A haunting tale of repression, obsession and the slow creep of the supernatural.
Every now and then I come across a debut novel that seems both familiar and a tad feral and Spoiled Milk fits the bill. Set at a girls’ boarding school in the 1920s, Emily tries to figure out the sudden death of Violet, the girl who seemed to have the entire school in her orbit. What starts as grief soon becomes something stranger. The girls turn to séances in the hopes of contacting Violet, and the more they call out into the dark the more the school appears to rot around them. As the story winds down, the creeping unease has become full-blown horror with ghoulish manifestations and the sense that something ancient has finally stirred.
The book is at its best in its characters, especially Emily and Evelyn. Their relationship is awkward and prickly and messy at times. I loved that they’re both flawed, and how their shame, internalised, impacts every interaction. The best way to describe Emily is as an unreliable narrator because she refuses to acknowledge her own desires. Evelyn’s reluctance to act as a medium gives an odd tenderness to her otherwise pious exterior. Their relationship is captivating, even when the writing surrounding it stumbles at times. I did feel the shift from hatred to obsession happened too abruptly and I found myself wishing for a slower burn.
Curran is an expert at atmosphere. The slow descent from schoolgirl drama to full-blown supernatural horror is handled with real confidence. There were times when I did actually turn on the lights at nite. The rot that spreads thru Briarley seems symbolic of so many things: repression, trauma, colonial guilt, the fragility of girlhood. The book does not really explain its haunting and while I usually like ambiguity, here it left me wanting a little more clarity. The séances show promise but are repetitive without much to add. Some threads, such as what happens to certain teachers or the whispers of a curse tied to the Briarley family, feel like they are not fleshed out enough.
I was super into Spoiled Milk, despite its flaws. The pacing stumbles at times but the last quarter still had me reading well past where I had planned to stop. It’s gooey, disturbing and strangely funny. Fans of sapphic horror, gothic boarding school tales and unreliable narrators will find plenty to enjoy here.
All in all, a strong and memorable debut. I will be watching anything else Avery Curran writes for sure.
