Delicate Condition is a 2023 Psychological Thriller/Horror by Danielle Valentine. American Horror Story: Delicate, the twelfth season of American Horror Story, is based on this novel.
Actress Anna Victoria Alcott, 36 and her husband Dex are struggling with infertility. When their first attempt at in-vitro fertilization fails, they engage in a second one. The embryos are implanted successfully and Anna gets pregnant. On top of that, her most recent project marks her as a hopeful Academy Award nominee. But all this joy is marred by a stalker, forcing her and Dex to move out of the city and take refuge in a friend's house. During this time, as her pregnancy progresses, Anna becomes convinced that something might be very wrong with her baby, her mind, or both.
The novel contains chapters intercut with Anna's story, taking place anywhere from 1648 to "many, many years later", Most of these are about women who are pregnant or have recently given birth.
The delicate tropes in this work.
- Body Horror: Anna develops a patchy red rash all over her legs. The patches are as rough and thick as a callus.
- Born-Again Immortality: The purpose of the ritual performed by Siobhan. She needs Anna to consent so that she can transfer her soul to Anna's unborn daughter and protect the baby from the consequences of the ritual that brought her to life.
- Born During a Storm: Anna goes into labor during a rainstorm.
- Came Back Wrong: Siobhan casts a spell to bring Anna's miscarried baby back to life. It works, but during the pregnancy, the baby appears less than human.
- Conspiracy Theorist: Io Preecher. Anna describes her thus:"From what I could tell, she seemed to be an old-school, Satanic Panic truther. She believed in satanic cults stealing babies and unborn fetuses for use in depraved rituals."
- Creepy Dolls: Subverted in that the dolls are part of a protection spell and moving them has adverse effects.
- Anna finds a naked Summer Day action figure at the beach, and is creeped out by seeing her face on the doll and the red X in its belly. She later finds another one with a red X on her mouth.
- Dolls appear in the other pregnancy tales. Alice finds corn husk dolls lying around her home. She destroys them.
- Condescending Compassion: Anna gets this from her doctors. When she complains of incapacitating pain, they tell her to take an aspirin or a bath.
- Defiant to the End: After Margaret Jones is found guilty of witchcraft, she is sentenced to be burned at the stake. The defiant look on her face convinced pregnant Alice that Margaret did something to her unborn baby.
- Go Mad from the Isolation: After Betty Anderson gives birth is placed on bed rest and complete isolation by her doctor. By the time her friend Frances visits, she has been in isolation for six weeks. Frances finds her crawling around on the floor, her dress torn and her hair dirty, and claiming that "they" took her baby, just like Frances warned her.
- Here We Go Again!: The last chapter takes place many years after Anna has her child. It has her attending a infertility support group and talking to a young woman who has also been struggling with infertility.
- Horror Hunger:
- Anna, who was not a big meat eater pre-pregnancy, looks at a dead raccoon and finds herself wanting to eat it. Same with a neighborhood cat and her dog Happy.
- While pregnant, Io Preecher found herself craving and eating roadkill.
- Pregnant teen Viviana finds herself craving raw meat.
- Imperiled in Pregnancy: Anna is stalked throughout her pregnancy. Right after she goes into labor, she and Dex get into a car crash. He ends up dying of his injuries.
- "It" Is Dehumanizing: Anna refers to her baby as "her" as soon as she learns the sex. After months of being stalked and all the signs that the baby is something other than human, by the time she is about to give birth, Anna is disturbed:"What is it? I thought. What does it want?"
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Anna accepts Olympia's offer of unblocking her memories about the ritual that Siobhan performed while she was in labor
- Law of Inverse Fertility: Anna needs to resort to expensive and painful treatments to conceive. In the other chapters:
- Abigail (1789) is a woman of wealth who cannot get pregnant until her lady's maid takes her to a folk healer. Lucy (1648) is also unable to conceive until she receives advice from a midwife.
- Judy (1957) finds herself pregnant again at 42, an age she considers obscene. She already has four children and feels desperate about her situation. Viviana, the daughter of strict Catholic parents, finds herself pregnant at sixteen.
- Man Bites Man: Anna goes into labor after learning that Dex has been cheating on her. On the way to the hospital, the sight of his wedding band enrages her to the point that she bites it off his finger.
- Mark of the Supernatural: In the "Alice Parsons, 1648" chapter, a woman is put on trial for witchcraft. Siobhan has a similar one, and Anna's daughter is born with one:"Margaret had been taken away two days ago and held in prison, where her jailer was said to have found the mark of the devil—a deep red stain like a little handprint just below her chin. A near certain sign of a witch."
- No Historical Figures Were Harmed
- Dr. J. Marion Syms, or rather, his statue. Medical student Rayna ("Rayna Perkins, 2018" chapter) goes out of her way to spit at the feet of the statue in Central Park whenever she walks by. She has nothing but contempt for a man whom Rayna's professors call "the father of modern gynecology
". She notes that they never mention Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey, three of the enslaved women he purchased to practice his procedures without consent or anesthesia. Rayna is present when his statue is torn down. - In "Betty Anderson, 1833", Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell places the titular character on his famous rest cure after she gives birth. By the time her friend Frances visits, she has been in isolation for six weeks.
- Dr. J. Marion Syms, or rather, his statue. Medical student Rayna ("Rayna Perkins, 2018" chapter) goes out of her way to spit at the feet of the statue in Central Park whenever she walks by. She has nothing but contempt for a man whom Rayna's professors call "the father of modern gynecology
- Real Award, Fictional Character: Anna is nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award for her role in The Auteur. She is unable to do much publicity or to attend the ceremony due to being put on bed rest; and loses to Gugu Mbatha Raw, for her role as Ophelia in a film adaptation of Hamlet.
- Red Herring: Anna's publicist Emily, Talia, and Conspiracy Theorist Io Preecher are all suspected of being Anna's stalker.
- The Reveal: Anna's friend Siobhan is a member of a coven. She wanted to help Anna after hearing about the miscarriage, so she set off a spell to bring the baby back to life—at the cost of her life.
- Show Within a Show: Of the "characters involved in production" type, since Anna is an actress.
- As a teen, she played protagonist Summer Day in Spellbound, a show that sounds like Sabrina the Teenage Witch in everything but name.
- Afterwards, Anna spends almost two decades as a character actress, until her most recent project, The Auteur goes from arthouse film to mainstream success.
- Trans Tribulations: Just like Anna and Dex, Talia and her partner Keagan are going through IVF. However, Keagan is trans so he and Talia need to use a sperm donor, making things more complicated.
- Woman Scorned: Anna learns about Dex's infidelity. It eventually ends with her biting off his wedding band right before they get into a car crash.
