A subversive literary horror novel that disrupts the tropes of women's historical fiction with delusions, wild beasts, and the uncontainable power of female rage The year is 1901, and Ada Byrd - spinster, schoolmarm, amateur naturalist - accepts a teaching post in isolated Lowry Bridge, grateful for the chance to re-establish herself where no one knows her secrets. She develops friendships with her neighbors, explores the woods with her students, and begins to see a future in this tiny farming community. Her past - riddled with grief and shame - has never seemed so far away. But then, Ada begins to witness strange and grisly phenomena: a swarm of dying crickets, a self-mutilating rabbit, a malformed faun. She soon believes that something old and beastly - which she calls Grey Dog - is behind these visceral offerings, which both beckon and repel her. As her confusion deepens, her grip on what is real, what is delusion, and what is traumatic memory loosens, and Ada takes on the wildness of the woods, behaving erratically and pushing her newfound friends away. In the end, she is left with one question: What is the real horror? The Grey Dog, the uncontainable power of female rage, or Ada herself? 1901: Ada Byrd - spinster, schoolmarm, amateur naturalist - accepts a teaching post in isolated Lowry Bridge, grateful to live where no one knows her secrets. Soon, Ada realizes that something beastly lives in the heart of Lowry Bridge, and it both beckons and repels her. As her own grip on reality loosens, Ada wonders if the real horror is her. Elliott Gish is a writer and librarian from Halifax, where she lives with her partner. A graduate of Simon Fraser University's Writer's Studio, Gish's fiction has appeared in many journals, including the New Quarterly, the Baltimore Review, and the Dalhousie Review, and was nominated for a 2022 Pushcart Prize. Sales and Market Bullets - INSPIRED BY ANNE OF GREEN GABLES: Elliott Gish grew up reading the novels of Lucy Maud Montgomery and felt comforted by the adventures of Anne and Emily. But in reading those books, she always felt there was something horrific lurking behind Montgomery's words, a darkness obscured by wholesomeness. Grey Dog leans into this nagging feeling, upending the tropes of Montgomery's worlds with beasts, monsters, and women's rage. - SMART LITERARY HORROR: It's Anne of Green Gables meets supernatural dread meets a queer awakening. Smart literary horror that will thrill gothic readers while satisfying the horror fans of filmmaker Jordan Peele. - DEBUT FROM AN AUTHOR WHO WANTS TO CREEP YOU OUT: Elliott Gish is a 2020 graduate of the Simon Fraser University Writer's Studio program and later participated in the program as an apprentice fiction mentor. - FOR READERS OF: Rebecca (Daphne du Maurier), The Haunting of Hill House (Shirley Jackson), The Yellow Wallpaper (Charlotte Perkins Gilman), The Change (Kirsten Miller), and Plain Bad Heroines (Emily M. Danforth)

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