Scribner Book Company
The Unworthy
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NATIONAL BESTSELLER
The long-awaited new novel from the author of global sensation Tender Is the Flesh: a thrilling work of literary horror about a woman cloistered in a secretive, violent religious order, while outside the world has fallen into chaos.
From her cell in a mysterious convent, a woman writes the story of her life in whatever she can find--discarded ink, dirt, and even her own blood. A lower member of the Sacred Sisterhood, deemed an unworthy, she dreams of ascending to the ranks of the Enlightened at the center of the convent and of pleasing the foreboding Superior Sister. Outside, the world is plagued by catastrophe--cities are submerged underwater, electricity and the internet are nonexistent, and bands of survivors fight and forage in a cruel, barren landscape. Inside, the narrator is controlled, punished, but safe.
But when a stranger makes her way past the convent walls, joining the ranks of the unworthy, she forces the narrator to consider her long-buried past--and what she may be overlooking about the Enlightened. As the two women grow closer, the narrator is increasingly haunted by questions about her own past, the environmental future, and her present life inside the convent. How did she get to the Sacred Sisterhood? Why can't she remember her life before? And what really happens when a woman is chosen as one of the Enlightened?
A searing, dystopian tale about climate crisis, ideological extremism, and the tidal pull of our most violent, exploitative instincts, this is another unforgettable novel from a master of feminist horror.
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Book Details
ISBN:
9781668063705
EAN:
9781668063705
Binding:
Hardcover
Pages:
192
Authors:
Agustina Bazterrica
Publisher:
Scribner Book Company
Published Date: 2025-04-03
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Brutally efficient in its storytelling
I knew I’d enjoy this book just from the first couple of pages. This was my first read from this author, and now I definitely want to dive into her backlog. It’s weird, entertaining, and thought-provoking, so different from what I usually read (a lot of fantasy, contemporary, and fantasy romance). I can already tell this will be a reread for me, especially during spooky season or even summerween.
Be very careful when you begin this book. It is a brilliant, unearthly, horrorifying, masterpiece. Even as you are beaten up with the story you are mesmerized by the beauty, the poetry of its existence. Its a dichotemy, i was both enthralled and repelled with it. There is that much power in this novel.
The Unworthy is dark, visceral, and unforgettable. Bazterrica pulls you into a suffocating convent where devotion, punishment, and survival collide. The narrator’s desperate confessions—scrawled in ink, dirt, even blood—are haunting, and the arrival of a stranger cracks open questions of memory, faith, and freedom. A chilling blend of feminist horror and dystopian vision, this novel lingers long after the last page.
This is a much heavier novel than Tender is the Flesh was, but it holds a much more special place in my heart. I read this in one sitting while at work (do not do this unless you want to ruin your day) and I was holding back tears the whole day. The narrator feels like such a real person, and even as someone who finds it difficult to empathize with others I found myself very emotionally responsive to everything that happened to her.The worst part of the book was by far a scene towards the end involving animal abuse/death - that was the only part of the book that made me regret this read, and if I knew about it beforehand I likely would not have read it honestly.
