The Refrigerator Monologues

November 15, 2017

This short collection of stories dissects with painful clarity the too-common comic book trope of endangering, abusing, and killing the women in male superheroes' lives solely to raise the stakes in the hero's story (comics fans will recognize the title as a reference to the fate of Green Lantern's girlfriend, who was murdered and stuffed in a fridge). From a coffee shop in the afterlife burg of Deadtown, the "Hell Hath Club" characters inspired by Gwen Stacy, Jean Grey, Harley Quinn, and other iconic women from comics tell the tales of their downfalls. The stories are gripping, exciting, and (very, very) grim, and each is not merely a riff on famous comics figures but full of original, surprising, and humanizing color. Karis A. Campbell's excellent reading is marred by an occasional mispronunciation but demonstrates her remarkable ability to conjure characters as she creates a unique voice for each of the book's six narrators. VERDICT Recommended for fans of comics such as Chelsea Cain's Mockingbird and Kelly Sue DeConnick's Captain Marvel and Bitch Planet, or readers who would enjoy a feminist take on George R.R. Martin and Melinda Snodgrass's "Wild Cards" books. ["Valente proves her adroitness with imagery and emotion in this extraordinary book of linked stories": LJ 5/15/17 starred review of the S. & S. hc.]--Jason Puckett, Georgia State Univ. Lib., Atlanta

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

With a supple voice that seems to shift from emotion to emotion effortlessly, Karis Campbell narrates this ingenious collection of monologues by the dead women of the urban fantasy DEADTOWN. As vividly imagined by Valente, Campbell creates varied voices for each of the sluts, mermaids, former punk rockers, and psychosis sufferers, as well as the Deadtown Public Radio talk show hostess. Campbell particularly succeeds at delivering the production's riffs on literary and cultural themes contained in its stories of time travel and romance as well as slam-poetry-style commentary on gender politics and some late-twentieth-century song lyrics. This is thought-provoking fun for listeners with a taste for wickedly smart one-woman shows. F.M.R.G. 2018 Audies Finalist � AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine