The Humours of Grub Street

Note: The author has withdrawn the rights to this book and it will not be published by ChiZine Publications.When Rye Hackett publishes his first political broadside in 1703, he finds out the hard way why there are so many writers in London's Grub Street: the monsters won't let them leave. After watching his hero Daniel Defoe stand in the pillory, a young lawyer named Rye Hackett gets the courage to publish a political essay. The moment he does, a woman made of mercury spirits him away to a maze of alleys and gin shops. Rye can't hide from the politicians who suspect his loyalties or from the mercury-women and printer's devils who guard Grub Street at the behest of their mysterious master. If Rye can't convince the scattered witches of London to help him, he'll end up in the pillory himself, or dead―and England could fall back into civil war.

Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“The novel is written with arresting detail and challenges literary tropes about women. Its roster includes half a dozen complex female characters and one trans male character, all of them captivating, sympathetic, repulsive, flawed, dangerous, selfless, determined, and damaged. They and Heartfield’s powerful battle scenes make this well worth the price of admission.”

Liz Bourke, Tor.com

“Armed in Her Fashion is Kate Heartfield’s debut novel, and what a strange, compelling, genre-bending debut it is. Part horror, part fantasy, part history, and part epic, it combines all of its elements into a commentary on gender, power, and patriarchy. . . . I really enjoyed Armed in Her Fashion. It’s worth reading. I may, in fact, need to read it again: there are interesting layers in the thematic work that Heartfield’s doing, and I’m not convinced I caught them all in one sitting. In other words, I recommend it.”

About the Author

Kate Heartfield is the author of dozens of speculative-fiction stories, including “The Seven O’Clock Man,” which was longlisted for the Sunburst Award. Her interactive novel The Road to Canterbury is coming soon from Choice of Games. Her novella The Course of True Love was published in 2016 as part of the Shakespearean fantasy collection Monstrous Little Voices from Abaddon Books. She recently had two novellas published through Tor.com: Alice Payne Arrives and Alice Payne Rides. Her first novel, Armed In Her Fashion, was released by CZP in 2018 and was nominated for several major SF/Fantasy awards. Kate grew up in Manitoba, lived for a year in Belize and now lives in rural Ottawa with her partner and their son. A former newspaper editor, she now makes her living as a freelance editor, teacher and writer.

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