The Female Of The Species: Tales of Mystery and Suspense (Harvest Book)

By Joyce Carol Oates

Book Overview

A young wife is home alone when the phone rings in "So Help Me God." Is the strange voice flirting with her from the other end of the line her jealous husband laying a trap, or a stranger who knows... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0156030276
• ISBN13: 9780156030274
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Ecco
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.9" x 0.7" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

Chilling and insightful

Scripture says that the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons. The meaning of this verse is commonly taken to imply the consequences of sinful parenting. For Oates, the sins of the parents are visited on the daughters. Here is an outstanding collection of women and girls of varying ages and circumstances who have in common both a horrible past or current hurt/injury by the one who they should trust the most and the horrible psychological and often sociopathic, violent and self-destructive effects of these hurts. Nabokov explores these themes. What makes Oates' contribution worthwhile is the brevity of the genre and glimpse into each life leaving you wanting to know more. In a sense, we often come across people with such backgrounds and who are severely disturbed as they briefly cross our paths. It is all too common and real. A book worth reading and thinking about.

Splendid Femme Fatale Tales from Oates

I certainly beg to differ with some of the disappointing customer reviews I have read here for Joyce Carol Oates's latest short story collection, "The Female of the Species". While Oates is not my favorite writer, I have yet to be disappointed with any of her work; whether these are short stories, novellas or novels demonstrate her considerable range and artistic abilities as a writer of superb fictional prose. In her latest collection, Oates certainly doesn't disappoint with her richly textured, stylish prose offering tales of women and children who are forced to commit acts most foul. My own favorite stories are "So Help Me God", "Madison at Guignol", and "Hunger", but the others are well worth reading too. "So Help Me God" chronicles the loneliness of a young wife who takes matters into her own hands when she finally deals with her older, violent husband, after being taunted by an unknown obsessive caller who knows intimate details about her life. "Madison at Guignol" is Oates at her stylishly wicked best, as a young fashionista gets her just desserts at the hands of some salesgirls in an opulent Madison Avenue store. "Hunger" describes a married woman's obsession with a young, handsome French-speaking visitor, who wins not only her heart, but also her young daughter's. Without question, Oates is still at the height of her creative powers with these elegant tales of diabolical mischief and mayhem; these are tales worth reading, but in small doses - as an editorial reviewer noted - to enjoy not only her elegant prose but also her splendid plotting.

Heroine and Goddess of the Female of the Species

Dark and fierce, these girls are ultimately savage yet all too believable. The writing is personal and bold, specific and so full of life one can almost smell the threat of danger. I guess I should disclose that I'm totally biased about Joyce Carol Oates. She's my female fiction writer fantasy, so of course I am thrilled and delighted that she does not slack off in this story collection. Now for that cold shower. It's definitely worth the read if you're into noir and dangerous women.

Dark and staggering, like only Oates can do it!

After reading First Love, I realized I hadn't read Joyce Carol Oates in a while and missed her incredible writing and dark, literary language. I love her short story collections and have read some of her novels and novellas (and I still have some unread stuff by her on my TBR pile). I wanted to read one of her short stories again, which is why I picked up The Female of the Species: Tales of Mystery and Suspense. I wondered if Oates still had it in her when it comes to writing short stories. The answer is a resounding yes! This incredible collection centers on women, women who are far from ordinary. These women are murderers, and they have needle-sharp teeth, razor claws and killer instincts that would make a male serial killer shake in his boots. The women in this collection have also had a history of abuse and obsessive behavior. This isn't surprising, for most, if not all of Oates's works have centered on some form of abuse. My favorite stories are "Angel of Wrath," "Angel of Mercy," "The Hunting," "Hunger," and "Tell Me You Forgive Me?" My one complaint is that I wish this collection had been longer. There are only nine stories total in this collection. Joyce Carol Oates's writing is rich with substance, symbolism and darkness and she is one of my favorite authors. I hope I will read another new short-story collection by her soon.

"Mommy held us all night long."

One should never assume that the fairer sex is the weaker and in this collection of stories, the prodigious Oates reveals the dark side of a woman's psyche, whether inspired by childhood abandonment or a married woman's rapidly escalating sexual obsession. Flying to the very edge of reason, each of these stories plunges into the darker waters of female behavior, some macabre, some grotesque, others giving voice to the secret impulses that drive women to extremes, to the edge of reason, innocent children taxed beyond the fragile structures of their emotional boundaries. In the first tale, "So Help Me God", a young woman falls in love with a bad boy cop, caught in a web of abuse with the husband she met at fourteen and married at eighteen. The exhilarating sexual energy of their early encounters feels far more dangerous as he toys with her dependency, obsession turning to terror. In "Doll, A Romance of the Mississippi", eerily reminiscent and a cross between "Baby Doll" and Lolita, a young girl travels the Midwest with her (step)father, preying on the sexual fantasies of vulnerable paying customers, frequently betrayed by her own twisted demons, home-schooled from the trunk of their 1953 Buick La Salle. "Madison at Guignol" speaks to a woman's quest for perfection: "But it is my soul I seek continuously, where I can and however." This fashion maven is a victim of her own pathetic hubris, caught in a horror beyond her ability to comprehend. A personal favorite is "Hunger", one of the longer pieces in The Female of the Species. Kristine, the second wife of a wealthy man, begins a casual dalliance with an enigmatic, exotic stranger, Jean-Claude, a new arrival in the elite oceanside community where she is vacationing with her small daughter. In the accepting society of this well-heeled colony, Kristine opens a door she is unable to close, her impulsive romance imbued with the menace of incipient violence, helpless against her consuming passion for the forbidden, en route to a stunning and elaborate betrayal. There are more: "The Banshee"; "The Haunting"; "Tell Me You Forgive Me?"; "The Angel of Death" and "The Angel of Mercy", each with a uniquely bizarre perspective. This collection is fascinating and unsettling, written in the evocative prose that is natural to this author, with random images of threat and menace, birds screeching through the sky, teeming hordes of feral cats, bucolic scenes threaded with nature's unpredictability, the power of one character's preoccupation with another, stalking death, all the ingredients to send a chill up your spine in the dark of the night. Luan Gaines/ 2006.