Helpmeet

Ruthnum (A Hero of Our Time) mixes body horror, weird fiction, and romance into a viscerally upsetting but quietly moving novella set in 1900 New York. Hospital maid turned unofficial nurse Louise has always known that her husband, surgeon Edward Wilk, has a weakness for womanizing, but that’s never stopped her from loving him. Now Edward is dying of an apparent sexually transmitted disease that’s causing his body parts to fall off, sink into themselves, and otherwise disappear. Louise does her best to care for him: injecting him with morphine, protecting him from society gossips, and cleaning out his empty eye sockets with gauze. Now, at Edward’s request, the pair move from their townhouse to a country estate where Edward may die in peace. As Edward’s disease progresses—and he confesses the sordid details of its likely cause—that which might have torn the couple apart actually bonds them more deeply than they could have imagined thanks to an incursion of the supernatural. Ruthnum writes beautifully even in the story’s most grotesque moments, and brings wonderful specificity to the burdens of caregiving. (“Edward’s illness had caused Louise to split. Just now, the wife had seen the tongue, and the nurse had picked it up and plated it to calm the wife.”) Weird fiction fans won’t want to miss this. (June)