Abstract

Queering Contemporary Gothic Narrative, 1970-2012. By Paulina Palmer. (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, 204 pages, $99.99). ISBN 978-1-137-30354-7

Highlights

  • The publication of Queering Contemporary Gothic Narrative is timely, even if it does not take into account some of the most recent developments in the field

  • Palmer’s monograph, part of the Palgrave Gothic series edited by Clive Bloom, explores the ways in which queer themes and Gothic tropes interact in fiction in productive ways, with a particular focus upon developments in the academic study of queer history informing her research

  • “Ghosts and Haunted Houses,” Palmer analyzes Steve Berman’s Vintage: A Ghost Story (2007) and Sarah Waters’s Affinity (1999), setting up a pattern of comparisons between lesbian- and gay male-focused/American- and Britishauthored stories that persists throughout the book, in relation to what she terms “spectrality.” She follows this with an exploration of The Water’s Edge (Louise Tondeur, 2003) and Winter Birds (Jim Grimsley, 1984) in relation to the concept of the haunted house

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Summary

Introduction

From her considerable academic output over the last twenty-five years, it is clear that Paulina Palmer’s primary research interest is in the queer Gothic, a literary and cinematic subgenre that is having something of “a moment” in academia at the present time. The publication of Queering Contemporary Gothic Narrative is timely, even if (likely thanks to the glacial speed of academic publishing) it does not take into account some of the most recent developments in the field.

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Conclusion

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