Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher/author for providing me with an ALC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was exactly what I wanted it to be! I loved it. I will make sure to check out other books by this author. When I requested this I was just intrigued by the concept of it and I loved how it turned out. This story had a great plot and if you have read this and enjoyed it, This was so much. It was such a great story. I would say give this one a try. I will continue to follow this author. Way to go to this author for not letting me down.

I highly enjoyed the narrator of the audiobook. Kept me listening.

This retelling of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein introduces new layers and intricacies to the classic narrative. It revolves around three pivotal women closely connected to Victor Frankenstein's life. Firstly, there's his mother, Caroline, driven by a fierce determination to safeguard her children amidst the tumultuous revolutions sweeping through Europe. Secondly, Elizabeth, taken in by the Frankensteins, pledges to Caroline to wed Victor and care for him unconditionally. Lastly, Justine, a maid welcomed into the Frankenstein household, demonstrates unwavering loyalty to the family, obediently fulfilling Caroline's every request.

I found it refreshing how the inclusion of these women's perspectives enriched the story and fleshed out the characters, imbuing them with vitality and profound complexity. The decision to allocate each woman her own section of the narrative, rather than toggling between points of view, maintained cohesion and prevented the story from feeling disjointed or repetitive. The fourth section, narrated from the viewpoints of both Elizabeth and Justine, offers a compelling exploration of their interactions with The Monster.

While I appreciated the historical context woven into the narrative, particularly concerning the political backdrop of the era, I wished for more in-depth exploration of certain character decisions. At times, these decisions seemed inconsistent with their established traits, lacking sufficient justification. Nevertheless, the author's inclusion of relevant historical details added depth and authenticity to the story, enriching the reader's understanding of the characters' motivations and actions.

My thanks to Muse Publications LLC and NetGalley for the ALC of “Unnatural Creatures”. This is one of the first books I downloaded when I first started to use NetGalley for reviews, and thought the publication date was Sept 2023, not Sept 22. By the time I went to listen to it, the audio had been archived. The premise sounds great. I'll have to try to find it elsewhere.

Unfortunately this book was not for me. I don't know if it was because of the audiobook format, which I have to admit I do struggle with from time to time, but for me, not enough was happening. I listened to the first 10% and maybe that's not enough to get into it, but I will unfortunately not continue this book.

UNNATURAL CREATURES
Kris Waldherr, author
Barrie Kreinik, Narrator
Historical Fiction

This book focuses on the three key women of Victor Frankenstein. His mother is the person who makes him who he is. His wife, Caroline, marries Victor but longs for another. And the servant who has been taken in by the Frankensteins after a lifetime of abuse.

This is a graphic look into the life of the Frankensteins and how crazy he really was. I would give this a 5 out of 5 stars.

If you're in the mood for a spooky read, this is it. A book that surrounds the story of Frankenstein's monster. It's a story of the women who shaped and molded Dr. Frankenstein as we know him from tales of old. The characters in this novel are fully fleshed out -- intricately detailed characters, each with beauty and with flaws, adding so much texture and background to the original tale of Frankenstein and his monster.

No vulgar language that I recall, but there are mature scenes (which I didn't care to read). Recommended for adults only.

Perhaps the reason we know a certain version of some stories is because that's the interesting one. Perhaps not every story needs to be retold.

I found myself frequently uninterested in and occasionally frustrated with the women in this book. I've always loved Frankenstein and wanted to see to what new intriguing places this book would take me. I can't say it was a bad book, but I didn't enjoy it. The illicit romance (the one involving Elizabeth, not the totally unnecessary one involving Justine) does away with the innocent relationship that exists in the original book between some of these characters.

Rather than adding to the mythos of Frankenstein and his monster, I find this book detracts from it on several levels. We read Shelley's Frankenstein because Victor and his monster are a dynamic, tortured duo, bound together until their inevitable ends. In the original, the characters are virtuous and charming. Victor is the only blight, with his twisted genius and hubris. And even he redeems himself dramatically. But Unnatural Creatures turns nearly everyone into selfish, weak critters.

Now, as to the narration: it is less than ideal. As I listened, I began to think there was no way this woman was British. The accent is like a caricature of an extremely snobbish Enlishwoman. And from what I can find online, the narrator is in fact American. I need to start checking the narrator before I listen to a book because this is the second one in a row where I found myself repeating pronunciations in disbelief as I listened. It grated.

Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook copy.

This is a re-telling of sorts but narrated from the perspective of the women in the Frankenstein original novel. I liked this scew on the perspective of the storytelling this classic tale. Whilst I still found the dialogue and older style language used a bit dull the story was a unique perspective of this gothic tale.

I liked how we hear from all of the other members of the Frankenstein family and how political and personal events are shaping their own viewpoint on what is going on behind closed doors. There is a family curse, a forbidden love triangle, someone rises again from the dead and a monster - what more could you want from a gothic re-telling.

The length of the story was a bit too arduous for me hence the four stars but I do recommend this book for fans of classic horror and gothic tales.

4⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

More recommendations can be found here www.Instagram.com/thedeadrosesbookclub
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We all know the story about Frankenstein and his monster. But do you know the stories of the women behind Frankenstein and his monster? This book provides readers the unseen female point of view in the Frankenstein story.

The mother who would go to any length to protect those she loves.
The wife who felt the only way to repay the kindness she's received from the Frankenstein's was to accept Victor's hand in marriage.
The servant who was brought into the home to get her off the street and the loyalty she has for the Frankenstein women.

The concept behind this story is so compelling. We have all heard the story of the doctor and his monster but what about those in their shadows? Kris Waldherr did a good job at mapping out this story. The character development drew in the reader and encouraged them to become invested in the stories of each woman. The prose throughout the story for me had a lyrical edge to it that a lot of historical fiction stories have. I would not necessarily say that this story would fall into the horror genre however, I can also see the other side of it where the original story was a horror story for its time.

I listened to this story as an audiobook with Barrie Kreinik as the narrator. I felt that they kept a decent pace throughout the story. Each female POV had good differentiation so that it was easy for the reader to tell the difference between who was talking at that point in the story. I feel that it did meet the expectations I had when I originally requested the story. While I was not a huge fan of the original story, I enjoyed this one more. It piqued my interest to see what happened behind the doctor. I would recommend this book to a friend.

Frankenstein is one of my favorite books, so I was super excited to find this retelling told through the eyes of the women in the story. Sadly, this book wasn't for me and I stopped it at about the 30% mark because I just couldn't get into the story.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the audio version.
I was excited about reading this book for Halloween 🎃. But I just didn't click with this book. To me it is a retelling of a masterpiece and the author just put in her feminist views that I just found unnecessary. It made Victor look awful and man hating. It just made me roll my eyes

"...determined to bear witness, because that is what survivors do."

---------------------

Do we need another Frankenstein retelling? 

Turns out, yes, yes we do.

This story was utterly immersive and both fulfilling as historical fiction and creepy as a gothic horror story. It is a story of love, loss, revenge and redemption. We get three POVs of women in Victor Frankenstein's life: his mother, Caroline; his betrothed, Elizabeth, and an adopted hunchbacked young girl, Justine, who serves the family for a period of time. The story follows a few timelines, each ending with a whiff of the monster. Together we learn about the family who nourished Victor, the losses they have suffered and how a bit of madness grew. Towards the end we also get to spend a good deal of time with the monster himself, an aspect of the story I thoroughly enjoyed.

I appreciated this new take on a classic story which helped flesh out the character of the man and the decisions which led to his creation. Truthfully, I enjoyed the deep dives into Caroline, Elizabeth and Justine as stories of women of the time on their own. Learning about the dichotomy of have and have not, the impact of the French Revolution, courtly love and medicine of the time were all fabulously written. I did this one on audio and the narrator was perfect for the tone and tenor of the time. 

Thanks to Muse Publications LLC, Independent Book Publishers Association for gifted access to the audiobook via Netgalley. All opinions above are my own.

In a Nutshell: The story of Victor Frankenstein and his monstrous creation, but coming to us from the point of view of the three female characters in the classic. As a retelling, this is outstanding. As a Gothic horror, decent. As a women-oriented historical fiction, quite good.

Story Synopsis:
You might already have read or have heard of Mary Shelley’s horror classic, ‘Frankenstein’. This novel tells us about life in the Frankenstein household before, through, and after Victor Frankenstein created “The Creature”, revealed to us from the thoughts of the three key women characters.
Caroline Frankenstein: Victor’s mother, Elizabeth’s guardian, Justine’s rescuer. The woman who loves her family and is ready to do anything to keep them safe, especially considering the current political climate. But she soon discovers that things are going out of her control.
Elizabeth Lavenza: Indebted to Caroline as the latter rescued her in childhood. Feels compelled to accept Victor as her husband to repay her obligation. But her heart isn’t Victor’s.
Justine Moreau (named ‘Justine Moritz’ in the original, if I am not wrong): Rescued by Caroline from an abusive mother. Devoted to Caroline and Elizabeth and ready to do anything for them, until one incident sets her on a different path.
The story begins in 1783 and ends in 1799. The book is divided into four segments, with the first three coming to us from the third person perspectives of Caroline, Elizabeth, and Justine respectively, and the final segment coming from both Elizabeth and Justine.


Bookish Yays:
😍 I love it when retellings stick to the essence of the original, while offering their own novel take on it. As a retelling, this book retains almost everything faithfully, except for a MAJOR twist. I was initially not sure how I felt about the twist but as Walton is missing from this book, I understand how it was needed to complete the story and appreciate that creative call. This also adds some interesting new elements (differing from the classic) to the final quarter of this book.
😍 In terms of ease of reading, the book improves on the original, at least as far as modern eyes are concerned, because it does away with those extended confessions in the original (courtesy Victor’s story being frame-narrated by Captain Walton to his sister through letters) and becomes more character-oriented in approach.
😍 If you’ve read the original, you might remember how passive and distanced the women characters are in that story. We don’t get to heard their feelings on Victor Franken stein’s work at all. (Which is quite sad as the classic was written by a woman writer, a pioneering one at that! But I am sure Mary Shelley was compelled to stick to the status quo when it came to female representation in fiction. Probably also why the classic was first published anonymously.) In this case, the women drive the narrative, either though acts of commission or omission. It was a nice experience to see the story from their eyes.
(Let me emphasise: the above point doesn’t make the story feminist. The women, with the possible exception of Justine in *some* scenes, are still constrained to their social situation and have to bend to the will of the men in their lives, just as in the original classic. This retelling is just a feminine-perspective retelling and not a feminist one.)
😍 This is one of the few novels I had read where multi-character perspectives don’t jump around across the characters. Rather, the four distinct segments focus on the voice of just one woman (two in case of the last segment), and this ensures that we get to know them well before we move to the other characters. This approach doesn’t always work, but in this novel, it was handled excellently.
😍 I loved the ending!!! I wish I could discuss it but as I don’t want to go into spoilers, I’ll just say it was true to the spirit of the original though the events of the finale were modified.
😍 The author makes great use of the prevailing socio-political climate in Geneva and France in other to highlight the motivations and actions of her characters.
😍 Every chapter begins with a quote from the original classic. This not only shows us how faithful the retelling is to the original in terms of events, but also creates a nice base to the events unfolding in that chapter.
😍 Just as in the original, this retelling also raises questions about ethics, scientific progress, and moral responsibility. This aspect is better in this retelling as the personalised third-person narration shows us the characters’ inner thoughts well.


Bookish Nays:
😒 If you read the original only for Frankenstein’s monster, you will need to wait a long time for him to come into the story. Because of the narrative viewpoint, we don’t get to see any on-page details about how he comes into being. The only clue we have about something bad happening is when we see Victor’s moral quandary through the eyes of the three women. As such, the horror element of the scientific miracle that Frankenstein achieved is quite diluted. This isn’t a negative, but more like a disappointment. After all, the horror in the original was not just the monster but in reading how he was created. So yeah, don’t pick this book if you want a horror story. It’s more like a dark historical fiction.
😒 The writing ought to have been somewhat more streamlined; it became a bit repetitive at times, especially but not only in the final section. Elizabeth’s giggles also were too frequent for my liking. The book also introduced an angle of foreshadowing, whereby we got to see a glimpse of the future danger through the women’s dreams. I wasn’t a big fan of this as it felt overdone.
😒 I could have done with toned-down romance elements. A couple of the relationships are almost instant, and one such connection doesn’t even make sense from the character’s perspective. Though there are no open-door scenes, the brief physical sequences also feel out of place in a classic retelling.

🎧 The Audiobook Experience:
The audiobook, clocking at 12 hrs 45 minutes, is narrated by Barrie Kreinik, voicing all three female perspectives. Sorry, but I only *liked* her performance and didn’t love it. She has a good voice, but her character voices are either non-existent or overdone. Her voice for the three main ladies sounded almost the same. For a couple of the male characters, she used a strongly British accent, which sounded quite odd for characters based in Geneva. She also doesn’t emote basic emotions such as crying or anger, choosing instead to narrate those lines in a regular manner. In short, the narration worked only to a certain extent for me. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either.

All in all, this indie book does a great job as the retelling of Frankenstein. (It’s so much better than the other award-winning retelling I read this month – Demon Copperhead!) But you will enjoy it better if you go into this with the right expectations. (Isn’t that true for every book though? 😊)
If you want to be spooked by the book, it’s not for you. After all, even the original isn’t scary if you are reading it in the 21st century. This book is more for historical fiction lovers who like darker or gothic stories.
Definitely recommended. While you don’t need to know the original story to read this standalone work, it would be of tremendous help if you are already aware of it, either through the classic itself or through some movie adaptation. Every retelling can be much better appreciated if we know what it’s based on, but this statement is all the more true for this novel as it relies on our already knowing what Victor Frankenstein did in Ingolstadt.

4 stars.

My thanks to Muse Publications LLC and NetGalley for the ALC of “Unnatural Creatures”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audiobook.

I loved the premise of this book - centering around the women in the Frankenstein family and their impacts on progressing the story, creating the story behind the novel we all know so well. And I think all-in-all I appreciate the book as a whole. The build-up was beautiful, though I wish that the ending had a little bit more of the beauty in prose found during the first half of the novel, there's often beauty in the horrifying tragedies we should expect from this retelling of a classic tale. Narration was great - emotional depth and cleaving desperation.

Wow! Loved this book, might even have enjoyed it more than the original Frankenstein book. As for the narration of this book it was truly superb and made me not to want to press the stop button.

This book tells the untold story of the three women in Victor Frankenstein’s story - his mother, his bride and his servant. I really enjoyed the powerful women we learnt about in this book. The book was so well written that the story just jumped off the page, or in this case through the headphones! At times leaves you breathless.

This was a wonderfully evocative book and was so atmospherically written. This has to be one of my favourite books of the year, and I would strongly recommend getting hold of the audiobook.

If you enjoyed the Frankenstein book I do recommend that you read or listen to this book.

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Format: audiobook ~ Narrator: Barrie Kreinik
Content: 4 stars ~ Narration: 5 stars

The novel Unnatural Creatures follows the lives of three women: Caroline, Elisabeth, and Justine. All three are linked to Victor Frankenstein. Caroline is his mother, Elisabeth is his adopted cousin and future bride, and Justine is a servant in the Frankenstein home.

A retelling of the classical novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. But this time told from the points of view of three different women in Victor Frankenstein’s life. Unnatural Creatures is historical fiction and not a true horror novel, but the mood is often eerie and atmospheric.

The narration by Barrie Kreinik is excellent.

Thanks to Muse Publications LLC for the advanced copy and this opportunity! This is a voluntary review and all opinions are my own.

I've already reviewed the ebook of this title, but wish to add that this is an excellent audiobook experience. The narrator drew me in from the first, the characters are clearly delineated, and mood was excellently conveyed throughout. I enjoyed a combination of listening and reading to this story.

Original ebook review (also on NetGalley):

I've seen a lot of 'female POV' retellings recently, and have enjoyed most of them. Ever since 'The Mists of Avalon' years ago, exploring the perspective of a well-known tale has been fascinating. I approached this one with interest, as the original author was both female and a well-known feminist. Surely the women in the story were well-drawn enough?

Less an alternate reality version and more of an alternate lense, this version of 'Frankenstein' does indeed focus on the ladies of the Modern Prometheus, including a lot of action where Victor himself was not present. Let's face it: in the original, he was a typical surgeon! Selfish, obsessed with his work, forgetting that he had a ladyfriend at several points! Perhaps Mary Shelley was bringing in aspects of her own life there...

By travelling with women of differing class, intellect and focus, we see far more than the original novel could. Kris Waldherr has not just explored the landscape; they've spent time with characters who were overlooked but still absolutely relevant. Each of these had an effect on Victor, and it's fascinating to see what they contribute while blossoming as uniquely themselves.

Also I know the original 'Frankenstein' is less action-packed than some readers might expect. This is equally calm in places, but knows how to turn up the heat when appropriate.

Interesting, enjoyable and thought-provoking.

This book is a reimagining of Mary Shelley's classic, which focuses on the women closest to Victor Frankenstein: his mother, Caroline; his fiancée, Elizabeth, and his servant, Justine.

I really liked all three women and I found their different relationships with Victor, and how they shaped him, very intriguing. My favourite was Justine. I found her storyline extremely compelling, and her relationships with other characters, Elizabeth and the Monster especially, very well written. The ending of her storyline was also an excellent conclusion.

Apart from the characters, I liked how each chapter started with a quotation from Frankenstein. It really tied the classic and this reimagining together. I also liked how the book had a rich historical setting, which added more depht to the original story.

All in all, a very good retelling and well worth a read.

I have not read Frankenstein but that didn’t affect this read. It was difficult for me to get into, but once I pushed through the beginning it was a good book! I was surprised. I really enjoyed reading from Caroline and Justine’s POV. I grew to like Elizabeth.

There were parts that shocked me! I even told my mom what was happening in the book and she was hooked, wanting to know more.

The narrator did a fantastic job of using different voices/accents for certain characters. Thank you to NetGalley for a copy of the audiobook.

I kept getting lost. It was hard to tell the characters apart. That being said I didn't care. The story was engaging and sometimes being lost actually worked out. It was good and I was invested in finding out how everything connected.

4 stars