“There are some who think that I know the truth and I simply don’t want to speak about it, either because I want to create mystery or because I’m ashamed of the connection. But the truth, I have found, is not what people want anyway. The truth is often too ugly to be spoken aloud. There is no glamour to be found in it.”

Slashed Beauties by A. Rushby is a brilliant meld of horror and historical fantasy. The novel is inspired by the Anatomical Venuses, real 18th century wax models of women whose skins could be peeled back to reveal their internal organs. The originals were made by Venetian craftsmen and designed to teach medical students anatomy, as a replacement for corpses which were hard to come by and inevitably rotted. They were so detailed they contained parts of anatomy not yet known to science. But being the product of the Enlightenment, the models were not only incredibly detailed, they were uncomfortably sultry. This was a feature not a bug – the anatomists suspected that making the models in the likeness of sexy ladies was the only way to keep the inevitably male medical students engaged. This makes them the perfect metaphor for the ways in which medical science has been shaped by the violence of the male gaze. Rushby takes this wonderful premise and runs with it, creating an atmospheric and taut horror chiller that explores the ingrained misogyny of 18th century England through to today by telling the stories of three sex workers, their descendant living with their legacy, and the ways in which women have been viewed as disposable. It succeeds both as brilliant entertainment and a thought-provoking critique of misogyny. 

Slashed Beauty is told across two time periods. In London, 1769, Eleanor has run away from her small town with her lover, only for him to desert her, leaving her penniless and friendless in the big city. At the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens, she meets Elizabeth, a beautiful and charismatic lady of the night who just so happens to be looking for beautiful young women to join her sérail. A victim of abuse herself, Elizabeth has a compelling vision of a sex work establishment run by herself and her fellow sex workers, a place of sisterhood and safety where they can ply their trade without risking rape and murder. Eleanor can’t believe her luck, especially when she meets Elizabeth’s protégé, the charming Emily, with whom she immediately forms a deep and passionate bond. But Elizabeth is not all she seems, and soon her darker motivations put her naïve charges in more danger than they could imagine. The other strand takes place in the present-day, where antiques dealer Alys, the descendent of Eleanor and custodian of the Anatomical Venus based on her, finally manages to secure the wax model of Elizabeth, on the condition that she take it to the storage facility where she keeps Eleanor and the remains of the model of Emily and destroys them. For the Anatomical Venuses are cursed, linked to the disappearance of the women they were based on, a string of grisly unsolved murders in the 18th century, and decades of ill fortune for their owners ever since. As both storylines progress, we learn more about the horrendous deal that Elizabeth made, the price of her bloody revenge against those who wronged her, and her terrifying plans to escape her waxy prison in the present.

The Anatomical Venuses are such a brilliant germ for a story. They’re the perfect mixture of uncanny and compelling, and so laden with metaphor, that it would be easy for a writer to pat themselves on the back for deciding to use the concept and churn out some generic horror nonsense and call it a day. Rushby does so much more than this. Slashed Beauties, like all the best horror, uses its brilliant concept to lay bare uncomfortable truths about the world we live in. Rushby paints 18th century London in vivid detail, making excellent use of historical research. Eleanor, Emily and Elizabeth are all compelling characters. The novel shows how precarious women’s existence was in the 18th century – tied to the man she ran away with and with zero financial prospects, Eleanor doesn’t have much choice but to go into sex work. Emily, as the mixed-heritage daughter of a father’s affair out of wedlock, similarly has very few options to work with, and sees sex work as a way of reclaiming her agency. Elizabeth’s idea of forming a sisterhood is noble, but is ultimately corrupted by her own vindictiveness and selfishness. But even with Elizabeth, who by the end of the novel we understand is a complete monster, Rushby shows us how her options as a woman trying to support herself through sex work are severely limited. The men who want to bid on the women in her sérail see the female sex workers as eminently disposable, and when Elizabeth tries to exert some of her own agency, she suffers ridicule, abuse, and her house taken away from her. Rushby doesn’t shy away from the other dangers of sex work as well – all three of the women are threatened by male violence at points in the narrative, and Emily contracts a venereal disease which is so poorly treated by a male doctor it almost kills her, and Eleanor finds herself pregnant. By the time the animated wax models awake to take their revenge on the shitty men, it’s hard not to cheer them on, save for the fact of how little agency Elizabeth gives Emily and Eleanor in her bargain.

This story is balanced by the story of Alys in the modern age, who is working with a coven of witches to break Elizabeth’s curse and so free Eleanor and Emily, her family line, and the men Elizabeth has selected as prey. There’s an excellent twist, which shows just how far the hand of the past extends into the present, and Rushby brings it all to a thrilling conclusion that keeps the reader guessing til the last page. Slashed Beauties is the perfect mix of old school horror chills and thoughtful social commentary, all delivered through compelling characters and unforgettable monsters. A horror classic for the ages.

Slashed Beauties is due for publication 17th September – you can pre-order your copy on Bookshop.org