Wild, Fearless Chests

by Mandy Beaumont

She is the explosion, the clamour, the thunder. She is the beat, the rage. She is every piece of violence imagined on the skin. She is the near miss. She is the woman you once were, the woman you could be, the woman you are. She is a triumph of our shared history, is every one of you, is your wild and screaming voice on street corners, is the madwoman you fear you may become. She loves you. As women's voices begin to rise together, Mandy Beaumont's brutal and uncompromising stories are a compelling reminder of the ways in which women have fallen, been dismissed, hurt, hated and loved from afar.These are the stories we have always known, have always heard about and are perhaps just short moments away from. They are yours, ours, mine. They are booming anger. They are wild love. They are the distorted and the decided, the imagined and the wanted. They are the shaking ground beneath our feet. A powerful call to arms. They compel us to stand tall. To break free. To defy the gaze. To claim our space. Wild, Fearless Chests is the sound of a certain revolution. '"Drowning in Thick Air" is shocking ... It is not like anything I have read in recent years and takes me to a place I have never been in my life or imagination or in fiction.' Frank Moorhouse

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Feminism

213 pages, Paperback

First published January 28, 2020

About the author

Mandy is an award-winning writer and a researcher in creative writing. Her debut novel The Furies was long-listed for the prestigious Stella Prize and shortlisted for the MUD Literary Prize. The Furies was also shortlisted for the Queensland Literary Awards Fiction Book of the Year . Her collection of short stories, Wild, Fearless Chests, was shortlisted for the Richell Prize and the Dorothy Hewett Award. Stories from the collection also won the MOTH International Short Story Prize and were shortlisted for other notable awards. She is a convenor in creative writing at Griffith University and holds a PhD and a Research Masters in creative writing. She is also a regular feature writer and book reviewer for The Big Issue.

Reviews

[Michael Livingston · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shorts about women - forgotten and ignored women, bold and difficult women, brutalised and not-quite-defeated women. Some of these stories felt a bit heavy-handed, but some hit me right in the guts - Bright Light and All Brilliance in particular is spectacular. It's an energetic and vivid collection, filled with anger and love for its characters.

[Nikki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, well, well. I've been anticipating this read for a while now and it exceeded all expectations. What a wild, fearless book it is. Mandy Beaumont sizzles and screams from the pages with her blistering, no bull-shit autopsy of the lives of women who aren't often heard. I stayed awake all night to finish as I was transported into the lives of these characters, often feeling rage and sometimes a sense of familiarity. The writing is stunning, the emotion powerful. Mandy Beaumont has arrived with a bang!

[Chiel Groeneveld · Rating 4 out of 5]

Several short stories about unheard women. And none of the stories are an easy read, no matter how nice the prose might be. It's sometimes cold, sometimes brutal, sometimes beautiful but always serves as a reminder about the ugliness in some peoples lives.
It's a book I'll have to let sink in for a bit.

[Lily Emerson · Rating 3 out of 5]

A patchwork quilt. Some squares I couldn’t stop running my fingers over, others I couldn’t quite fit into the overall design. Beaumont always writes well, with a lovely cadence. Many, maybe even the majority, of these stories are resonant, bell loud, lived in. However, there were several stories in here that I felt overreached, were not organic, were not best served by her. So a patchwork quilt, enjoyed in its imperfections.

[Sofia Casanova · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every woman should read this. Mandy’s debut collection of short stories explores the darkness of being a woman, particularly a woman misplaced. It dives straight into the heart of violence and its veins that flow through the lives of women. Across these stories her prose is sharp and rhythmic, dancing along the lines of poetry; the powerful imagery across each story cleverly bleeds together to form one overarching narrative. It’s a narrative we’ve all heard before; these are stories we are familiar with, and it was brutal to read them in such a way. This collection is a visceral experience, and one that shouldn’t be taken lightly. The women in these stories are mostly nameless, and Mandy is unflinching in her depiction of sexual violence, poverty, abortion, humiliation, and death. Of all the stories, “Drowning in Thick Air” is my favourite from the collection, and one that I felt imprint itself on my body. When you pick up Wild Fearless Chests, know that it is a scream of anger, of recognition, full of rage and love and the smallest fragment of hope. It’s a brilliant piece of literature for our times. 👏

[Georgia McDonald]

Short stories “of the ways in which women have fallen, been dismissed, hurt, hated and loved from afar”. No rating for this but I loved it.

[Carol - Reading Writing and Riesling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Confronting, raw, challenging...this has so many emotions …

My View:
This was an interesting read – a mixed bag of subject matter/themes, a collection of short stories is hard to review as a body of work, but in this collection you will find some stories that will infuriate you – because of the unfairness, the prejudice, the underserved attitudes of entitlement/privilege. Some stories will break your heart for many of the same reasons. Some will raise a smile, albeit generally a small one, some will have you in tears of frustration and sadness. Occasionally you will find a story that has you cheering form the sidelines.

Altogether this is a powerful, emotional, challenging, confronting, raw and often, brutal read. I am sure there is something here that will make you think.

[Mem · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of short stories, laden with heartache and misplacement. Some a bit too smart for me. Others that feel like they’re about me. Drinking Makes Your Heart Ache More Than it Should and And They Wanted Us to Love Them got me good.

[Sam Coley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I took this book very slowly, one story per day, because I really wanted to savour it. I lost it a bit at the end though where I couldn't control myself and just had to GO WILD, I think the last 3 or 4 stories I read one after the other, I gobbled them up like a GREEDY LITTLE GOOSE, because I have poor impulse control but also because the stories are THAT GOOD.

There were stories in this collection that I liked more than others (3 were 100% perfect perfect PERFECT my favourites but I won't say which because you know, you should love all of your children (or someone else's children?) equally, but there were none that I didn't like.

It reminded me a bit of Roxanne Gay's Difficult Women, in a really good way. Where I found Difficult Women sometimes lagged, Wild Fearless Chests does not - it is unrelenting. Powerful, super contemporary, an important book that isn't OBSESSED with its own importance, I would recommend this book to a lot of people, maybe even some that I think might not exactly 'enjoy' it, just because I think they SHOULD read it anyway.

Mandy Beaumont's style has a musicality about it, there's a certain tempo to the writing which is more obvious in some stories (looking at you (with heart eye emojis), Bright Light and All Brilliance) and less obvious in others, but nevertheless present throughout. Musicality is not the right word, but I've been looking at synonyms and I can't find the right one. Also I discovered just now that I have been using the world patina in ENTIRELY THE WRONG WAY my WHOLE LIFE (it's something to do with metal!! WHO KNEW?!?!). Timbre? If there's a word to describe the way Patti Smith slips in and out of poetry, prose and verse with the ease of channel flipping on TV, let me know. GERMAN MAYBE?

I was lucky enough to snag this book in the Authors For Firies auction on twitter, and would happily spend $100 on it again.

I CAN'T WAIT to see what's coming next from Mandy Beaumont, so if she's reading this, GET CRACKING.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes I go through all the books my friends have read and try to find ones that are going to work for me. This is one of them and I took to reading it for my thesis as well.

"She is quietened by his violence" (3).

This collection of short stories is shattering from its beginning. You read of diverse women and their experiences, their need to be heard and their harms and horrors. Beaumont has crafted something chilling and addictive in her writing, she leaves enough space for the reader to immerse themselves fully, to consider the life of each woman beyond the story. It's genius.

"Memory is wonderful like that, I think. It breaks up the world for us to keep being" (109).

Beaumont's poetic lines act as attempts to reclaim space, voice and memory. It is exactly this that I have been focused on in my 2020 studies and life. This is chilling and beautiful.

[Allieblahblah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, this book is just wow! I haven’t read anything like it before. Each and every short story ripped me apart and sometimes I felt I might stay broken for a while, but there were also some truly uplifting stories in here as well.

I can’t say much about the story, because it’s a collection of many many short stories. That was one thing that surprised me was how short they all are, but how each one packs such a punch.

Read this book if you want to read about all kinds of women, and I mean all kinds! There is no holding back and it is truly beautiful and spectacular.

This is a brave book and the writing is so so good! It’s the best short story collection I’ve read, and I think it really speaks to the times we’re living in. It’s nitty gritty. It’s earth shaking.

[Emily Maree · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were some short stories that I loved and felt connected to and then there were others that I didn't fully grasp the meaning of and felt a slight discomfort towards.
This book was not quite what I was expecting it was going to be and therefore, it did not live up to the expectations I had for it.

[Ely · Rating 3 out of 5]

This wasn't really what I was expecting from this. There were a couple really great stories, and then there were a whole bunch that were just kind of strange and not the sort of thing I like to read. They were quite confronting and some were just downright uncomfortable.

[Ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This beautifully written collection became heavier and harder as time wore on, until eventually my heart hurt and I was wary of the woe in pages to come.

[Nic]

Unrated. Not a book I can stomach right now, particularly on the back of the one I’ve just finished. These COVID days are depressing enough, I need something lighter.

[Griflet]

Too dark for right now.

[Kate McGain · Rating 5 out of 5]

A ballsy exploration of women's stories. Beautiful, ugly, bitter and sweet, no feelings unfelt.

[Rebecca Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is dark, wanting, lust, pain, broken hearts and love, unflinchingly...not for the faint hearted. For those who delve and push aside to see the raw emotions, all of them.

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would like to thank Mandy Beaumont, Hachette Australia and NetGalley for the ARC of Wild, Fearless Chests.

In a time when the culture of abuse and toxic masculinity is exposed as rife by a rising empowered movement, this collection of stories adds to the voices calling for social justice and cultural change. Change that will be aided in Australia by the influential work of people such as Jane Caro, Cash Savage, Clementine Ford and Mandy Beaumont.

The writing is crafted with skill and creativity, frequently unique with single word sentences and capitalization. The stories are powerful and affecting.

I highly recommend this collection; to be added to school reading lists and as compulsory reading for our politicians and judiciary.