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The Solstice
“Timely, delightful, mortifying, and skillfully written, Elaine Pascale has delivered the ultimate dystopian story.” —Nora B. Peevy for Hellnotes
Love is risky in the days of the Solstice.
Love, happiness, and hope are only available to those wearing red bands and taking Solidox pills. Solidox ends the pain of aging and returns the consumers to youthful health. Solidox tastes like the greatest comfort food imaginable, or even goodnight kisses. It also causes a hunger that can only be satisfied by human flesh.
When a hurricane decimates the only bridge on the island, the trapped residents must find ways to survive against those wearing red bands who have begun hunting them. There are rules attached to the hunt, but the rules favor the hunters. Amongst the debris and garbage that remain after the storm, a virus spreads, causing long-term memory loss leading to a war of attrition between the Red Bands and their prey.
Participants of the Solstice must use ingenuity to avoid being killed; nonparticipants are executed on sight. With the rules being arbitrary yet inflexible, is there a way to survive the Solstice?
Love is risky in the days of the Solstice.
Love, happiness, and hope are only available to those wearing red bands and taking Solidox pills. Solidox ends the pain of aging and returns the consumers to youthful health. Solidox tastes like the greatest comfort food imaginable, or even goodnight kisses. It also causes a hunger that can only be satisfied by human flesh.
When a hurricane decimates the only bridge on the island, the trapped residents must find ways to survive against those wearing red bands who have begun hunting them. There are rules attached to the hunt, but the rules favor the hunters. Amongst the debris and garbage that remain after the storm, a virus spreads, causing long-term memory loss leading to a war of attrition between the Red Bands and their prey.
Participants of the Solstice must use ingenuity to avoid being killed; nonparticipants are executed on sight. With the rules being arbitrary yet inflexible, is there a way to survive the Solstice?
118 pages, Paperback
Published April 18, 2025
15 people want to read
About the author
Elaine Pascale
23 books111 followersElaine Pascale is the author of The Blood Lights; If Nothing Else, Eve, We’ve Enjoyed the Fruit; The Kitchen Witches; The Language of Crows; and the soon to be released The Solstice. She is the co-editor of Dancing in the Shadows: A Tribute to Anne Rice. She is a regular contributor to Pen of the Damned and the Ladies of Horror Picture-Prompt Challenge. Elaine enjoys chocolate, a robust full moon, reading spam emails, and paddleboarding.
Find out more at elainepascale.com, https://www.amazon.com/author/elainep..., Facebook: elaine.pascale
X and Instagram: @doclaney
TikTok @elainepascale
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@elainepascal...
Newsletter: https://elainepascale.substack.com/
Find out more at elainepascale.com, https://www.amazon.com/author/elainep..., Facebook: elaine.pascale
X and Instagram: @doclaney
TikTok @elainepascale
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@elainepascal...
Newsletter: https://elainepascale.substack.com/
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 30, 2025
Original and terrifying dystopian nightmare that kept me turning pages until my eyes were blurry.
December 7, 2025
A post-apocalyptic world where boomers eat human flesh? This is the most terrifying book I’ve read all year.
A hurricane destroys the country. What’s left is a small island where the wealthy class, I.e. boomers, control everything. So much so to where they host events called Solstices where they consume human flesh. The reason for their cannibalistic cravings? Solidox, a new medication that was originally intended to help cats and got picked up by boomers who wanted to ward off death. But the main side effect is uncontrollable cravings. And with food rations decreasing on the island, boomers turned to their only source of meat.
Elaine Pascale covers this post-apocalyptic society from all angles. We get several POVs, from some of the “red bands” (the most powerful class) and from the lower classes (young, poor, and hunted). Reading about all these characters does get confusing and there were times I had to flip back through the book. But in this context, the POV shifts worked.
The ending also asked more questions than anything. While I usually hate endings like this, it worked for this story. As I’m sure we all will agree, real life doesn’t have a “happy ending,” especially when it comes to political corruption. The fact that one problem was replaced by another was a good way to end the book and maybe we might get a part 2?
I only took off one star because the red bands ate cats in many scenes. Pascale doesn’t go into graphic detail fortunately. But it still made me sad.
Cat-eating scenes aside, I absolutely recommend this book if you want to read dystopia while we’re in a dystopian hellscape.
A hurricane destroys the country. What’s left is a small island where the wealthy class, I.e. boomers, control everything. So much so to where they host events called Solstices where they consume human flesh. The reason for their cannibalistic cravings? Solidox, a new medication that was originally intended to help cats and got picked up by boomers who wanted to ward off death. But the main side effect is uncontrollable cravings. And with food rations decreasing on the island, boomers turned to their only source of meat.
Elaine Pascale covers this post-apocalyptic society from all angles. We get several POVs, from some of the “red bands” (the most powerful class) and from the lower classes (young, poor, and hunted). Reading about all these characters does get confusing and there were times I had to flip back through the book. But in this context, the POV shifts worked.
The ending also asked more questions than anything. While I usually hate endings like this, it worked for this story. As I’m sure we all will agree, real life doesn’t have a “happy ending,” especially when it comes to political corruption. The fact that one problem was replaced by another was a good way to end the book and maybe we might get a part 2?
I only took off one star because the red bands ate cats in many scenes. Pascale doesn’t go into graphic detail fortunately. But it still made me sad.
Cat-eating scenes aside, I absolutely recommend this book if you want to read dystopia while we’re in a dystopian hellscape.
December 30, 2025
This is a story of how advances in technology/medicine and the desire of people can change society. The conpet is simple, a medicine that should help society turns out to cause more problems than it set out to solve.
You are thrust into the story with no real understanding of what is happening or how it got this way. Throughout the story there are some flashbacks and explanations that explain some of the background but not all. So you have to just take some things as they are.
There is no one main character, but a lot of characters that push the story along and help with the explanation of the plot. So be warned that a straight forward linear from a set perspective story is not what this is. It is told through many different views.
You are thrust into the story with no real understanding of what is happening or how it got this way. Throughout the story there are some flashbacks and explanations that explain some of the background but not all. So you have to just take some things as they are.
There is no one main character, but a lot of characters that push the story along and help with the explanation of the plot. So be warned that a straight forward linear from a set perspective story is not what this is. It is told through many different views.
January 13, 2026
How do you keep dystopian fiction fresh and interesting, given the sheer quantity of it that our, eh, current times seem hell bent on inspiring? You look to Elaine Pascale, that's how. With a mix of pitch black humor, well placed barbs finding their targets (which include the pharmaceutical industry, generational/culture war politics), and some good old-fashioned cannibalism, if you have not yet added The Solstice to your dystopian/resistance reading list, than frankly you're missing the boat.
August 4, 2025
Elaine Pascale brings her wit to this creepy, dystopian novella of hurricanes, mad science, and cats. At times it feels like an otherworldly version of The Purge, but with an atmosphere that feels much like the 1970s horror gem, Messiah of Evil. Plus, how can you resist a novella where invisibility is a thing? I really enjoyed this one.
November 11, 2025
Couldn’t put it down! I really enjoyed how the story was told from different perspectives, but was still came together perfectly. 10/10, highly recommend!!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews