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I love indie booksellers, so I’m especially stoked that independent booksellers across the South nominated Hellions for the Southern Book Prize in Fiction. “All books nominated for the Southern Book Prize have been submitted by bookseller members of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (SIBA) and have received enthusiastic reviews from Southern booksellers. The 18 finalists, six in each category, received the highest number of nominations and rave reviews, making these books a collection of the most beloved ‘handsells’ of the year in fiction, nonfiction, and literature for young readers.” Readers get to pick the winner.  VOTE HERE by February 1.

I’m a huge fan of Sadie Hartman, author of Feral and Hysterical: Mother Horror’s Ultimate Reading Guide to Dark and Disturbing Fiction by Women, so I’m especially happy to see Hellions listed in “Mother Horror’s Top 50 Horror Books in 2025.”

Two best-of lists highlight Beth Steidle‘s brilliant cover design for Hellions.  Electric Lit included Hellions in “Help Us Choose the Best Book Cover of 2025,” while Literary Hub featured the psychedelic gator cover in “The 173 Best Book Covers of 2025: According to 52 Book Cover Designers.”

Largehearted Boy has great taste in books and music, so I’m delighted to see Hellions on “Largehearted Boy’s Favorite Short Fiction of 2025.” “The stories in Julia Elliott‘s collection Hellions are marvelously diverse and divine magic from everyday lives.” I loved making a Hellions playlist for Largehearted Boy back in April.

The Southern Literary Review recommends Hellions in their “2025 SLR Holiday Gift Guide.” “In Hellions Julia Elliott disturbs and bewitches her readers. This collection defies conventional story telling blending Greek and Roman mythology, mysticism, fairy tales and folklore, as well as allusions to the Old Testament and nursey rhymes. Her female characters are formidable. They reject the maiden, mother, and crone archetypes to introduce a new feminist narrative. And on top of that, Elliott’s prose is transcendent.”

Happy to see Hellions (Tin House, 2025) in Literary Hub‘s “100 Notable Small Press Books of 2025.” A great list. “Hellions poses burning questions about humanity’s place in nature and connection to ancient rituals amid the environmental degradation and tech distractions of the modern world. But it’s way more fun than that makes it sound. In these funny, feminist tales, laced with magic, rule breakers raid hoards, soar to uncanny trampoline heights, visit prehistory through magic dating apps, and follow primal urges. Elliott writes sensory, sensual prose turned up to 11, with descriptions that practically explode. These rich and surprising stories, grounded in archetypal imagery, linger after reading the way a spent firework shimmers in the night sky before fading.” (Jenny Shank)

Author Laura Venita Green, whose genre-bending novel Sister Creatures dropped on October 7, recommends Hellions in “10 Books Featuring Devils, Doppelgangers, Ghosts, and Creepy Dolls” on Electric Literature:

Monsters, beasts, creepy dolls, a mystic manuscript, a Swamp Ape, a Wild Professor, and Pazuzu, the demon from The Exorcist. The eleven stories in this collection have it all. Through the use of myriad fantastical elements, Elliott explores the clashing worlds of children and adults, and how one can never fully understand the other. . . . Rendered in hyper-specific prose, Hellions evokes an underlying tension and uncertainty that feels very true to the human experience. I recommend this book to everyone.

Mother Horror, aka Sadie Hartmann, recently released Feral and Hysterical: Mother Horror’s Reading Guide to Dark and Disturbing Fiction by Women, essential reading for feminists and horror fans. Needless to say, I was thrilled to see Hellions featured in “Dark and Disturbing Fiction for 2025: Horror Gems that Have Set the Course for the Rest of the Year” (The Lineup). Hartmann calls it “a short story collection that lingers—strange, piercing, and deeply unsettling in a way that feels both mythic and personal. . . . There’s a wild, Southern Gothic atmosphere threaded throughout, paired with prose that’s lush and seductive. Julia Elliott understands how to use strangeness with purpose.”

Jonathan Haupt’s review for The Post and Courier nails key themes in Hellions. In “Julia Elliott Pens Collection of Weirdly Wonderful Speculative Short Stories,” Haupt proclaims, “With nods to medieval history, folklore, horror, science fiction and Southern gothic coming-of-age narratives, Elliott traverses an uncanny and generally rural landscape where outsider heroes (or anti-heroes) escape normalcy by embracing the sublime or surreal otherworldliness inherent to who they were always meant to be.”

Oh how I love Amanda Trout’s New Letters review. In “Hellions by Julia Elliott,” Trout states, “In what reads as a spiritual successor to her debut collection The Wilds, Pushcart Prize-winning author Julia Elliott has once again proven her mastery of the sinister folkloric short story with Hellions. This set of eleven tales enchants its readers with legends of monstrous alligators, flying cabins, bewitched children, and more, all in Elliott’s signature Southern Gothic-meets-fairy-tale style. Match this expansive world with the exquisite poise of Elliott’s writing—the whimsical diction, the attention to detail, the bold blend of archaic chant with modern slang—and you have the makings of a masterpiece.”