Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s Reviews > Come See the Living Dryad

4.5 stars. Free novella (not really a fantasy, more a dual timeline mystery) here on Tor.com. Review first posted on Fantasy Literature (along with six other short fiction reviews):

Dr. Daphne Levitt, an American university professor, travels to Great Britain to investigate the murder of one of her ancestors, Daphne Merwin, as part of a book she is writing. The Victorian-era Daphne suffered from an extremely rare genetic disease known as Lewandowsky-Lutz dysplasia or “Tree Man” disease, which can result in crippling wood-like growths, especially on the hands and feet. She ended up as the star attraction in a Victorian freak show, and was married to Professor Lewison Merwin, the proprietor of the quasi-scientific show. The police arrested a habitual drunk, semi-homeless man, Alfred Potts, for her murder, and he was hanged shortly after.

Dr. Levitt feels a connection to her ancestress, especially because she shares a milder form of the same disease. As she reviews the evidence, including a knife and a blood-stained nightgown, she realizes that it is pointing her to a different answer about the murder.

This novelette alternates between excerpts from Dr. Levitt’s book The British Freak Show at the Fin-de-Siècle, passages from the Victorian-era Daphne’s personal journal, and newspaper clippings and correspondence. Together, they create a sympathetic picture of a woman striving to live with dignity against all odds, and her great-great-granddaughter’s search for the truth.

I would rather be back on the streets of London, begging for crusts of bread. Am I insensate, a piece of wood for him to move about as he wishes? Am I the mythical creature he likes to call me? No, I am human, whatever I may appear to be. I breathe, I feel, I love.

Although Tor calls this a fantasy, it’s not actually speculative fiction. Tree Man disease is an actual disorder; a Google image search shows heartrending images of a few people who suffer from this disease. But Theodora Goss has written a touching, quietly tragic tale of a woman who yearned to be seen as human, not as just a strange curiosity.