The short story novella “Cabbage” is just the thing to awaken your spring senses! Our gardens love us and will stop at nothing to reciprocate that adoration! Rosemary wishes to spend her last days battling her illness at home with her husband Thomas and among the flora and fauna she cultivated. What Thomas didn’t anticipate was the blooming life forces in the field, eager to both worship Rosemary in her finals hours and avenge those who have trespassed against her! The gorgeous cover art caught my eye for this book. What I liked best is that often when someone is going through a tragic terminal illness, we grieve for them and undergo a process of emotions with a sort of horror being one of them. That horror is wrapped up into thoughts like "I'm glad it's not me" and "that person must feel horrible" and "how are they facing death so soon?" We don't think about the impact of the loss people around the affected person will feel, and in this case Thomas confronts something even worse! As a plant person, it's also really satisfying to read about Rosemary's garden coming alive as she herself is perishing. All in all, a very fast and interesting read, can't wait to read more from the author! Thanks to NetGalley and Publisher for the ARC!

This is a great little horror story!

The premise is not too complicated. A husband and wife move to a small farm so that the ailing wife can spend the last of her days in a garden. However, after a small accident, they discover the garden can give them wonderful things, but for a sacrifice.

The story follows many common tropes that come with monkey paw wishes, but I was surprised by a couple of the twists and turns. Although it's a story I've read before, I genuinely enjoyed the morning I spent reading it. I do think this is a great spring horror story, dripping in flowers, vegetation, and images of how life can be just as monstrous as death.

This book was written so well. You can really see how much time and effort the author put into their work. Each chapter is started with a different quote that correlates perfectly to this authors own writing.

The visualization of the garden and the personification of the vegetables really painted a picture in my mind.

Though short, this story covers greed, grief, love, and sacrifice. In the end the inevitable is bound to happen and the process is beautiful.

What a weird little story. In a terrifying and fascinating way....

Cabbage confronts the past of an older couple, one who is dealing with end of life treatment at home, through mystical going ons after an accident with blood and the cabbage patch in their garden.

Spooky.

Interesting title to begin with, I wonder what kinda story Im going to get about a cabbage and where this is going to lead??

Im greeted with descriptive writing that evoke vivid imagery, Im a very visual thinker if that's a thing and it's really important that I can create that image of the characters, the settings, the feel of the scene etc and this book definitely did that with every single word. I felt I was there with them so we're off to a good start.

This honestly took a turn that I did not expect, again the descriptive words, smells all created a hilariously bizzare image... Im wondering at this point if I've accidentally taken some sort of hallucinogenics.... Safe to say the images at the end of each chapter helped in convincing me I must have, there's no other explanation to what Im now seeing and thinking!

We're essentially with an old couple, Rosemary is on her last legs and Thomas the clumsy fool drops some blood on the cabbage plants... No scenario has ended well with spilt blood has it? It's all downhill from here and im dragged down the garden path of pure madness. Safe to say Im now scared of cabbages.


It's a short story, of which I'm quite glad of because I don't think a full book of that would have kept me reading, I would have literally lost my mind! But it was quite entertaining, safe to say nothing was predictable in any way and it was a fun little read.

Fast paced read. Gross and unsettling. I’ll never look at a garden the same way again. If Scott Smith’s The Ruins spooked you, you’ll enjoy the chills and thrills of this short tale.

Who knew a book about cabbage could warm my heart this way?

This book was written so well. You can really see how much time and effort the author put into their work. Each chapter is started with a different quote that correlates perfectly to this authors own writing.

The visualization of the garden and the personification of the vegetables really painted a picture in my mind.

Though short, this story covers greed, grief, love, and sacrifice. In the end the inevitable is bound to happen and the process is beautiful.

Thank you Netgalley and C.S. Fritz for this ARC

🥬🥬🥬Cabbage 🥬🥬🥬

“Does the seed know it must die?”
One of Rosemary’s final requests of her husband was to create the garden of her dreams. A place where she could live the remainder of her days in peace. A place that will remind her of her best moments and memories long past. Thomas toils day and night to complete it, but in a moment of carelessness in the cabbage patch, he unknowingly rips the veil between the natural and unnatural. What was meant to be a gift rapidly blossoms into an overwhelming curse—one that unleashes a cornucopia of dread, tension, and fraught.

A positivity weird short story that I really enjoyed.
Dealing with sensitive subjects such as grieving and life ending illness this was an interesting and emotional read combined with craziness.
If you enjoy Sayaka Murata books and stories then I think you will want to read this. It reminded me of Life Ceremony and Hare House by Sally Hinchcliffe.

Thanks to netgalley for my ecopy!

Such a weirdly beautiful story! The imagery was so well done, along with the character development done within such a short amount of time. I think it’s so beautiful that from death life was born, and sustained in a way. I was saddened for the husband but elated for the wife in a way for a second chance, of life and of witnessing miracles.

"Cabbage" by C.S. Fritz could be placed somewhere between the witch's vegetable patch in "Rapunzel", Roman Polanski's "Rosemary's Baby", the plants born from Vendredi's sperm in Michel Tournier's "Vendredi ou la vie sauvage" or the legend that children come from cabbages. "Cabbage", a dark and poetic fairy tale, will appeal to those who have read "Helpmeet" by Naben Ruthnum.

Thomas, Rosemary's husband, has only one desire: to make his wife Rosemary, who is suffering from pancreatic cancer, happy. To this end, he tends a magnificent vegetable garden where he plants his favourite flowers as well as cabbages. When he breaks a vial of blood on the vegetable, it seems to magically grant wishes.
This is a subtle tale of loss and mourning, but also of life itself and its many transformations. The writing is poetic and gripping, and makes me want to read more of the author's work.

Although I wasn't always captivated by the quotes between the chapters, I loved the cover as much as the Spotify playlist!

Thank you to NetGalley and Albatross Book Co. for this wonderful discovery!

A definitive 5/5 !

This is a short horror story following an elderly couple after the wife's terminal cancer diagnosis. The husband, wanting to make her last months more pleasurable, has planted a wonderful garden for her to enjoy. But after the husband accidentally waters a red cabbage with his wife's blood a miracle happens and after that, things will change.
This is a really interesting horror story, with a lush garden fed by blood and desire, exploring the interplay between curse and miracle, love and hatred, life and death. My absolute highlight were the vibrant and wonderful descriptions of the vegetables and flowers growing the in the garden. It all felt lush and delicious and made me feel as if I could sink my teeth into a ripe tomatoe in just a second. It definitely made my visualisations of everything going on so much more vivid and unsettling and horrifyingly beautiful!
The pacing is also very well done with just enough set up to understand what's going on before the horrors begin and things start to unravel. It also works very well as a short story and explores many unsettling themes, but if the author ever decided to extend it into a longer story I would love to check that out as well! In general some parts could have been extended a bit, increasing immersion without making this feel bogged down in any way, which is my only complaint.
Finally, I really enjoyed that the author includes quotes at the beginning of each chapter that fit the vibes of the story perfectly without giving too much away and led to me making guesses about the direction the chapter could take all the time and still finding myself surprised when it didn't go the way I thought it would. But when I then looked back at the quotes I found they still fit perfectly, just not the way I had thought they would.

The cover of this book appealed to me and I went in completely blind. I ended up giving this short story 4 stars because I loved the crescendo pace: I loved how it started in a comfortable setting showing us an old couple living their last days together as the wife is about to die of pancreatic cancer. The husband meant ro do well by making her a garden but his clumsiness turned their final days into a horror movie. The horror brought up old resentment which led to the wife making him pay for old mistakes.

A great palate cleanser full of gorgeous and deep quotes.

This was such a quick and unique read and I absolutely loved the premise! The story was unsettling and weird in the best way, and I really think it was made for this type of (short story) format.

Unfortunately, the pacing took me out of the story a little bit, and some of the characters’ choices felt incredibly abrupt. I wish certain scenes had been expanded upon to eliminate this reading whiplash.

Overall, I enjoyed the story, and the imagery was incredible. I also really liked how the author tied various quotes into the narrative — I found that they added an interesting layer of nuance that can sometimes be missing in short stories simply due to their length.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Cabbage is a short Novella delving into loss, love, resentment with some creepy happenings throughout.

A very enjoyable short read, with really touching moments of past resentment and the ways that can play out for both parties all the while dealing with the inevitable death of a loved one.

I would have loved some more context in places, there were continuously hints of something bad happening before and unfortunately the question wasn't answered but overall an enjoyable quick read.

🥬👁️Short Story Review👁️🥬

Title: Cabbage
Author: @casey_fritz

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Thoughts: This was weird and I happen to love weird 😅. What I really love about it though is its originality.
This short story hits upon the grief of preparing to loose a partner to an incurable disease, the loss of a child, and creates a poetic tone for life born from death.
I love death talk being integrated into our culture and for a creepy little tale, this did so.
Now I'm rating this 4 ⭐️'s as a short story. For me, short stories have a different jive apart from books that have 200+ pages to allow character development and plot lines.

2.5 stars

this was a creepy and unsettling little novella! i like the concept of the story but i think the execution fell short mostly due to the length. i also liked the ending and the curated playlist! if it were longer and included more background details, i think this could’ve been a 4 star book.

A unique horror short story.

I never thought that I would see a garden from this point of view.

Well crafted and mesmerizing.

Goodness review DarkS

With what would have been an easy read, the choice of words used at times meant the story lost its immersiveness. I thought I’d give a different genre a go compared to normal and I’m gutted the characters were wooden.

Positives - the plot was well paced and writing style despite the vocab choices was nice to read.

Undoubtedly the writer will improve in the future but due to the lack of immersion I cannot rate this higher.

This is a story about a dying wife, her husband, and the garden that he built for her…

This short story by CS Fritz could easily have been a solid 4 star read for me, however it had just a few too many elements that I took issue with. The story was well paced, with a plot that was gripping, which should have made this an easy read, however quirks of word choice drew me out of the story frequently, and made it hard to immerse myself. Furthermore, the characters really let this story down for me. They felt wooden and unrealistic, almost entirely unphased by the supernatural happenings surrounding them. The other issue I had with the story was the lack of foreshadowing for the major plot development about two thirds through. There’s what felt to me a glaringly obvious piece of foreshadowing the page before, but no mention of anything prior to that.

However, with that said, the themes of this book were incredibly strong, and while there was odd prose at moments, Fritz was nonetheless able to create an incredibly disturbing and creepy setting in a short space of time, with a thoroughly entertaining plot and ending. This was a story that could have been fantastic but let down by just a couple of parts of the storytelling.

I absolutely loved this. It’s a super short novella, read it in under an hour

This novella covers grief and sacrifice, and what we’re willing to do for the ones we love. It’s so surreal and creepy, and the Spotify playlist makes this SO much more eerie. I will definitely be rereading this one again.