The forest eats the girls who wander out after dark . . .‘A dark, atmospheric and riveting debut, wreathed around a love story like no other’ – Samantha Shannon, author of the million-copy bestseller The Priory of the Orange TreeRooted in fairy tales, folklore, and sapphic romance, The Maiden and Her Monster by Maddie Martinez is perfect for readers of Katherine Arden, Ava Reid and Naomi Novik.As the healer’s daughter, Malka has seen how the forest’s curse has plagued her village. But when the Ozmini Church comes to collect its tithe, they don’t listen to the warnings about a monster lurking in the trees. After a clergy girl wanders too close to the forest and Malka’s mother is accused of her murder, Malka strikes an impossible bargain with a zealot Ozmini priest: if she brings him the monster, he will spare her mother from execution.Venturing into the blood-soaked woods, Malka finds a monster, but not the one she expects: an inscrutable, disgraced golem who agrees to implicate herself if Malka will help to free the imprisoned rabbi who created her.But a deal easily made is not easily kept. And as their bargain begins to unveil a much more sinister threat, protecting her people may force Malka to endanger the one person she left home to save – and to face her growing feelings for the very creature she was taught to fear.* * *‘A dark and endlessly enchanting fairy tale’ – Ava Reid, No. 1 New York Times bestselling author of A Study in Drowning‘A gorgeous dark fantasy rendered in detail sharp as a tailor’s needle’ – S. T. Gibson, No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author of A Dowry of Blood‘A dark, poignant fairy tale about resilience, faith, and redemption’ – Allison Saft, the Sunday Times bestselling author of A Dark and Drowning Tide