Nest In" is a monster romance between an amorphous leech-like human-eating monster whose reproductive cycle is laying eggs in a host that eat that host from the inside out, and a beautiful, fat lesbian from a monster hunter family who are dedicated to finding and killing the wyrm. The protagonist is in fact this wyrm, who can shapeshift and is doing the best she can to go undetected as she's is trying very hard to not be killed, and keeps building lies upon lies without really meaning to.

It's also a story about not sacrificing yourself for other people, and holding other people up so they learn not to be sacrificed.

It's also a story about narcissistic mothers who live their lives through their daughters and breaking these chains.

It's also just a very fun, funny, horror read that I trusted the whole way along. It has twists and turns galore, it is never easy, but I did not think it would hurt me, and it didn't. Brilliantly written. The setting is a fantasy world that is half ours (there are bombs, and very modern speech) and half high fantasy. It is smart, and clever, but never quippy in a way that draws attention to itself. The characters are wonderful. Shesheshen, the monster and protagonist, goes through one of the best character arcs.

Truly loved this one.

Thank you NetGalley and DAW for this ARC copy!

I really do not know what to say about this book. I don't usually read the synopsis about books because I like to be surprised and I am definitely surprised. I still dont really know what happened in this book or how we even got to the ending but I was entertained the whole time, and I still can not tell you what that book was even about.

There is a lot of body horror which does not bother me at all, but if it is definitely something you need to be comfortable with going into this story.

4.5 ⭐️

Amazing. My jaw was on the floor on page one. The gore and monstrosity was unapologetic from the start. This story also had a heavy load of trauma and dark themes. But as it often is, the obvious monster isn’t always the worst.

Despite the ugliness, the writing was so fun and whimsical even. The book had some golden moments of situational comedy and hilarious conversations. The story moved swiftly and had that tense monster hunting vibe paired with the comedy of the monster being among the hunting party.

The sapphic/asexual romance was so tender and precious my heart was about to burst. It was pure and just right for the characters, honouring each others’ boundaries and understanding their baggage.

My only issue with this story was the ending. I felt that the last few chapters were unnecessary. The story would have been just about perfect without them.

This is one of the most romantic books I’ve ever read. At its base, it’s a monster romance filled with gore and strangeness and it’s wonderful. I had such a good time reading it! We’re all better when we love and care for someone, even when we don’t actually have hearts. Or any other organs of our own. A delightfully disgusting read!

Thank you to NetGalley and DAW for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Someone You Can Build a Nest In is ambitious: not only is the character non-human, she’s not even approximately humanoid (unless she chooses to be) but rather a shapeshifting blob that can take objects in from her environment – chair legs, knives, body parts of others – and use them to shape herself. It’s well written and I’d happily read more from John Wiswell, but not everything about this worked for me.

What I liked: the novel includes thoughtful asexual sapphic representation, some well considered conversations about trauma and its impact on relationships, and a mix of graphic gore and violence with humour that somehow inexplicably worked in terms of overall tone. The pacing mostly worked for me. There are some fantastic descriptions and turns of phrase in this book.

What I didn’t love so much: Shesheshen felt way too human as a non-human POV; I understand wanting to make the POV character somehow relatable, but this didn’t quite work for me. The last 20% or so of the book felt like an unnecessary add-on. The insta-romance wasn’t convincing (I’m admittedly not a romance reader, and those who are might like this aspect of the story more than I did).

Thank you to the author, DAW, & NetGalley for providing me with an ARC.

Content warnings: emotional abuse, physical abuse, gaslighting, child abuse, child death, blood, gore, body horror, injury detail, violence, murder, death, animal cruelty, animal death, grief, abandonment. Don’t be misled by reviews calling this ‘cozy’ – the abusive dynamics in this book are severe and pervasive.

4.5
Thanks to the author/publisher for providing me with an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
This is technically a sapphic romantasy story about a monster falling in love with a human, but it also kinda feels like a sci-fi story that just happens to take place in a fantasy setting, just because the monster main character feels so alien (by the end, she still retains that monster/alien-like qualities, but in a much more endearing way). Some parts of this book (particularly near the end) feel like cozy fantasy, but there were still a lot of action and tense sequences in the middle of the book. The cozy parts are done so well in order to build and develop the characters and their relationships. The tense parts of the book aren't as good, but still done well enough for me to not complain. The writing is funny in a non-annoying way, and on sentence level, it's clear that there were a lot of effort put into it. Combine those things with the brilliant observations from the non-human main character, the result is a really engaging and personable writing style, even though it's a third person pov. The worldbuilding is probably the part of the book that feels the most lacking, but that's fine by me as it's never really the focus of the story anyway. Overall, just a truly delightful read with a really interesting main character and relationship.

Man, I’m cutting it too close with this one.
Usually, when I find a book I enjoy, J just wanna smash through it and finish it in a night. This time, I wanted to savor it. Take a bite and let it coat my senses.
Someone You Can Build A Nest In is a horrormantasy exploring humanity, familial trauma, healing, and how to love someone.

It’s very tender. Shesheshen’s inner voice is very cute in the way she talks, and thinks, and grows. Even in the foreign way she navigates falling in love.

The writing was very believe able. Wiswell did a fantastic job with the twists and navigating them, writing some predictable ones and some that had me like ! :o !
I will be thinking about this book forever. I cannot express enough how much I LOVED reading it. I’m gonna go reread it.

Thanks to the publisher, Wiswell, and NetGalley for a free eARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinions.

Genre: horror romance, body horror

Shesheshen is an amorphous shape-shifting monster. Yes, she terrorizes and eats humans sometimes, but that’s really just for necessary nourishment. But the local landowning family, the Wulfyres, are out to kill her to break their family curse. She’s transformed herself to look a little like a human, or human enough to pass muster in town. An encounter with several hunters puts Shesheshen in a bad spot, and a young woman named Homily rescues her, nursing her back to health (unbeknownst to Homily, Shesheshen regenerates on her own, but she actually appreciates the attention). Even when Homily admits she’s out looking for ways to kill this monster, Shesheshen feels a bit like something warm and fuzzy is giving her feelings?! when she’s never had feelings before.

First off, this book was gross. Like body horror, regenerating shape-shifting monster gory details gross. Even for someone like me, for whom body horror is my favorite horror subgenre, there are some rough spots. You’ve been warned. But it was also funny. And heartfelt. And sweet. And insightful.

This is monster romance, not monster smut. And it warmed me to the core. It’s romantic in the way that Shesheshen learns to love Homily, but also to accept her changing body as a monster. (She loves being the monster she is, it just comes with some confusing feelings sometimes, you know?)

The driving Big Bad of the plot is venomous and spiteful, and not at all subtle in the ways it’s bad. Homily’s mother and sister rank up there with the more hateful mothers and sisters you’ll find in books. I, too, would like to tear them limb from limb.

This book is going to find a really niche home with certain readers and body-horror monster romance is apparently my new niche.

This is a cute book. Like if you made Octavia Butler's "Bloodchild" cute, lol.

I liked the first half, with Shesheshen falling in love and trying to act human, a lot. The second half, with the actual plot kind of coming together, didn't do it for me so much; I thought it was too neat and convenient a lot of the time. Still, cute.

I did feel much of the time like this book was too didactic, or like a little too much 21st-century voice crept into the clearly medieval-western-Europe-inspired world; words like "trauma," "abuser," and "enby" were thrown about with surprising frequency, and it was obviously a book with a Point. Obviously it's a made-up fantasy world and it can look like anything, and the Point happened to be one I agree with, but next to all the chain mail and old crumbling lairs and rosemary wine, it was still jarring.

I received an eARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.