Plain Bad Heroines

by Emily M. Danforth · 2020

When a cursed New England boarding school for girls reopens to film a sensational horror movie, the past erupts into the present. In 1902, students Flo and Clara fall fiercely in love while idolizing scandal‑writing rebel Mary MacLane, only to meet a gruesome end in a swarm of wasps that seals the school’s dark legend. A century later, a glamorous cast of actresses arrives to dramatize the infamous “Brookhants curse,” and the line between fiction and reality blurs as the original tragedy seeps back into the halls. Emily M. Danforth weaves gothic horror, sly satire, and a fierce sapphic romance into a wildly inventive tale that celebrates storytelling, rebellious female spirit, and the haunting power of love.