Haunted Houses

Haunted Houses is the story of three young women. Jane's occasionally violent father reads her the Gettysburg Address at bedtimes, while Emily's parents are FDR Democrats who only privately concede she may be normal. Grace believes her dolls come alive at night and talk against her, and has a mother who likes animals more than people. Tillman charts the girls' unsteady drift into womanhood, revealing the multiple forms of inheritance - family, gender, culture - that a girl must swallow or rebel against.