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The Fifth Wound
A baroque work of intimate myth exploring one woman’s interdimensional search for beauty and embodiment, through kaleidoscopic renderings of hospital corridors, brutal breakups, and passionate romance.
The Fifth Wound is a phantasmagorical roman à clef about passion as a way of life. In one dimension, this is a love story—Aurora & Ezekiel—a separation and a reunion. In another, we witness a tale of multiple traumatic encounters with transphobic violence. And on yet another plane, a story of ecstatic visionary experience swirls, shatters, and sparkles. Featuring time travel, medieval nuns, knifings, and t4t romance, The Fifth Wound indulges the blur between fantasy and reality. Its winding sentences open like portals, inviting the reader into the intimacy of embodiment—both its pain and its pleasures.
The Fifth Wound is a phantasmagorical roman à clef about passion as a way of life. In one dimension, this is a love story—Aurora & Ezekiel—a separation and a reunion. In another, we witness a tale of multiple traumatic encounters with transphobic violence. And on yet another plane, a story of ecstatic visionary experience swirls, shatters, and sparkles. Featuring time travel, medieval nuns, knifings, and t4t romance, The Fifth Wound indulges the blur between fantasy and reality. Its winding sentences open like portals, inviting the reader into the intimacy of embodiment—both its pain and its pleasures.
259 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 7, 2023
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2942 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 88 reviews
May 20, 2023
The Fifth Wound is a stunningly ambitious work, a blow against the novel as a capitalist project of common intelligibility and a reorientation to a thoroughly queer enterprise. In many ways, Mattia is doing for prose what 김현 (Kim Hyun) has done for poetry, stripping away the trappings of a cisnormative shared meaning and building in its wake a new language - or more specifically, a new grammar that reorients language away from the imperial tongue. Mattia is also collapsing the boundary(ies) between character, writer, and content creator (in fact, she does this in the first sentence), along with a host of other conventions. The novel is unapologetically maximalist, a compilation of narrative prose, poetry, drawings, footnotes, song lyrics (some redacted), text messages, photographs, emails, screen shots, reproduced religious texts (and visuals), and probably other media. Various languages and dialects make appearances, including Middle English, with its deregulated spelling, and a passage in Classical Chinese, translated into contemporary English by the author. Mattia's influences range from Kafka to 李碧華 (Lilian Lee), Lispector to Fanny Howe. And surely others too. Kudos to Nightboat for publishing this groundbreaking project.
April 18, 2023
This book is transdimensional! Wounds are portals; sentences break open. The narrator has a romance with a Siren; is visited by the spirit of Eleanor Rykener (thought to be the first trans woman in recorded history (ie. a police report)); sustains a knife injury in the face; falls deeply in love; makes meaning, makes myths. Excess is the key here. Maximalist fantasy is a protective gauze and the writing conjures magic of all kinds. A "challenging" read; not for everyone because so intensely and defiantly itself; will be beloved by and formative to many.
March 3, 2023
Such an inventive, silly, smart book that travels through time to deliver a heavily footnoted t4t love note. Your brain will work for it, your brain will be rewarded.
March 7, 2023
Aurora Mattia entranced me with this debut. It ebbs and flows, with moments of opaque writing, and tender scenes with a silky translucent shine. This book takes the traumatic and ecstatic moments of her life, her wounds, her loves, and circles around them in romantic and stylized prose. Her high femininity and appropriation of a mythic self hit my heart. Mattia did what few could ever do when writing The Fifth Wound, I really loved reading this book.
July 28, 2024
“To write of the self is to write in the shale of a wound that never stops opening.”
“To honor and caress and ridicule with tenderness the wound and the discoursr of assurance.”
- Christina Tudor-Sideri
These quotes could have been easily found in “The Fifth Wound” and isn’t that the magic of universality? Discourse is certainly personal, but words prove the connection between minds, souls, hearts, where distance finds no ground for separation. (“We melted into each other with phrases”)
Authors and readers converse in silence through books that shed light on the same topics, just seen through different eyes, wounded by personal, irreplicable experiences. Notwithstanding completely relatable. Feeling and sensation can sink into any pore and not only inhabit a mind, but rather transform it. Make the hidden essence finally visible.
It is hard to describe the poetry of the self, one must feel it. After all,
“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought, and the thought has found words.” (Robert Frost)
To remember is to ache, to desire is to burn. The mandatory fuels to life are also our means of destruction.
“The first time I wore lipstick, I wore it as a wound. Later I wore it on my lips in order to say: what if I were beautiful? But lipstick never forgot its first meaning: instead of a razor blade.” (Aurora Mattia)
This book is a gift to those willing to wound themselves in order to draw the landscape of one’s depths. A fairy tale imprinted in blood - beautiful, scary, erotic, electrifying… painfully irresistible. Erudite in its violently woven hunger.
Horrific unapologetic tenderness in the midst of breathless panic, on the edge of the ultimate ripeness of existence. “Something like a rotten peach eaten alive by its own sweetness.”
I’m left wounded and grateful for the rare sight of an inward myth. As real and palpable as skin, forever wounded through sharp edges of broken mirrors.
“To honor and caress and ridicule with tenderness the wound and the discoursr of assurance.”
- Christina Tudor-Sideri
These quotes could have been easily found in “The Fifth Wound” and isn’t that the magic of universality? Discourse is certainly personal, but words prove the connection between minds, souls, hearts, where distance finds no ground for separation. (“We melted into each other with phrases”)
Authors and readers converse in silence through books that shed light on the same topics, just seen through different eyes, wounded by personal, irreplicable experiences. Notwithstanding completely relatable. Feeling and sensation can sink into any pore and not only inhabit a mind, but rather transform it. Make the hidden essence finally visible.
It is hard to describe the poetry of the self, one must feel it. After all,
“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought, and the thought has found words.” (Robert Frost)
To remember is to ache, to desire is to burn. The mandatory fuels to life are also our means of destruction.
“The first time I wore lipstick, I wore it as a wound. Later I wore it on my lips in order to say: what if I were beautiful? But lipstick never forgot its first meaning: instead of a razor blade.” (Aurora Mattia)
This book is a gift to those willing to wound themselves in order to draw the landscape of one’s depths. A fairy tale imprinted in blood - beautiful, scary, erotic, electrifying… painfully irresistible. Erudite in its violently woven hunger.
Horrific unapologetic tenderness in the midst of breathless panic, on the edge of the ultimate ripeness of existence. “Something like a rotten peach eaten alive by its own sweetness.”
I’m left wounded and grateful for the rare sight of an inward myth. As real and palpable as skin, forever wounded through sharp edges of broken mirrors.
February 19, 2024
The best trans/queer novel I've read this so far this year and quite possibly, though it's still too early to tell, the best of the year. I've written a longer review in Serbian.
Problem koji Matija postavlja sebi kao spisateljici i nama koji njen tekst čitamo jeste kako upisati trans telo u (književni) tekst (svet), i na prvim stranicama ispostavlja svojevrsni program svog pisanja: “Zbilja, želela sam da pravljenje rečenica bude način vođenja ljubavi, želela da reči budu organska materija jednako vitalna i nesvodiva kao sperma, želela da snovi budu tečnosti izmamljeni i izbrizgani iz sluzi bolesnih roze žlezdi u kojima naša tela pohranjuju i destiluju njihove grube i primordijalne nektare, nevoljni med, svaki podrum, svaki kutak i ostava prazni u njihovo vreme, žuboravi, prelivajući, laki, lepršavi, lagani višak vlažnih i neznanih prevoja (to je bio san), ali ja sam bila spremna samo na to da pevam o lepoti stvari, a ne o načinu na koji je lepota protkana mržnjom kao meso krvlju. Mislim na to da sam samo pisala o leptirima i bezimenim bogovima” (3).
The rest: https://talas.org.rs/2024/02/14/upisa...
Problem koji Matija postavlja sebi kao spisateljici i nama koji njen tekst čitamo jeste kako upisati trans telo u (književni) tekst (svet), i na prvim stranicama ispostavlja svojevrsni program svog pisanja: “Zbilja, želela sam da pravljenje rečenica bude način vođenja ljubavi, želela da reči budu organska materija jednako vitalna i nesvodiva kao sperma, želela da snovi budu tečnosti izmamljeni i izbrizgani iz sluzi bolesnih roze žlezdi u kojima naša tela pohranjuju i destiluju njihove grube i primordijalne nektare, nevoljni med, svaki podrum, svaki kutak i ostava prazni u njihovo vreme, žuboravi, prelivajući, laki, lepršavi, lagani višak vlažnih i neznanih prevoja (to je bio san), ali ja sam bila spremna samo na to da pevam o lepoti stvari, a ne o načinu na koji je lepota protkana mržnjom kao meso krvlju. Mislim na to da sam samo pisala o leptirima i bezimenim bogovima” (3).
The rest: https://talas.org.rs/2024/02/14/upisa...
June 13, 2023
Everyone who decides to read this has been given a gift. I finished reading many months ago, but it’s important to me that I represent the intensity of the feelings it left me with accurately, so here I am now, with the thoughts and feelings still just as fresh as the moment my eyes rested on the last page. The Fifth Wound is a text that perfectly articulates why I will always love to hurt, and why at the end of it all, I know we are here to hurt each other, in all the worst and most divine ways. An infinite undiscovered iceberg of the self we must chip at, incessantly, painfully. The gift of such sensations. Aurora Mattia’s words made me remember the rare moments in my life where I felt like a woman and I loved it. Her tales made me ache to find the place in my atmosphere where I might access those memories without dissociating the me that exists now from the woman I loved being then. I think of how much fear it fires in me, and how much the desire overwhelms it, still. I am always thinking gender thoughts, introspecting while I move throughout the world but what excites and overwhelms me about what Aurora presents, is how pure the desire feels. As a very openly and vocal transmasculine person, it often feels taboo, dirty, and inaccessible for me to associate feelings of joy and desire with femininity and womanhood, but those feelings are all taken and rinsed in waters so honest through the words she brought to me (and all of us), that I don’t feel too afraid anymore. I feel overwhelming desire to reconnect to the things I have been told I should be afraid of.
Aurora begins by beckoning the reader to promise not to fall in love with her. It might sound bold and presumptuous at first, but what follows is prose that separates blood from bone in such intimately visceral ways, that you, like me, might become convinced that the writer knows you much more intimately than they could possibly truly know. An energy that permeates throughout the novel and never ends, something so intense and light, all at once. The Fifth Wound feels like a cree to look beyond her siren song. Be patient with her prose, it demands it. It also demands persistence and urgency, with run on sentences and long footnotes full of passion, access to beyond what that intensity might mean, stories that layer over one another in flawless transition. Aurora paints images of memories past in vivid detail that make me burn to see it all through her eyes, and to comb through the recesses of my mind to find the colors I may have forgotten.
I want to say so often that this book is fundamental trans, gender, transgender, transsexual text – but that feels like a very flat summation of what The Fifth Wound does, and can do for a reader. It’s a weaving of myth, fantasy and reality that is nothing short of otherworldly, while maintaining a palpable mortality. Transition, love and sex, trans love and sex as genuine mythos, as written scripture, as history written by our hearts with our blood and breath and bodies. Her stories are never just one story, and I never felt a passive observer in them. I became the devil on her shoulder, the pen on the pages, a subway seat, the notes app in her iphone, the angel Ezekiel himself. Her words force me to contend with the idea that the things that happen to us, the cosmic and undefinable, all mean something, and that it all matters. To wonder why my love courses through me in the ways it does, why I compare it in my own mythos to sludge and plague. Pain and pleasures, folding into myths and mysteries.
The way that Aurora speaks of beauty penetrates the deepest parts of my fear centers as she interrogates what it means to be beautiful, what we gain and what we lose when we become beautiful. There is so much pain, and a just, vile amount of self awareness. There is so much willingness to admit the things others know about themselves but opt to lock away like ancient secrets. It is such fearless writing. From the moment Aurora begins to lead me into her tale of being visited by Saint Catherine of Sienna, I began to glow, and the intensity of that light did not cease, but shifted in color from soft pinks and purples to deep reds and blues.
She says, “whatever my genitals are, they were once a wound.” and that sentence alone is some of the most beautiful prose I have ever consumed in my life. It’s the truth for me, as an intersex person who was surgically “corrected”, whatever I have now, it was once a wound. That has healed, and split, and filled and split again. Violence is a language that Aurora understands fluently, and that speech intwines with the languages of prayer and memory to weave something truly magical. The waves of love, pleasure, of scent and sight, of fear and rejection, wash over me so aggressively that it makes me lovesick for the version of me that felt my love like hunger. She says that writing this book was a way to survive, and you can feel that in every page. She reminds me that attempting to outrun the pain will prolong it. She reminds me that I see us all as constellations in a vast galactic system, tangles together, planets and comets and moons, space dust in between. That love is often patience, that solitude is not a punishment for all. I relate heavily to Ezekiel in the sense that I am simply not very present day to day on an extremely consistent basis socially, or interpersonally. Aurora says “Paradise is nowhere” but to me, paradise is that mystery, the unknown, and the freedom to find what lies in between. I have hurt people with my desire for absolute freedom, for patience when my words are few and my presence is rare. I don’t feel proud of it. I feel angry that so much life and freedom was taken from me that I feel the fear down to my marrow of stagnancy, that I have accepted my own mortality so deeply that I want it to be a feature of me that is loved and admired, that I am only ever showing up in times where there is truly nothing else I would rather do, that all my thoughts and truth is in that moment, that I am ever present, that I am there there there. Im a fairy, like Aurora and Ezekiel. Paradise is nowhere, I exist in the wind, I love you from here, from there, from everywhere. Aurora frequently vanishes from heaving a presence online, without a word, without a trace, without a hint of when she might be back – The Fifth Wound is a visceral, intimate, reflective display of the parts of the mirage we don’t get to see, and an honoring of the parts that we do, a beckoning to let it go without claw marks.
-“Whatever my genitals are, they were once a wound.”
-“I am a blurry object.”
I am here, and I am gone. Love me and let me fly, watch the wounds split and fill and heal and split again. I have given up so many things in the pursuit of a satisfied mystery. To know it all, and to have it all, is to leave nothing left to learn. Aurora Mattia is an absolute fairy in every essence of the word. She created a portrait of the world with her words, and her wounds, that will stick with me forever. This is a book that reminded me, as fantastic writing usually does, that there are always new ways to put words together. There is always a new way to tell a tale, to weave a story, to construct a fantasy, to detail the viscera. I am grateful for The Fifth Wound and for the existence of people with such clarity of complexity like Aurora Mattia, Silicone Angel.
5/5 stars.
Aurora begins by beckoning the reader to promise not to fall in love with her. It might sound bold and presumptuous at first, but what follows is prose that separates blood from bone in such intimately visceral ways, that you, like me, might become convinced that the writer knows you much more intimately than they could possibly truly know. An energy that permeates throughout the novel and never ends, something so intense and light, all at once. The Fifth Wound feels like a cree to look beyond her siren song. Be patient with her prose, it demands it. It also demands persistence and urgency, with run on sentences and long footnotes full of passion, access to beyond what that intensity might mean, stories that layer over one another in flawless transition. Aurora paints images of memories past in vivid detail that make me burn to see it all through her eyes, and to comb through the recesses of my mind to find the colors I may have forgotten.
I want to say so often that this book is fundamental trans, gender, transgender, transsexual text – but that feels like a very flat summation of what The Fifth Wound does, and can do for a reader. It’s a weaving of myth, fantasy and reality that is nothing short of otherworldly, while maintaining a palpable mortality. Transition, love and sex, trans love and sex as genuine mythos, as written scripture, as history written by our hearts with our blood and breath and bodies. Her stories are never just one story, and I never felt a passive observer in them. I became the devil on her shoulder, the pen on the pages, a subway seat, the notes app in her iphone, the angel Ezekiel himself. Her words force me to contend with the idea that the things that happen to us, the cosmic and undefinable, all mean something, and that it all matters. To wonder why my love courses through me in the ways it does, why I compare it in my own mythos to sludge and plague. Pain and pleasures, folding into myths and mysteries.
The way that Aurora speaks of beauty penetrates the deepest parts of my fear centers as she interrogates what it means to be beautiful, what we gain and what we lose when we become beautiful. There is so much pain, and a just, vile amount of self awareness. There is so much willingness to admit the things others know about themselves but opt to lock away like ancient secrets. It is such fearless writing. From the moment Aurora begins to lead me into her tale of being visited by Saint Catherine of Sienna, I began to glow, and the intensity of that light did not cease, but shifted in color from soft pinks and purples to deep reds and blues.
She says, “whatever my genitals are, they were once a wound.” and that sentence alone is some of the most beautiful prose I have ever consumed in my life. It’s the truth for me, as an intersex person who was surgically “corrected”, whatever I have now, it was once a wound. That has healed, and split, and filled and split again. Violence is a language that Aurora understands fluently, and that speech intwines with the languages of prayer and memory to weave something truly magical. The waves of love, pleasure, of scent and sight, of fear and rejection, wash over me so aggressively that it makes me lovesick for the version of me that felt my love like hunger. She says that writing this book was a way to survive, and you can feel that in every page. She reminds me that attempting to outrun the pain will prolong it. She reminds me that I see us all as constellations in a vast galactic system, tangles together, planets and comets and moons, space dust in between. That love is often patience, that solitude is not a punishment for all. I relate heavily to Ezekiel in the sense that I am simply not very present day to day on an extremely consistent basis socially, or interpersonally. Aurora says “Paradise is nowhere” but to me, paradise is that mystery, the unknown, and the freedom to find what lies in between. I have hurt people with my desire for absolute freedom, for patience when my words are few and my presence is rare. I don’t feel proud of it. I feel angry that so much life and freedom was taken from me that I feel the fear down to my marrow of stagnancy, that I have accepted my own mortality so deeply that I want it to be a feature of me that is loved and admired, that I am only ever showing up in times where there is truly nothing else I would rather do, that all my thoughts and truth is in that moment, that I am ever present, that I am there there there. Im a fairy, like Aurora and Ezekiel. Paradise is nowhere, I exist in the wind, I love you from here, from there, from everywhere. Aurora frequently vanishes from heaving a presence online, without a word, without a trace, without a hint of when she might be back – The Fifth Wound is a visceral, intimate, reflective display of the parts of the mirage we don’t get to see, and an honoring of the parts that we do, a beckoning to let it go without claw marks.
-“Whatever my genitals are, they were once a wound.”
-“I am a blurry object.”
I am here, and I am gone. Love me and let me fly, watch the wounds split and fill and heal and split again. I have given up so many things in the pursuit of a satisfied mystery. To know it all, and to have it all, is to leave nothing left to learn. Aurora Mattia is an absolute fairy in every essence of the word. She created a portrait of the world with her words, and her wounds, that will stick with me forever. This is a book that reminded me, as fantastic writing usually does, that there are always new ways to put words together. There is always a new way to tell a tale, to weave a story, to construct a fantasy, to detail the viscera. I am grateful for The Fifth Wound and for the existence of people with such clarity of complexity like Aurora Mattia, Silicone Angel.
5/5 stars.
March 26, 2023
I wasn’t even Aurora then; I was an ingenue with three older transmasc femboy lovers, two of whom hated each other, two of whom I hated and a third, Velvet, whose heart was soft, whose stories were many and whose pheromones were, with mine, wordlessly histocompatible. And then there was Noel, neither lover nor friend but something unknown, as if we were both moons of a distant planet full of ruined temples and poisoned lakes and glades of moss where generations had passed in life and breath and love and death, and no one ever knew, and no one ever would
The Fifth Wound has the potential of a new transfeminine classic. The writing is what some may call "all over the place", some "experimental" and what I'll call "ethereal". There's an entire section dedicated to writing and publishing as this is not the author's first novel, but the first published one (and I want to read the other two they sounded amazing) and her unique prose is commented on by many agents and publishers.
It took me a while for me to be grounded into the story. I was charmed by the opening on the tantalising love between Ezekiel and Aurora but I couldn't really what was going on. If you're reading the book and feels like this, don't worry you'll find your footing later.
The Fifth Wound has the potential of a new transfeminine classic. The writing is what some may call "all over the place", some "experimental" and what I'll call "ethereal". There's an entire section dedicated to writing and publishing as this is not the author's first novel, but the first published one (and I want to read the other two they sounded amazing) and her unique prose is commented on by many agents and publishers.
It took me a while for me to be grounded into the story. I was charmed by the opening on the tantalising love between Ezekiel and Aurora but I couldn't really what was going on. If you're reading the book and feels like this, don't worry you'll find your footing later.
April 24, 2024
Aurora and Ezekiel, why?
The Fifth Wound is not a simple book to talk about, nor is it simple to describe and review. It is a roman à clef of the author, whose true name is not even Aurora, and of her life and experiences as a trans woman, particularly crossing the orbital path of a man she fell in love named Ezekiel; which is not his true name either. The book defies genre: it is equal parts memoir, literary fiction, fabulism, romance, fairy-tale, soft sci-fi, weird fantasy, psychological exposé, maximalist song, and hagiography. Truly, with its stream of consciousness prose, the best summation I can describe to the The Fifth Wound is that it is the Trans Finnegans Wake. Though, unlike James Joyce, Aurora Mattia does not event an entirely new language, at least, again, not like Joyce, nor are her words meant to let scholars ponder for centuries with their Empire-born sense of academia. Mattia does amalgamate some words from time to time, and her descriptions of her thoughts and emotions can lean into. what some would call florid, but she is far less opaque than Joyce.
Perhaps trans hagiography is a better description of this book. Hagiography, for those who don't know, is the term applied to the religious literature of biographies about the lives of Christian saints, though the term has been applied to biographies of other faiths as well. No, Aurora isn't a religious person, though there is much religious symbolism spread throughout the book, particularly that of the side wound of Jesus' stigmata; more on that in a bit. There is also significant attention to the Greek goddess Aphrodite, more so her trans sister Aphroditos (Aphroditus) who is an actual goddess from history. I say hagiography, because truly the lives of the saints are fantastical to many modern readers, especially to the non-religious. But those fantastic stories usually tell the tale of of someone extremely devoted (like Aurora), who goes through great extremes (like Aurora), and at the end of it all, after going through so much and losing much (like Aurora), they've received their crown of martyrdom and their pain and desires is known to the world (like Aurora).
To quote Aurora herself, "enough prefacing," let's get into it:
Interspersed throughout the book is the story of Aurora's coming into her trans womanhood and her romance with Ezekiel. The book is not told in chronological order; this, along with the stream of consciousness writing, might be difficult for some readers. I myself felt the beginning a little slow moving and tough to get into, but after a while I acclimated. Along her journey, Aurora encounters other lovers, poetry, saints, trans sisters, internal and external violence, and strange creatures. At the heart of the matter is Ezekiel leaving Aurora, some time after he told Aurora that she is pretty but not beautiful. As Aurora goes through things, Ezekiel's leaving and his words mist back into her mind. She and Ezekiel still communicate with each other from time to time, exchanging poetry mostly, but Aurora craves his return. There's a sense that Ezekiel feels this craving, but keeps Aurora at arms--very, very, very long arms--distance. Aurora does fall in love with other people, including some femboy trans boys, some other trans women, and a non-binary lover or two, but her relationship with these other people aren't the same as with Ezekiel. Some of them are merely her soundboard or a support for her and eventually come to realize this, others, such as one instant with one other trans woman, is merely an objectification with her body. None of these other people really connect and know Aurora, even when they go through the ringer with her. And it isn't totally their lack of understanding her that is the cause, Aurora herself doesn't really ever give them all of herself like she did Ezekiel. Ezekiel is the only one who knows what she's talking about when she speaks, he's the only one who when they touch feels all of her--he's the only one who, together in their fairy and divine queerness, can feel the pleasures and pains that reign so fervently in Aurora's existence. For some reason, their relationship makes me think of Fleabag: The Scriptures, or more so the television adaptation. Throughout the entire series, Fleabag breaks the fourth wall to commentate on what's going on around her and no one sees her do it...until the second season with the priest, who finally notices. The priest who she cannot have and should not have because of his vow. Even though that vow is broken, she cannot have him, she cannot have the one person who finally sees her.
It is Aurora's struggles embracing her trans identity and Ezekiel's leaving that are the seedlings for the first of Aurora's wounds. Aurora turns to the self-harm to fight the pain. The first wound.
The other wounds are mentioned in passing: staples on her forehead, possibly from part of her facial feminization surgery, the second wound; cuts under her breast from the breast augmentation and implants, the third wound; and her bottom surgery which gave her a vagina, the fourth wound.
The titular fifth wound comes when Aurora is knifed on the train by a random man, stabbed in the eye. It is this attack that leads to many things for Aurora. For one, it's the first act of violence enacted upon her trans body. Two, it leads to Aurora being hospitalized and shows us her initial reservations with the medical industry under Empire, but that will have an encore. But most importantly, it leads her to being visited by the historical trans woman Eleanor Rykener, in disguise as Saint Catherine of Siena, who time traveled from her era while on the run. Eleanor speaks in Old English, but there's a "translation" of her dialogue at the back of the book for context. Eleanor comes with a medieval Book of Hours that contains the vulva-like depictions of Christ's wounds, and when she touches these images in the book, Aurora can feel her fingers in her vagina. In medieval piety, Christian devotees would often kiss or caress the depictions of these wounds because it was akin to being intimate with Christ and drinking his holy blood. Saint Catherine of Siena, who Eleanor is disguised as, is most notably known for doing this in a vision . At the same time, the wounds of Aurora's surgeries and harm against her body--her five wounds--are her own stigmata. Eleanor has Aurora eat the Book of Hours and then goes off to form a feminist punk band with a Siren that Aurora hung out with earlier, away from the praying eyes of Saint Isidore of Seville.
Aurora is desperate for Ezekiel to know this part of her story. She informs us that he reads it, but his response is not recorded. Did he ever give one?
But that is not the last of Aurora's wounds. She obtains a sixth one within another wound. During a night with a tinder date, the man penetrates Aurora's too harshly and causes her vagina to bleed profusely. He flees and Aurora panicked roommates and boyfriend take her to the hospital. There, everyone assumes she is a cis woman and believe her period is acting up. She tells them repeatedly that she is a trans woman and is either ignored, viewed like a strange specimen, or assured that she'll be treated like a "real" woman. Her surgeon who did her bottom surgery refuses to come and says to jsut take pain medication dismissively. Eventually she is sutured, but she can still feel the pain of the man's force. She finally sees her surgeon who only laughs, proud of her "handiwork." This unsettling scene in the hospital is another one of Aurora's critiques of the Empire healthcare. Because she passes for a cis woman, that is is, she fits the ideal of what white cis heterosexual patriarchal people demand for trans women, her true pain and problems are ignore. Her transsexuality is dismissed and Othered. Empire demands certain things of those outside of its ruling caste, and once and if those demands are met, the true needs of the Othered are ignore, believed to be sanitized away.
So if you're wondering what I meant by "Empire" throughout this entire review, that's what I mean. Aurora commentates on it frequently throughout the book. Empire is that "traditional" white cis heterosexual patriarchy way of doing things: of living, writing, and thinking. As a trans woman, Aurora combats it throughout the book and even mentions she combated it while writing the book. She will not tell her story simply, just because that's what publishing wants in its minimalist schema.
It is after this sixth wound that Aurora begins to desire Ezekiel more. The trauma it caused her throws her into self-destruction and those around her can no longer support her. She wants and needs Ezekiel. And she wants to know why he left her and called her pretty, but not beautiful. Eventually they meet and the answer is before everyone:
Aurora loves too much. Ezekiel loves too little.
Their love is both a gale in summer and a maelstrom above a churning abyss. It's beautiful, it's sexy, it's tender...and it's not meant to be. We see that Ezekiel has his own problems. Aurora's behavior during their time pushed him away, but then again he never gave Aurora all of himself. They love each other, but Ezekiel has to go away. Again. He doesn't want to go, Aurora doesn't want him to go. We don't want him to go.
The entire scene is just so heartachingly tragic.
Ezekiel and Aurora still talk, but she's eventually committed to a psych ward for a time. In interviews, Aurora's mentioned that she and Ezekiel still talk and she thanks him in the acknowledgement of the book. But I still have to ask, "Why didn't it work out? Why?" Throughout the book, it seems that Ezekiel is struggling with his own queerness. Mattia has mentioned that readers and reviewers who don't acknowledge Ezekiel's own queerness and simply view them as a heterosexual couple--when they are both, most likely bi--completely misses the point of their journeys and desires.
The Fifth Wound is the odyssey of one trans woman through Empire and love. It's a beautiful, phantasmagorical, love story and hagiography of a muse and poet who is a siren, mermaid, fairy, mystic, and a plethora of other things all at once. My review simply cannot do the book justice. My testament to The Fifth Wound is simply that, to borrow from the imagery of those medieval, mystics, it's a story that rips open your chest and replaces your heart with Aurora's. It forces you to confront the mind and love of a woman who desires so much you may burst.
Aurora and Ezekiel, if either of you read this, I doubt you will, you two are incredible.
The Fifth Wound is not a simple book to talk about, nor is it simple to describe and review. It is a roman à clef of the author, whose true name is not even Aurora, and of her life and experiences as a trans woman, particularly crossing the orbital path of a man she fell in love named Ezekiel; which is not his true name either. The book defies genre: it is equal parts memoir, literary fiction, fabulism, romance, fairy-tale, soft sci-fi, weird fantasy, psychological exposé, maximalist song, and hagiography. Truly, with its stream of consciousness prose, the best summation I can describe to the The Fifth Wound is that it is the Trans Finnegans Wake. Though, unlike James Joyce, Aurora Mattia does not event an entirely new language, at least, again, not like Joyce, nor are her words meant to let scholars ponder for centuries with their Empire-born sense of academia. Mattia does amalgamate some words from time to time, and her descriptions of her thoughts and emotions can lean into. what some would call florid, but she is far less opaque than Joyce.
Perhaps trans hagiography is a better description of this book. Hagiography, for those who don't know, is the term applied to the religious literature of biographies about the lives of Christian saints, though the term has been applied to biographies of other faiths as well. No, Aurora isn't a religious person, though there is much religious symbolism spread throughout the book, particularly that of the side wound of Jesus' stigmata; more on that in a bit. There is also significant attention to the Greek goddess Aphrodite, more so her trans sister Aphroditos (Aphroditus) who is an actual goddess from history. I say hagiography, because truly the lives of the saints are fantastical to many modern readers, especially to the non-religious. But those fantastic stories usually tell the tale of of someone extremely devoted (like Aurora), who goes through great extremes (like Aurora), and at the end of it all, after going through so much and losing much (like Aurora), they've received their crown of martyrdom and their pain and desires is known to the world (like Aurora).
To quote Aurora herself, "enough prefacing," let's get into it:
Interspersed throughout the book is the story of Aurora's coming into her trans womanhood and her romance with Ezekiel. The book is not told in chronological order; this, along with the stream of consciousness writing, might be difficult for some readers. I myself felt the beginning a little slow moving and tough to get into, but after a while I acclimated. Along her journey, Aurora encounters other lovers, poetry, saints, trans sisters, internal and external violence, and strange creatures. At the heart of the matter is Ezekiel leaving Aurora, some time after he told Aurora that she is pretty but not beautiful. As Aurora goes through things, Ezekiel's leaving and his words mist back into her mind. She and Ezekiel still communicate with each other from time to time, exchanging poetry mostly, but Aurora craves his return. There's a sense that Ezekiel feels this craving, but keeps Aurora at arms--very, very, very long arms--distance. Aurora does fall in love with other people, including some femboy trans boys, some other trans women, and a non-binary lover or two, but her relationship with these other people aren't the same as with Ezekiel. Some of them are merely her soundboard or a support for her and eventually come to realize this, others, such as one instant with one other trans woman, is merely an objectification with her body. None of these other people really connect and know Aurora, even when they go through the ringer with her. And it isn't totally their lack of understanding her that is the cause, Aurora herself doesn't really ever give them all of herself like she did Ezekiel. Ezekiel is the only one who knows what she's talking about when she speaks, he's the only one who when they touch feels all of her--he's the only one who, together in their fairy and divine queerness, can feel the pleasures and pains that reign so fervently in Aurora's existence. For some reason, their relationship makes me think of Fleabag: The Scriptures, or more so the television adaptation. Throughout the entire series, Fleabag breaks the fourth wall to commentate on what's going on around her and no one sees her do it...until the second season with the priest, who finally notices. The priest who she cannot have and should not have because of his vow. Even though that vow is broken, she cannot have him, she cannot have the one person who finally sees her.
It is Aurora's struggles embracing her trans identity and Ezekiel's leaving that are the seedlings for the first of Aurora's wounds. Aurora turns to the self-harm to fight the pain. The first wound.
The other wounds are mentioned in passing: staples on her forehead, possibly from part of her facial feminization surgery, the second wound; cuts under her breast from the breast augmentation and implants, the third wound; and her bottom surgery which gave her a vagina, the fourth wound.
The titular fifth wound comes when Aurora is knifed on the train by a random man, stabbed in the eye. It is this attack that leads to many things for Aurora. For one, it's the first act of violence enacted upon her trans body. Two, it leads to Aurora being hospitalized and shows us her initial reservations with the medical industry under Empire, but that will have an encore. But most importantly, it leads her to being visited by the historical trans woman Eleanor Rykener, in disguise as Saint Catherine of Siena, who time traveled from her era while on the run. Eleanor speaks in Old English, but there's a "translation" of her dialogue at the back of the book for context. Eleanor comes with a medieval Book of Hours that contains the vulva-like depictions of Christ's wounds, and when she touches these images in the book, Aurora can feel her fingers in her vagina. In medieval piety, Christian devotees would often kiss or caress the depictions of these wounds because it was akin to being intimate with Christ and drinking his holy blood. Saint Catherine of Siena, who Eleanor is disguised as, is most notably known for doing this in a vision . At the same time, the wounds of Aurora's surgeries and harm against her body--her five wounds--are her own stigmata. Eleanor has Aurora eat the Book of Hours and then goes off to form a feminist punk band with a Siren that Aurora hung out with earlier, away from the praying eyes of Saint Isidore of Seville.
Aurora is desperate for Ezekiel to know this part of her story. She informs us that he reads it, but his response is not recorded. Did he ever give one?
But that is not the last of Aurora's wounds. She obtains a sixth one within another wound. During a night with a tinder date, the man penetrates Aurora's too harshly and causes her vagina to bleed profusely. He flees and Aurora panicked roommates and boyfriend take her to the hospital. There, everyone assumes she is a cis woman and believe her period is acting up. She tells them repeatedly that she is a trans woman and is either ignored, viewed like a strange specimen, or assured that she'll be treated like a "real" woman. Her surgeon who did her bottom surgery refuses to come and says to jsut take pain medication dismissively. Eventually she is sutured, but she can still feel the pain of the man's force. She finally sees her surgeon who only laughs, proud of her "handiwork." This unsettling scene in the hospital is another one of Aurora's critiques of the Empire healthcare. Because she passes for a cis woman, that is is, she fits the ideal of what white cis heterosexual patriarchal people demand for trans women, her true pain and problems are ignore. Her transsexuality is dismissed and Othered. Empire demands certain things of those outside of its ruling caste, and once and if those demands are met, the true needs of the Othered are ignore, believed to be sanitized away.
So if you're wondering what I meant by "Empire" throughout this entire review, that's what I mean. Aurora commentates on it frequently throughout the book. Empire is that "traditional" white cis heterosexual patriarchy way of doing things: of living, writing, and thinking. As a trans woman, Aurora combats it throughout the book and even mentions she combated it while writing the book. She will not tell her story simply, just because that's what publishing wants in its minimalist schema.
It is after this sixth wound that Aurora begins to desire Ezekiel more. The trauma it caused her throws her into self-destruction and those around her can no longer support her. She wants and needs Ezekiel. And she wants to know why he left her and called her pretty, but not beautiful. Eventually they meet and the answer is before everyone:
Aurora loves too much. Ezekiel loves too little.
Their love is both a gale in summer and a maelstrom above a churning abyss. It's beautiful, it's sexy, it's tender...and it's not meant to be. We see that Ezekiel has his own problems. Aurora's behavior during their time pushed him away, but then again he never gave Aurora all of himself. They love each other, but Ezekiel has to go away. Again. He doesn't want to go, Aurora doesn't want him to go. We don't want him to go.
The entire scene is just so heartachingly tragic.
Ezekiel and Aurora still talk, but she's eventually committed to a psych ward for a time. In interviews, Aurora's mentioned that she and Ezekiel still talk and she thanks him in the acknowledgement of the book. But I still have to ask, "Why didn't it work out? Why?" Throughout the book, it seems that Ezekiel is struggling with his own queerness. Mattia has mentioned that readers and reviewers who don't acknowledge Ezekiel's own queerness and simply view them as a heterosexual couple--when they are both, most likely bi--completely misses the point of their journeys and desires.
The Fifth Wound is the odyssey of one trans woman through Empire and love. It's a beautiful, phantasmagorical, love story and hagiography of a muse and poet who is a siren, mermaid, fairy, mystic, and a plethora of other things all at once. My review simply cannot do the book justice. My testament to The Fifth Wound is simply that, to borrow from the imagery of those medieval, mystics, it's a story that rips open your chest and replaces your heart with Aurora's. It forces you to confront the mind and love of a woman who desires so much you may burst.
Aurora and Ezekiel, if either of you read this, I doubt you will, you two are incredible.
July 26, 2023
I'm obsessed. Idek, just read it.
June 20, 2025
Reviewing this book is useless. It’s a cacophony. It’s a fistful of feral flowers. It’s a word reading bonanza.
December 21, 2023
OH MY GOD
I HAVE NEVER READY ANYTHING LIKE THIS EVER
im like crying and feeling a flowing cracking open feeling in my body
this book is like falling in love! it is absolutely visionary and it is possibility-widening for myself in living and in writing. and i found myself reflected so much in it - especially a way of being in the world through being in love with words and with people through words and weaving a web of language and poets around yourself. i love how self-assured it was, how it brings gravity to experiences and thoughts that i often critique within myself or push down or shy away from.
i read it really fast and i also had to slow down in ways that i haven't while reading in a long time - long sentences, lush sentences, sensuous sentences moving through a dream logic traversing different worlds.
it is going in all of my goodreads shelves bc it is doing all the things i love and all the things i now love but hadn't thought about yet. also it is literally sooo sam cohen queer futures experiments in narrative fiction like wow this is really a whole genre
i definitely have more to say, might return to this. i dog-eared so many pages (evil bc it's a library book) and took pics of so many pages.
thank you aurora !!!!!!!
I HAVE NEVER READY ANYTHING LIKE THIS EVER
im like crying and feeling a flowing cracking open feeling in my body
this book is like falling in love! it is absolutely visionary and it is possibility-widening for myself in living and in writing. and i found myself reflected so much in it - especially a way of being in the world through being in love with words and with people through words and weaving a web of language and poets around yourself. i love how self-assured it was, how it brings gravity to experiences and thoughts that i often critique within myself or push down or shy away from.
i read it really fast and i also had to slow down in ways that i haven't while reading in a long time - long sentences, lush sentences, sensuous sentences moving through a dream logic traversing different worlds.
it is going in all of my goodreads shelves bc it is doing all the things i love and all the things i now love but hadn't thought about yet. also it is literally sooo sam cohen queer futures experiments in narrative fiction like wow this is really a whole genre
i definitely have more to say, might return to this. i dog-eared so many pages (evil bc it's a library book) and took pics of so many pages.
thank you aurora !!!!!!!
May 3, 2023
There is much to be said about Mattia’s exquisite prose and her ability to render romance with such passion and precision that reading The Fifth Wound felt like surrendering myself to hypnosis—before I realized what was happening, I was holding my breath as Ezekiel seduced and then shattered my heart. But for now, what I will say is that I greatly appreciate a book that, with its sprawling sentences and depth of thought and emotion, forces me to slow down (I am a notoriously speedy reader) and take my time savoring each word.
December 31, 2023
excellent, transcendent, deeply Piscean nonsense — i could drink this down over & over.
January 10, 2026
“…time isn’t real” “One of the things I’ve learned from the fifth wound” “it’s the funkiest book i’ve ever read” “It really is, I don’t think that I’ve understood any of it, But I’ve UNDERSTOOD some of it” “YES, it’s not logical, you just feel it or you don’t” “EXACTLY, and once I try to explain to myself why I got it- it’s gone” “it’s fruitless, when i think about that book all i see is sparkly pink angels” “I think of Catherine of Siena eating out a book”
“The vision proceeds from the wounding which echoes, pulses in my eye.”
“The vision proceeds from the wounding which echoes, pulses in my eye.”
January 7, 2024
What an exciting piece of literature!! Though I can hardly explain to you what it was about this anti-memoir, memoir, really confronting what literature and narratives are, who gets to tell their story and how, the way stories are shaped and the *meaning* we find within them. At its core this is definitely a love story towards oneself and others (I think) and how we make meaning within this world through art, poetry, history and experiences. The language Mattia used was also just beautiful, so many beautiful words and sentences, just very perfectly descriptive. There was so much vivid imagery in my mind as I was reading. This is inspiring me to write more. Maybe I'll finally do it!
I'll be perfectly honest I found the first chapter a little frustrating, I did not get it at all, I was thinking I might DNF except I hate DNFing books AND I didn't want to DNF the first book I started this year!! So I'm glad I didn't do that. I hope to read something like this again!
I'll be perfectly honest I found the first chapter a little frustrating, I did not get it at all, I was thinking I might DNF except I hate DNFing books AND I didn't want to DNF the first book I started this year!! So I'm glad I didn't do that. I hope to read something like this again!
July 25, 2023
“My favorite genre of literature is gossip. My second favorite is prayer. But sometimes those are one and the same.”
June 10, 2023
this book was freakin cool. reading it felt like entering an in-between world. aurora puts into words things i’ve never been able to find the words for. super trans , queer , how much went over my head? idk. still loved it.
August 10, 2023
2.5/5
I was SO excited to read this book; I only heard of it because it was my local queer book club's selection for July, but, after reading the synopsis, it made me want to read it IMMEDIATELY!
Unfortunately, I knew almost immediately that I wasn't going to enjoy this book. I read the first chapter multiple times trying to grasp what Mattia was trying to discuss, but it was so utterly boring that I couldn't even focus long enough to care.
Though I loved the things being discussed in this novel, Mattia's writing style drains every topic of any enjoyment by using EVERY WORD POSSIBLE to describe what it is she's discussing. She'll describe something MULTIPLE times, and there is no "building upon" it... it just drones on and wastes the reader's time. She shares the words of some of her literary critics in this novel, and I believe they said it best when they said:
- "But your description of the novel itself sounds to me like angels dancing on the tip of a pin rather than an attempt to engage, transfigure, or say something about the world as it is."
- "Some pages are weighed down by literary loft. And some fly by it. Some sentences are exquisite, but they are next to dozens of others so full of STUFF that they overload."
There were some really great parts of this novel; however, they just couldn't match the utterly boring and droning parts of it. I loved the references to classical studies and mythology, I loved the look at "right person, wrong time" relationships, I loved hearing about Mattia's experiences as a trans woman... but this book could've been a short story with the amount of SUBSTANCE within it... over half the book is unnecessary verbiage twisted in a way that attempts mysticism.
I definitely don't recommend this one; however, I would be interested to pick up another Mattia... maybe one that is SEVERAL projects after this one, so she has time to hone her voice.
I was SO excited to read this book; I only heard of it because it was my local queer book club's selection for July, but, after reading the synopsis, it made me want to read it IMMEDIATELY!
Unfortunately, I knew almost immediately that I wasn't going to enjoy this book. I read the first chapter multiple times trying to grasp what Mattia was trying to discuss, but it was so utterly boring that I couldn't even focus long enough to care.
Though I loved the things being discussed in this novel, Mattia's writing style drains every topic of any enjoyment by using EVERY WORD POSSIBLE to describe what it is she's discussing. She'll describe something MULTIPLE times, and there is no "building upon" it... it just drones on and wastes the reader's time. She shares the words of some of her literary critics in this novel, and I believe they said it best when they said:
- "But your description of the novel itself sounds to me like angels dancing on the tip of a pin rather than an attempt to engage, transfigure, or say something about the world as it is."
- "Some pages are weighed down by literary loft. And some fly by it. Some sentences are exquisite, but they are next to dozens of others so full of STUFF that they overload."
There were some really great parts of this novel; however, they just couldn't match the utterly boring and droning parts of it. I loved the references to classical studies and mythology, I loved the look at "right person, wrong time" relationships, I loved hearing about Mattia's experiences as a trans woman... but this book could've been a short story with the amount of SUBSTANCE within it... over half the book is unnecessary verbiage twisted in a way that attempts mysticism.
I definitely don't recommend this one; however, I would be interested to pick up another Mattia... maybe one that is SEVERAL projects after this one, so she has time to hone her voice.
March 30, 2024
updated, more fleshed out review:
The Fifth Wound is a book about valuing yourself, and valuing other people, and what sorts of qualities we pick out to color and justify that valuing, and the risks and rewards of doing so. It poses difficult questions about this, and extremely deftly delivers on them in ways which perfectly marry form and content. The stylistic choices Mattia makes for this might feel indulgent, but that indulgence is necessary, it is what the book is about. A love letter to the self, not in a self-involved way, but in a truly caring way, the sort of letter you send someone embarking on a difficulty that you know they can handle. The most confident book I’ve ever read.
Every time I think of some caveat to append to this review, I realize the book has beat me to it. It’s that sort of complete (though, funnily, in the last pages, incomplete, in a sense) work.
Seriously, go read it.
Original, vibes based, very overwhelmed in the moment review below:
amazing. beautiful. so so so so good. aurora captures a lot of the beauty of the present moment, presenting it in a context both unique and immediately graspable. i’ll be coming back to this book for years.
The Fifth Wound is a book about valuing yourself, and valuing other people, and what sorts of qualities we pick out to color and justify that valuing, and the risks and rewards of doing so. It poses difficult questions about this, and extremely deftly delivers on them in ways which perfectly marry form and content. The stylistic choices Mattia makes for this might feel indulgent, but that indulgence is necessary, it is what the book is about. A love letter to the self, not in a self-involved way, but in a truly caring way, the sort of letter you send someone embarking on a difficulty that you know they can handle. The most confident book I’ve ever read.
Every time I think of some caveat to append to this review, I realize the book has beat me to it. It’s that sort of complete (though, funnily, in the last pages, incomplete, in a sense) work.
Seriously, go read it.
Original, vibes based, very overwhelmed in the moment review below:
amazing. beautiful. so so so so good. aurora captures a lot of the beauty of the present moment, presenting it in a context both unique and immediately graspable. i’ll be coming back to this book for years.
November 29, 2024
Surreal and utterly exquisite.
Nothing I write can possibly capture the surreal, ornate enchantment of Fifth Wound. It's Fantasy like nothing I’ve ever seen before, a jewelled phantasmagoria that weaves through queer history and a world of fae and sirens, anchoring both in the fantastical and sometimes terrifying reality of a single trans woman’s life. The writing is so beautiful it hurts, hallucinatory and opulent and spiralling, Mattia leading us through a sacred labyrinth with honey and lotus on our tongues.
I can’t even. I really can’t. It defies description, never mind explanation. No doubt it’s not for everyone, but it’s soul-shaking for those it is for, and I’m so grateful to count myself among that number. This is a book that challenges everything you think you know about storytelling and writing – to say nothing of the queer experience – and it’s pure magic. Mattia has a lifelong fan in me.
Nothing I write can possibly capture the surreal, ornate enchantment of Fifth Wound. It's Fantasy like nothing I’ve ever seen before, a jewelled phantasmagoria that weaves through queer history and a world of fae and sirens, anchoring both in the fantastical and sometimes terrifying reality of a single trans woman’s life. The writing is so beautiful it hurts, hallucinatory and opulent and spiralling, Mattia leading us through a sacred labyrinth with honey and lotus on our tongues.
I can’t even. I really can’t. It defies description, never mind explanation. No doubt it’s not for everyone, but it’s soul-shaking for those it is for, and I’m so grateful to count myself among that number. This is a book that challenges everything you think you know about storytelling and writing – to say nothing of the queer experience – and it’s pure magic. Mattia has a lifelong fan in me.
Read
March 27, 2023I can't rate this book because it was unlike anything I have read before, and I don't think a rating could do it justice, but more so I still have no idea what I read, and in that way this book was uncategorizable. Like a fever dream, like maraschino cherries in your mouth, like a rose bed, like thinking about your lover over and over again, like perfume and being and feeling expensive, like a myth. I don't even know what to say. It took me a minute to realize that The Fifth Wound was about Aurora's life and not fiction. There are parts of the book where I have zero idea what happened but here we are. Sometimes the language was confusing, but that shouldn't keep you from reading the book (unless that really does keep you from reading it).
Read
October 12, 2023This was fantastic. Mattia has such a unique voice and this novel displays such a unique grasp of language that left me mesmerized. I can imagine some might be put off by some of the tangents she goes off in as she mythologizes her life but there's so much being said here that I felt deep within my bones. So many unique insights on gender, sexuality, love, and the world. I was constantly taken aback at how eloquently she speaks and the way she finds meaning in her experiences. I'm not sure that anything I say about it can do it justice, but I'm am extremely glad I read it. I imagine it's a book that will only become richer if I ever revisit it in the future.
April 22, 2025
Beautiful! Heartbreaking! Fun! Grotesque! Took me 4 months to finish!
I’ll be thinking abt this one for a while. There was a part in old/Middle English that was actually very fun but probably had me looking insane reading on my flight to nyc.
Thanks Kay for another great rec
I’ll be thinking abt this one for a while. There was a part in old/Middle English that was actually very fun but probably had me looking insane reading on my flight to nyc.
Thanks Kay for another great rec
June 30, 2023
Abstract, self-mythologizing, and the reincarnation of Virginia Woolf that I have been WANTING. The fact that it is not the most talked about book right now is a crime.
July 19, 2023
interlude of galloping. Hooves in the dust. No lyrics.
seafoam, peaches, and glass.
seafoam, peaches, and glass.
September 28, 2024
absolute and pure magic in every sense of the word. i don’t think i’ll ever be able to get this book out of my head !!!
December 21, 2024
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘍𝘪𝘧𝘵𝘩 𝘞𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘴 𝘢 𝘱𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘴𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘰𝘳��𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘳𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘢̀ 𝘤𝘭𝘦𝘧 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘢𝘴 𝘢 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦. 𝘐𝘯 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯, 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘪𝘴 𝘢 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺—𝘈𝘶𝘳𝘰𝘳𝘢 & 𝘌𝘻𝘦𝘬𝘪𝘦𝘭—𝘢 𝘴𝘦𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢 𝘳𝘦𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘰𝘯. 𝘐𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳, 𝘸𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘢 𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘪𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘤 𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘴𝘱𝘩𝘰𝘣𝘪𝘤 𝘷𝘪𝘰𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦. 𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘯 𝘺𝘦𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘦, 𝘢 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘦𝘤𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘤 𝘷𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘴𝘸𝘪𝘳𝘭𝘴, 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘬𝘭𝘦𝘴. 𝘍𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘭, 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘦𝘷𝘢𝘭 𝘯𝘶𝘯𝘴, 𝘬𝘯𝘪𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵4𝘵 𝘳𝘰𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦, 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘍𝘪𝘧𝘵𝘩 𝘞𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘶𝘭𝘨𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘭𝘶𝘳 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘧𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘴𝘺 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺.
Untrue to my typical reviewing form, I'm using the publisher's blurb because this is unlike anything I've ever read and I'm unsure how to summarize it. In the book Mattia writes about rejection from publishers, who reply saying her writing is unlike anything they've ever read but they won't be going forward with her. So apologies for saying the same thing, but I am genuine in my respect and awe for this book!
At it's core, it's about a trans woman in NYC, her romantic and sexual lives, and her terrifying experiences with gender violence. But this book transcends genres and form. It's memoir, fiction, myth, poetry. It's randomly a tribute to Townes Van Zandt. It has footnotes. There are hints of the gothic and the biblical everywhere you look. It's confounding, it's horrific, it's beautiful, explicit and tragic. There's an interdimensional... spaceship? The sentences are long, the commas are many; the pages require your attention.
This definitely won't be for everyone. Truthfully, I'm still not even sure if it's for me. But this is such a unique book and Mattia's talent and voice is undeniable that I would definitely recommend this. I will be thinking about it for some time.
Untrue to my typical reviewing form, I'm using the publisher's blurb because this is unlike anything I've ever read and I'm unsure how to summarize it. In the book Mattia writes about rejection from publishers, who reply saying her writing is unlike anything they've ever read but they won't be going forward with her. So apologies for saying the same thing, but I am genuine in my respect and awe for this book!
At it's core, it's about a trans woman in NYC, her romantic and sexual lives, and her terrifying experiences with gender violence. But this book transcends genres and form. It's memoir, fiction, myth, poetry. It's randomly a tribute to Townes Van Zandt. It has footnotes. There are hints of the gothic and the biblical everywhere you look. It's confounding, it's horrific, it's beautiful, explicit and tragic. There's an interdimensional... spaceship? The sentences are long, the commas are many; the pages require your attention.
This definitely won't be for everyone. Truthfully, I'm still not even sure if it's for me. But this is such a unique book and Mattia's talent and voice is undeniable that I would definitely recommend this. I will be thinking about it for some time.
September 25, 2025
This book is like falling through a dream.
Flitting between reality, fantasy, and truth, Mattia explores the violence surrounding transwomen's lives and bodies and she couches this all through the most tender portrayals of love.
Part philosophical and part confessional, Mattia weaves a story across and throughout time, sliding between past, present and future in very queer ways. When I first started reading this book, I was enraptured by its language; I described to my partner like watching a movie and thoroughly enjoying the experience of watching so much that by the time you get to the end, you can't quite describe to anyone else what the movie was about but you know you loved it. However, eventually, the words build into a story, into a history, of love and violence that is read both through and between the words on the page.
My favourite part of this book is how Mattia talks about sex. Sex is both erotic and disgusting, and I think she captures that appeal and fear so wonderfully. I am not transgender, but I imagine that pull between desire and disgust is felt even stronger by queerly made bodies. I really enjoyed how wonderfully and honestly Mattia represents the horror of being in a body.
This is a book I am going to be thinking about for the rest of my life. It's not for everyone; there are few people I would recommend it to. But if it's for you, you'll know right away because you'll find it *astonishingly* wonderful, terrifying, beautiful, hopeful, and tragic. 10/10.
Flitting between reality, fantasy, and truth, Mattia explores the violence surrounding transwomen's lives and bodies and she couches this all through the most tender portrayals of love.
Part philosophical and part confessional, Mattia weaves a story across and throughout time, sliding between past, present and future in very queer ways. When I first started reading this book, I was enraptured by its language; I described to my partner like watching a movie and thoroughly enjoying the experience of watching so much that by the time you get to the end, you can't quite describe to anyone else what the movie was about but you know you loved it. However, eventually, the words build into a story, into a history, of love and violence that is read both through and between the words on the page.
My favourite part of this book is how Mattia talks about sex. Sex is both erotic and disgusting, and I think she captures that appeal and fear so wonderfully. I am not transgender, but I imagine that pull between desire and disgust is felt even stronger by queerly made bodies. I really enjoyed how wonderfully and honestly Mattia represents the horror of being in a body.
This is a book I am going to be thinking about for the rest of my life. It's not for everyone; there are few people I would recommend it to. But if it's for you, you'll know right away because you'll find it *astonishingly* wonderful, terrifying, beautiful, hopeful, and tragic. 10/10.
July 26, 2023
a "novel" that is also a memoir, that is also an epic poem, that is also a love letter. aurora mattia has language in a gilded birdcage above her bed. the sentences sweep like evening gowns, sometimes effortless and sometimes laboring, but always cool. a transsexual fantasia, mattia uses ancient forms to mythologize her own creation. i enjoyed reading a book that was (in a way that reminded me of eve babitz's Slow Days, Fast Company: The World, the Flesh, and L.A.) addressed to a single person, carefully crafted to impress just him. if the rest of us read it, she really doesn't care.
at times it was tooth-achingly self indulgent (especially when almost a chapter was spent airing out literary rejections for past books; attributing the personal rejections of a white woman who studied creative writing at Yale as a symptom of Empire feels rather unbecoming), but that same self-indulgent-ness represents a sort of bravery that few authors are willing to share. to lay your literary intentions bare, to declare that behind the gauzy candy-like prose all you desire out of the act of writing is to create your own personal fairy garden, to use it like makeup to emphasize your most beautiful features. it is something worth aspiring to.
at times it was tooth-achingly self indulgent (especially when almost a chapter was spent airing out literary rejections for past books; attributing the personal rejections of a white woman who studied creative writing at Yale as a symptom of Empire feels rather unbecoming), but that same self-indulgent-ness represents a sort of bravery that few authors are willing to share. to lay your literary intentions bare, to declare that behind the gauzy candy-like prose all you desire out of the act of writing is to create your own personal fairy garden, to use it like makeup to emphasize your most beautiful features. it is something worth aspiring to.
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