A friend pitched The Society for Soulless Girls to me as “Legally Blonde’s Elle and Vivian fall in love while solving supernatural murders.” How could I resist? Fanfic-inspired literature has seen a boom in the BookTok era, but The Society for Soulless Girls is not among these entries: the similarities between Carvell freshmen Lottie and Alice aren’t a one-for-one parallel between the Legally Blonde protagonists—yet this hook-worthy sales pitch remains an apt launchpad to discuss the novel.
Though Lottie and Alice fulfill all the criteria of a grumpy/sunshine pairing, both have an inherent dark side to explore based on their interest in attending the cursed Carvell Academy. The fictional university shuddered its doors for ten years after a string of unsolved murders occurred at the campus’ North Tower. When field hockey player and aspiring true-crime journalist Lottie Fitzwilliam enrolled at Carvell, she was possessed by an overwhelming gumption that she’d be the one to crack the decade-old case. Unfortunately, gumption was far from the only thing to possess Lottie during her first semester.
Enter Lottie’s emotionally guarded roommate Alice Wolfe. A burning, unimaginable anger festers within the goth philosophy student, threatening her dreams of becoming a lawyer and opening her up to a friendship (or maybe more) with Lottie. When Alice stumbles upon an ancient ritual to dissuade her of these violent impulses, the many webs of Carvell’s mysterious and morbid history begin to unravel before her and Lottie.
Steven dedicates her novel to “the girls who were born angry,” which denotes another immediate hook for me. The underlying themes of The Society for Soulless Girls often had me flipping my mental jukebox between grunge band Veruca Salt’s anger homage “Seether” and Sleater-Kinney’s “Was It a Lie?”
From music to literature, I’m consistently attracted to the theme of feminine anger, though it can sometimes be challenging to find a narrative that approaches the subject with the assertive direction found within the pages of The Society for Soulless Girls. Though anger, particularly Alice’s, permeates much of the book, Steven’s unfolding mystery reveals that the emotion plays a much more practical role in the novel’s central plot. In this manner, anger serves a blunt mechanic function that works well for the scope of Steven’s story.
The Society for Soulless Girls incorporates Catholicism and the convent into its long lineage of feminine rage, via the matriarchal figure of Sister Maria. While this allows for the reexamination of classic horror centerpieces such as exorcisms and possession through a historically feminist lens, it also sets a distinct tone for the novel. Carvell Academy leaps off the page as Lottie and Alice navigate its darkest corners, and the established base of Catholicism makes it feel uniquely grounded by adding a specific texture to the ever-growing landscape of dark academia.
As hinted, the academically minded Alice serves as the lighting rod to explore The Society for Soulless Girls’ central theme, and her characterization immediately sparked my interest in Steven’s supernatural-drenched angle on anger. Though somewhat broody and often described as goth, Alice doesn’t necessarily bear the usual markers of a character possessed by anger issues. And though an act of violence enacted by an ex once made Alice feel powerless, that incident does not necessarily encompass the origin of her rage. Instead, this anger is presented as a reality that’s likely always existed inside the bookish protagonist, just like it could across an array of people outside the expected archetypes typically associated with such behavior.
Alice’s stoic seething not only makes her a refreshing character, but balances nicely against Lottie’s Scooby Doo-esque enthusiasm regarding the same morbid subjects. The two find themselves romantically drawn to one another as they grapple with wrenching supernatural threats that continually pry at the delicate trust they’ve established.
Though The Society for Soulless Girls firmly operates in the realm of dark academia and supernatural horror, Alice and Lottie’s sickly-sweet chemistry allows for a welcomed rom-com juxtaposition to the pervading terrors of Carvell. Aside from the previously mentioned grumpy/sunshine trope, the accursed duo deal in a coterie of beloved genre trappings such as enemies-to-friends-to-lovers, roommates, “everyone knows but them,” and even a side of butterfly-inducing bed-sharing (to wash down the body horror).
While dark academia pairs perfectly with the fall, the genre has proven a tried-and-true backdrop for amplifying sapphic stories as well. The Society for Soulless Girls fondly reminds me of other fall favorites such as A Lesson in Vengeance and Wilder Girls.
And though the book proves a less treacherous read than the in-universe tome Soul Purification Rituals in 19th-Century Convents, it should be stated that the novel deals in subjects some readers may wish to avoid—specifically suicide. Blood and bejeweled body horror likewise abound in Steven’s page-turning sapphic excursion.