A queer woman must fight her way out of a big-box craft store run by a diabolical religious cult in this gripping survival horror novel by Jenny Kiefer, author of This Wretched Valley
The ratcheting tension and gut-churning terror will appeal to fans of The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay and The Ritual by Adam Nevill
Ruth is trapped. She’s stuck in her small, religious hometown of Kill Devil, Kentucky, stuck in the closet, and stuck living paycheck to paycheck. After her manager finds out that she lives with her girlfriend, Ruth is fired from her job as a cashier at New Creations—a craft store owned by the church that dominates life in the town.
In an act of revenge, Ruth attempts to shoplift some yarn but is caught red-handed by a New Creations cashier. Instead of calling the police, the employees lock her in the store—and attack her. When Ruth is forced to stab out one of their eyes with a knitting needle, she realizes she’s facing far bigger trouble than a simple shoplifting charge. As Ruth fights for her life, she plunges deeper into the tangled web of the New Creationists, who are hiding a terrible secret that threatens not only her, but the entire town.
This relentless horror novel will have you on the edge of your seat as it hurtles towards a breathtaking conclusion. Will Ruth escape? Or will the shocking secret at the heart of the cult die with her?
this is about hobby lobby 90% of the book takes place in a craft store— New Creations— that serves the New Creationists, a cultic offshoot of Christianity.
We got ride or die lesbians. We got diabetes vs. rats. We got evil jars. We got everyone’s greatest knitting needle fear. We got a creepy psuedo Christian cult importing holy goods labeled “tile samples” to stock for some unknown reason. We got podcast segments.
This book is stuffed full for the murder girlies out there. It was a fun read, somehow making the act of hiding for maybe an hour plus into something worth holding your breath over. The twist was not really a twist per se, but the book does well on feeding you the hints over time so the reader can put it together fairly quickly. I wouldn’t even call it a real twist. The scariest part is that while the cult bits are normal scary, the stuff that actually happens… people go through all the time.. Being gay in a conservative town IS dangerous. People die. And people die from the difficulty it leads to, with financial insecurity and inability to find community, always looking over your shoulder…
