A ‘traditional wife’ influencer allows a demonic creature to impregnate her in this unnerving horror novel, perfect for fans of Nightbitch and Mary, from the author of Serial Killer Support Group.

Every #tradwife needs a baby. She’ll get one at any cost.

When Camille Deming isn’t cooking, cleaning, or homesteading in her picture-perfect country farmhouse, she’s posting about her tradwife lifestyle for her online followers. She takes inspiration from other tradwives on social media, aspiring to be like them, but Camille’s missing a key component: a baby. And contrary to what she posts online, things with her husband Graham have been strained. Pressured by her eager followers, Camille fears that without a baby, her relationship will suffer and her social media will never grow out of its infancy.

When Camille discovers a mysterious, decrepit well in the wheatfield behind her house, she makes a wish for a baby. Afterwards, she has unsettling experiences that she convinces herself are angelic in nature, and when she’s visited one night by a strange creature, her wish comes true.

Camille’s pregnancy announcement gets more engagement than anything she’s ever posted—so what if Graham’s reaction is lukewarm? Camille’s life is finally falling into place. Never mind that her pregnancy is developing freakishly rapidly and she’s suddenly craving raw meat. Being a traditional wife is worth it.

Rosemary’s Baby for the digital age, this disturbing horror novel is one you’ll want to devour in just one bite.

I’ll be honest with you. I selected this book from Aardvark because I wanted to watch the nauseating “trad wife” movement get absolutely roasted. You know the type. Carefully curated farmhouse. Flour on the apron that definitely got there on purpose. Posting videos about “biblical womanhood” and the importance of large families while running a full-time content operation. Yeah. Them. I was ready to enjoy a good skewering, and Saratoga Schaefer absolutely delivers on that front. What I didn’t expect was how much the book would stick with me after I finished it.

Camille is a tradwife influencer who desperately wants to go viral. The problem is she’s missing the one thing required for a legit trad wife: a baby. What her followers don’t know is that her marriage is quietly falling apart behind the scenes, and the pressure from strangers on the internet is somehow louder than anything happening in her actual life. When she finds a creepy old well on her property and makes a wish, things get weird fast. And when a mysterious creature shows up in the night and her baby wish comes true, Camille convinces herself it was divine intervention. Because of course she does. Yeah, that thing totally wasn’t a demon. It was an angel answering her prayers.

Camille is a fascinating character to follow, and not because you’re rooting for her. You’re watching her make increasingly bad decisions and nodding along like, yep, that tracks. Schaefer does something really smart here. She doesn’t write Camille as stupid. She writes her as someone so desperate for validation from strangers that she will reframe literally anything to fit the story she needs to tell. The demonic pregnancy? Angelic. The raw meat cravings? Just a phase. The fact that her husband is clearly uninterested in her? He’s just adjusting to their new home. Camille’s ability to rationalize is the scariest thing in this book, and that’s saying something because there is some genuinely unsettling stuff in here.

The pacing is tight. Every chapter drops you somewhere slightly more unhinged than the last, and Schaefer doesn’t ease you into the horror. She lets it creep into the spaces between Camille’s perfectly edited posts and her increasingly unraveling reality. The gore, when it shows up, earns its place. By the time things get truly graphic, you’ve been watching Camille make small sacrifices for so long that the big ones feel almost inevitable.

What makes this book land, though, is that it’s not just about tradwives specifically. It’s about all of us and our embarrassing hunger to matter to strangers. Camille’s particular flavor of that hunger happens to involve linen dresses and sourdough starter, but the core impulse is recognizable. How far would you go to feel seen? Schaefer is asking that question and then answering it in the most disturbing way possible.

If you like your horror with a side of social commentary, pick this one up. It reads fast, it gets under your skin, and it has things to say that go beyond the obvious satire. Highly recommended.

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