Patricia Wants to Cuddle by  Samantha Allen

Patricia Wants to Cuddle

Samantha Allen

A unique and bitingly entertaining cocktail of reality TV satire and gory body-horror, this read will gleefully keep you on your toes. Set in the final stages of a reality TV dating show, we follow the power-plays of the remaining contestants where nothing is off-limits in their bid to win. It's a thrillingly fast and wild ride, often bloody and monstrous, but ultimately a hopeful one of queer solidarity and survival, both human and Sasquatch.

Extract

Amanda stays outside to enjoy the fresh air a moment longer. Flipping the camera over, she opens the touch screen to a grid view of the most recent photos and selects the first. It blinks to life on the small LCD screen: orange light wending its way through the trees, Amanda standing there in half-silhouette, hand on her hat, looking appropriately grateful for the day. It might be good to use that as a caption instead. Something from Maya Angelou, maybe.

But then she notices another silhouette in the image, this one smaller, darker, and more distant, wedged in the narrow gap of light between two trees. The shadow is so black against the orangey backdrop that, at first, it looks like a section of the touch screen has gone dead, but no. Something is in the forest. 

Parallels
  • The Dark Game by Jonathan Janz
  • Horrorstor: A Novel by Grady Hendrix