In the Western literary tradition, the pursuit of physical beauty was often faced with deadly consequences. Powerful women in fiction and history took drastic measures and paid the price for their obsession—with Snow White’s stepmother poisoning the young princess to regain her status as the fairest of them all, only to die a terrible death, and Countess Elizabeth Bathory supposedly paving the way to her own downfall by bathing in the blood of young women to preserve her youth and beauty. Similarly, tragic heroes met terrible ends if were ensnared by the beauty of themselves or others, with Narcissus dying of starvation after forgoing sleep and food for days to stare at his reflection in the lake water, Dorian Gray being haunted by a physical embodiment of his vanity, and sailors and kings alike being lured to their deaths and downfalls by sirens and femme fatales.
While contemporary works like American Psycho and The Stepford Wives have satirised the fanatical pursuit and worship of beauty alongside hyper-consumerism in past decades, the subject’s true reckoning came alongside the unprecedented growth of the beauty and wellness industry in the twenty-first century.
Once occupied almost entirely by men’s fables, this microgenre has since blossomed into a space for women and their nuanced renderings of distinct yet unmistakably universal experiences with the pursuit of beauty. With the rise of the anti-hot movement and the ‘natural beauty revolution’ championed by Pamela Anderson and Jamie Lee Curtis, it is clear that narratives surrounding beauty are evolving as women become leaders of the conversations instead of its subjects.
Celebrated female authors like Margaret Atwood, her self-designated ‘literary heir apparent’ Mona Awad, and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jennifer Egan have explored the idolatry of beauty from Ancient Greece to the ’90s New York fashion scene. Asian and Asian American authors are also behind some of the most enigmatic works of this literary niche—with Frances Cha and Natsuo Kirino fashioning bleak, film noir portrayals of Seoul and Tokyo in which true beauty is the highest currency in If I Had Your Face and Grotesque, and Ling Ling Huang questioning if the ultimate goal of wellness is really beauty in Natural Beauty. Similarly, Anna Metcalfe’s Chrysalis, draws parallels with Han Kang’s modern classic The Vegetarian with a nameless protagonist’s metamorphosis through sculpting her body.
Below, find Vogue Singapore’s shortlist of social horror books about the pursuit of beauty—all written by female authors—that will have you digging deeper into your inner psyche.
1 / 7
'Rouge' by Mona Awad
Following the sudden, mysterious death of her beauty-obsessed mother, a woman embarks on a surreal, fairytale-like descent into the dark side of beauty at her late mother’s favourite high-end spa, featuring a menacing mirror.
2 / 7
'Natural Beauty' by Ling Ling Huang
Inspired by classical musician and author Ling Ling Huang’s lived experiences, the thriller follows a young piano prodigy as she takes a job at a high-end beauty and wellness store in New York City and attempts to navigate an eerie, privileged, and beauty-obsessed world.
3 / 7
'Chrysalis' by Anna Metcalfe
After an abusive relationship, the unnamed narrator undergoes a metamorphosis to become bigger, stronger, and stiller at the gym. After gaining a vast social media following by showcasing her statuesque body unmoving like a tree and surrounded by plants for hours at a time, she withdraws from society and devotes herself into achieving complete control over her mind and body.
4 / 7
'Grotesque' by Natsuo Kirino
A psychological investigation into the pressures facing middle and working class women in Tokyo, Grotesque follows the lives of an unnamed narrator, her being ‘grotesquely beautiful’, and an overachieving former classmate as they struggle and compete with a society that appears to values youth and beauty above all else.
5 / 7
'If I Had Your Face' by Frances Cha
Frances Cha’s debut novel follows the beautiful and ‘painfully plastic’ Kyuri, who works in a room salon that only hires only the top ten percent of the most beautiful women to entertain their clients. Together with her three friends, the women pave their own roads in present-day Seoul while navigating impossible standards of beauty and expectations for women with eerie threats lurking in the background.
6 / 7
'The Penelopiad' by Margaret Atwood
A discussion on the social horrors of beauty would be incomplete without the face that launched a thousand ships. In Margaret Atwood’s parallel novel to the Odyssey, Helen of Troy is viewed through the lens of her cousin, Penelope, who stridently loathes Helen for her coveted beauty and holds her solely to blame for the Trojan war.
7 / 7
'Look at Me' by Jennifer Egan
After a car accident in her hometown that resulted in extensive facial reconstructive surgery that has altered her face beyond recognition, a veteran fashion model returns to New York as a stranger and begins a new life after being dismissed by the fashion world, where one’s look is oneself.
