The Science of Women in Horror

I had the privilege of meeting the authors of The Science of Women in Horror Meg Hafdahl and Kelly Florence at the Haunted Basement in the Rosedale Mall in Roseville, MN. I always have a huge weakness for local writers and I always get even more enthusiastic when they share my taste for the macabre. I really loved their previous book The Science of Monsters as it went into different aspects of truth behind horror movies and their second book exceeded my expectations.

The Science of Women in Horror focused on the women in horror movies.  This book discusses different perspectives on female representation in horror movies through interviews and film analysis. It is composed of a series of short essays that are grouped together thematically. This made it easy for me to pick up the book and jump to the essays on some of my personal favorite shows/movies such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Ghostbusters and Haunting of Hill House.

I also learned a lot of interesting tidbits of information as I read this book.  I discovered that Scully on the television show the X-Files influenced women to go into STEM fields. The movie Midsommer is used to discuss the concept of voluntary death in Siberia and is used as a depiction of how this is is utilized. The movie Us was utilized to dive into the social psychology of revenge.  These are only a few examples of how Hafdahl and Florence demonstrate how smart that the horror genre can really be.

I would highly recommend this book to horror movie enthusiasts because it provides new insights on old shows. While the surface is often just scratched on the variety of subjects that are brought out by the horror movies it fits the scope of the book. It will likely leave you hungry to continue to learn more about the topics that are of interest to you...or make you eager to go back and watch some of your favorite female horror heroes!

I am also publishing my review on Goodreads.