Review: ‘Nightbitch’ by Rachel Yoder (a startling novel about motherhood)
I accidentally read the whole of Rachel Yoder’s ‘Nightbitch’ in one afternoon after getting it out of my bag to have a little look when I got it back from the library. Oops…
At first it was intrigue and curiosity, then it got weirder and I got even more intrigued, and then I was just in for the ride.
It’s hard to summarise ‘Nightbitch’ properly, so I’ll hand over to the book’s summary:
One day, the mother was a mother but then, one night, she was quite suddenly something else...
At home full-time with her two-year-old son, an artist finds she is struggling. She is lonely and exhausted. She had imagined - what was it she had imagined? Her husband, always travelling for his work, calls her from faraway hotel rooms. One more toddler bedtime, and she fears she might lose her mind.
Instead, quite suddenly, she starts gaining things, surprising things that happen one night when her child will not sleep. Sharper canines. Strange new patches of hair. New appetites, new instincts. And from deep within herself, a new voice...
It's a searing look at the pressures of being a mother, and the expectations and duties placed on her. The sense of an eradication of herself and even in the novel she is only referred to as ‘mother’, until she becomes Nightbitch. Her son is the centre of her world, and she is the centre of his, entirely dependent on her for everything for the last two years and the cracks are appearing. Filling those cracks and providing the mother with freedom and independence is her new canine urges. From eating raw meat, licking her son’s cheek, frolicking in the grass in the middle of the night - they make her feel alive for the first time in years.
The depiction of the drain of the routine, the monotony, the havoc wreaked upon the mother’s body by the rush of hormones is so visceral and intense it all bubbles through the pages and I got a bit more of a glimpse into the reality of being a mother.
It honestly made me worry for my sister who's recently given birth, though I'm 90% sure she's not going to turn into a dog... The loneliness and isolation of caring for a newborn at home on her own with no access to family and friends to help out. It made my heart ache for her, and even though I’m two hours away, I’m so much more aware of the psychological effects that I’m making sure to check in with her every day. So thank you Rachel Yoder!
I've never read anything like Nightbitch and I'm still thinking about it over a week later. It’s an incredibly powerful read that I really recommend.
Written by Sophie
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