Picket Fence Be Damned

Short story review

Photo by Bethany Zwag on Unsplash

When searching for the ideal photograph of a domestic terrorist, it is doubtful that a matriarch represents such an image.

Glitter is more than microplastic in disguise. Like McMansions, its superficial flash has the potential to shift attention away from what may be less glamorous. At first glance, life in White Hills¹ perfectly aligns with all that Marissa, the featured protagonist, hoped to manifest.

Accomplished by way of hypergamy, she is unaware that status exchange is an invisible and more prevalent form of discrimination. Isolated from her humble beginnings and bored with shopping and endless trips to the salon, Marissa struggles with making meaningful connections but is excited to learn that she is pregnant.

Anxiety reminds her that being a childless couple was mutually agreed upon, yet she eagerly ambushes her husband, Andrew, at the local (good ole boys) club. A sports venue staffed with scantily clad waitresses, it is dark and becomes more unwelcoming after she allows her nationality to slip.

A blistering critique of inherent evil, this character-driven tale of a trophy wife examines the threshold of desire and sacrifice. Readers are placed in the lead bumper car and bounced between assimilation and imposter syndrome until it is evident that the latter is the focused effect of the former.

Written by Rebecca Roanhorse, a dual-race woman of Black and Ohkay Owingeh descent, this tightly packed piece uses tension to subtly suggest that domestic violence is an offshoot of generational brutality and one aspect of colonization inherent in Western DNA.

An allegorical tale of the horror that resides at home, it asks readers to contemplate the logic surrounding societal beliefs that marital unions between Caucasian men and minority women are a form of self-harm.

Fans of Native American folklore will appreciate the depth of details. Readers faced with the daily challenges of vacillating between belonging and failure to belong may question whether cultural identity can be erased. Others may learn that relinquishing control is not the lesser of lack of control.

Rating: 5+ stars

Additional shorts featuring characters questioning their sense of place:

Nothing Must Spoil This Visit, by Shauna Singh Baldwin

Do You Know Where I Am?, by

Sherman Alexie

1. Part of Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology