Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart

And Other Stories

By: GennaRose Nethercott

Narrated by: GennaRose Nethercott, January LaVoy, Gabra Zackman, Max Meyers, Elena Rey

ONE OF THE WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF BOOKS' BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • From the author of the breakout novel Thistlefoot: a collection of dark fairytales and fractured folklore exploring how our passions can save us—or go monstrously wrong.

“Real magic, real delight, doled out generously in the shape of wistful, ferocious, this-world-but-better stories.”—Kelly Link, author of White Cat, Black Dog

The stories in Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart are about the abomination that resides within us all. That churning, clawing, ravenous yearning: the hunger to be held, and seen, and known. And the terror, too: to be loved too well, or not enough, or for long enough. To be laid bare before your sweetheart, to their horror. To be recognized as the monstrous thing you are.

Two teenage girls working at a sinister roadside attraction called the Eternal Staircase explore its secrets—and their own doomed summer love. A zombie rooster plays detective in a missing persons case. A woman moves into a new house with her acclaimed artist boyfriend—and finds her body slowly shifting into something specially constructed to accommodate his needs and whims. A pack of middle schoolers turn to the occult to rid themselves of a hated new classmate. And a pair of outcasts, a vampire and a goat woman, find solace in each other, even as the world's lack of understanding might bring about its own end.

In these lush, strange, beautifully written stories, GennaRose Nethercott explores human longing in all its diamond-dark facets to create a collection that will redefine what you see as a beast, and make you beg to have your heart broken.

Read, Don't Listen!

GennaRose Nethercott has crafted a number of beautifully written, haunting, and sometimes macabre tales. She then manages to obliterate the mystical and moody tone of her work by screeching an attempt at... quirkiness(?) at the listener. I found her voice so insufferable that I had to skip over the stories she read. Fortunately, there are a number of other narrators who somehow manage to do a much better job of conveying the tone of the stories than the author herself.

And I get it, none of us sound the way we hear ourselves, but Nethercott's aggressive coquettishness is just... a lot. I'll likely get a physical or digital copy of this book in order to finish the stories I skipped, as I really do enjoy Nethercott's writing and story-telling ability.

Folklore for the Modern Age

Thank you Nethercott! This book was a pleasure to read and listen to.
The narrative was both whimsical and unpredictable, laying a fantastic lore and atmosphere right on top of our world that was so rich and creative it felt like I was walking through it while listening to the book.

I was lead here by the “Sleepy” podcast - I put it on to fall asleep but wound up keeping myself awake to see how it ended! And I was not disappointed.

Overall, I would say 4 of these stories are phenomenal and the rest are really, really good. 100% worth a listen if you’re someone who is interested in cryptids, a little spooky atmosphere, and frequently revisits fairy tales in their own imagination. Happy listening!