The Writing Retreat

Content Warning: This section explores violent, abusive, sexual, and occult subject matter. It also replicates Bartz’s use of the adjective “queer.”

The Writing Retreat revels in playful engagement with ideas about writing and artistic creation, as well as self-conscious mimicry of Gothic conventions and numerous references to other works of fantasy and horror. Most characters represent archetypes—Roza the villainous “puppet master,” Taylor the traitorous “turncoat”—while maintaining their own, deeply nuanced identities. Alex, in particular, grows and changes throughout the novel, subverting the “damsel in distress” persona. The plot itself is as straightforward as it is riddled with the potential for mayhem. Five young female creatives are lured to an allegedly haunted, remote estate to write for a well-known author of horror: It begs the question of what could possibly go wrong. Complicating matters is the fact that, although these writers are hardly acquiescent or suggestible, they allow their egos to lead them astray as often as they assist them in revolting.

The Writing Retreat clearly draws on the established conventions of the Gothic genre. The setting most certainly satisfies one requirement, as the characters gather at the isolated and haunted estate of Blackbriar (see Symbols & Motifs). This location invokes myriad literary references ranging from Jane Austen’s famous satire of Gothic novels Northanger Abbey to Stephen King’s infamous horror classic The Shining. Indeed, Alex and Poppy experience a metafictional thrill at the thought of visiting the estate: “anyone who was more than a casual fan of Roza’s knew the story [of Blackbriar], which was itself like something out of her novels” (34). Blackbriar’s 19th-century inhabitants were found dead—one disemboweled, the other burned beyond recognition—after occult activities. Alex decides to write her own historical horror novel, The Great Commission, based on these events. As her plot unfurls, Alex cannot quite believe how fitting the setting turns out to be. She notes with both irony and astonishment that Blackbriar even had a real “secret room, and it was a dungeon” (206). Blackbriar is a metafictional setting for a Gothic horror story, wherein the characters are self-aware of their place in a typical Gothic horror manor.

As is also common for Gothic literature, the characters of The Writing Retreat are beset throughout the narrative by terrible weather and monstrous threats. At one point, a storm cuts the group off from outside communication, which amplifies the plot’s constant undercurrent of suspense. Meanwhile, Alex finds herself constantly “waiting for something horrific to pounce” (69). Monsters, in human and imaginary forms, manifest throughout Gothic novels, as they also do here. Alex writes about—and briefly thinks she encounters—the demon Lamia, whom Daphne was said to have channeled during her séances. Roza is an amoral monster, while Taylor presents as a psychopath. Secret passageways lead to hidden rooms stained with blood, and young women unconsciously undergo constant surveillance by malevolent authorities: all hallmarks of the Gothic novel’s fixation on the devilish and uncanny.

The novel simultaneously mimics and subverts several Gothic tropes. Alex’s dreams, which often turn into nightmares, pay homage to Gothic conventions that elevate the importance of dreams and nightmares. For example, Alex dreams about or hallucinates that she participates in transgressive sex acts: unions which are hinted at in traditional Gothic novels, but not typically depicted in graphic detail. In particular, the queer dynamic of her real and fantasized sexual encounters breaks with historical Gothic literature (though LGBTQ+ themes have a long history in Gothic stories). Alex’s character development also shows the influence of new gender conventions, too. Rather than being the usual “damsel in distress” in need of rescue, she becomes the resourceful and sometimes ruthless heroine of her own story. She will neither leave Wren behind nor allow Roza to control her narrative: Indeed, Alex goes so far as to burn her own manuscript in symbolic defiance of Roza’s manipulative whims. This dramatic character arc is thrown into high relief when Alex reflects on her choices near the end of the book, noting that she has always “needed […] a powerful, protective being to take care of [her]. Which was probably why [she’d] felt drawn to Wren and Roza in the first place” (256). Through this traumatic personal journey, though, Alex decides to trust herself. As she puts it, “The sadness faded and a delicate sense of peace settled on me, instead. It told me that the only way to get through this was to listen to myself. Rather, my body” (256). By having Alex embody her newfound bravery, as opposed to imbuing her with an abstract moral or intellectual bravery, the author aligns this trait with a feminine rather than a traditionally masculine pole. The damsel saves herself, and her friend, while also embracing her own non-normative sexuality as a source of empowerment. Bartz’s novel is a feminist critique of traditional Gothic narratives as much as an homage to these Gothic classics.