Providence Girls is a sapphic horror romance novel written by Morgan Dante, inspired by the works of H. P. Lovecraft with a romantic twist.
Told through the letters between Lavinia "Vin" Whateley and Asenath "Azzie" Waite, their paths cross when Vin is discovered nearly dead and brought into the care of Azzie. From there, a budding relationship forms between the two women as they bond over their painful pasts and their struggles to make new lives for themselves.
However, Vin notices that her dear friend has been exhibiting worrying signs of changes in her body. At first, it was just hair falling out; but as time goes on, the symptoms grow worse...
Dear Providence Girls; let me shares you these examples:
- Abusive Dad: Both Vin and Azzie had to deal with fathers that didn't love them and did them wrong.
- Vin's father was abusive to his daughter throughout her life. And that's not even getting into the fact he raped his own daughter while channeling Yog-Sothoth to produce the twins.
- Azzie's father never had any affection for his daughter because he believed women to be weak, stupid and "inferior". He even goes so far as to steal her body so he could find a "superior" body for himself while leaving her in his corpse. However, it doesn't stick.
- Albinos Are Freaks: This is a sore spot for Vin as she has experienced prejudice against her for her being born albino, like her mother before her.
- Apologizes a Lot: Vin has a really bad habit of apologizing every time she says or does something she perceives wasn't right. Azzie calls her out on it after a while, which helps Vin grow out of it.
- Body Horror: Over the course of the story, Azzie experiences the warning signs of her physical transformation into a Deep One, like her mother before her. Vin eventually notices these and does her best to help her through it.
- Content Warnings: The author warns of disturbing content that would make readers uncomfortable in the novel, from abuse to body issues.
- Dies Differently in Adaptation: In The Thing on the Doorstep, Daniel Upton kills Ephraim Waite to prevent him from walking free in his friend's body. Here, however, Azzie killed her father herself by shooting him and then cremating the body he took over for good measure.
- Epistolary Novel: The entire story is told through the letters between Vin and Azzie as they share their experiences, hopes and struggles with their personal traumas.
- Grand Theft Me: Azzie's father pulled this on her with the intention of finding a "superior" body for himself while getting rid of Azzie herself. However, Azzie manages to free herself from her father's corpse and take back her own body years later.
- Human Sacrifice: This fate almost befell Vin at the hands of the people of Dunwich, but her son Wilbur warned her about it, giving her the chance to escape.
- Interspecies Romance: A lesbian variant. Vin slowly falls in love with Azzie, who is the descendant of the Deep Ones from Innsmouth.
- Locked Out of the Loop:
- Azzie attempted to do this when she learned via newspaper that Vin's son, Wilbur, was killed by guard dogs at Miskatonic University just to protect Vin's feelings. This backfired on her, however, when she finds out anyway.
- Averted by Vin. When she picks up a newspaper about the raid on Innsmouth, she shows Azzie the news as she didn't want to keep her in the dark since the town involved Azzie's mother.
- Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Vin is the feminine with her girlish personality and her preference of wearing dresses, while Azzie is the masculine with her stoic personality and tendency to wear men's clothes.
- Missing Mom:
- Vin's mother was killed years prior to the story by the townsfolk, leaving her with an abusive father.
- Azzie's mother was shut away for years due to her change into a Deep One. Azzie last knew that she was headed to Innsmouth, but whether her mother survived the raid or not is left up in the air.
- Ominous Hair Loss: Over a period of time, Azzie noticed that her hair has been falling out in larger quantities without new ones growing out, the first clue to her progressive transformation into a Deep One.
- Parental Incest: A non-consensual, abusive type. While channeling the Outer God he worships; Vin's father raped her for the purpose of producing the children of Yog-Sothoth.
- Patricide: Once she finally managed to take back her own body, Azzie took this opportunity to kill her father (who had already claimed a new body for himself) and cremate the body to get rid of him for good.
- Spared by the Adaptation: Vin and Azzie, unlike in Lovecraft's original stories (Lavinia supposedly dies at Wilbur's hands and Asenath has her body stolen by her father and left to die), survive and try to establish a new life.
- The Tooth Hurts: Later on, Azzie experiences pains in her mouth from losing her teeth as the latest stage of her transformation.
- Violently Protective Girlfriend: A lesbian variant. When Dr. Philips comes to the house to find Azzie drastically transformed and threatens Vin under the superstitious assumption she did something, Azzie attacks and kills Dr. Philips.
