This was one of my October reads. I bought it a while ago and had been saving it for Halloween (if you can’t tell I’m a bit behind on my reviewing). The cover is what drew me in. There’s something captivating in that image, the strangeness of it, perhaps, the forewarning of grotesque, not to jump ahead, here’s a quick summary—
Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Met by Eric LaRocca is an epistolary-type novella of mostly email exchanges and chat logs from the year 2000 between two women. What first starts as an exchange for the purchase of an antique apple peeler quickly escalates to a master-slave relationship between two lonely women, Zoe and Agnes. What enfolds is quick and painful, leaving the reader with a brutal glimpse at the cruel indifference humans can have towards another’s suffering while seeking entertainment.
Agnes posts a message on a queer community board looking to sell her great-grandmother’s apple peeler. Plated with financial difficulty Agnes is in a vulnerable position when Zoe reaches out to purchase the peeler. I really enjoyed the back and forth emails over the apple peeler. Despite the voices sounding similar, I thought the backgrounds behind each character were interesting and revealing. I could also see how, after casually sharing such personal family history with each other, a bond of trust was formed. The quickness in the nature of the exchanges was helpful in showing how eager they were for companionship.
The premise of two strangers meeting over the internet and then covering the relationship solely through their exchanges was an interesting approach. It begs the question, how well can you ever really know someone over the internet. The simple fact that they could easily be lying about everything is the shadow behind these characters and reveals itself at the very end. Never would have gotten the ending from the apple peeler emails. With that in mind, I liked that I couldn’t immediately tell where the story was going.
The imagery used in this novella, whether disgusting or inciting, was really strong. Not shrinking away from the darker details provided a more captivating pull, like not being able to look away from a car crash, I felt compelled to see the story through.
In terms of what I’ve seen in sapphic fiction, this would probably disturb the general audience (infant death, animal death, disgusting ingestion of rotting meat), but I don’t think it’d be too hard for anyone who enjoys horror writing. So take that what you will. If you want something quick and messed up, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke could be for you!