Mrs. Caliban Summary
Rachel Ingalls

Mrs. Caliban Overview

Mrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalls is a strange novella about a housewife and a monster. When an escaped frog-man guilty of killing his captors at the Jefferson Institute for Oceanographic Research shows up in Dorothy's kitchen, she decides to harbor him in her spare bedroom until she can find an excuse to drive him back home to the Gulf of Mexico. In the meantime, the two begin an illicit affair. However, when the monster sneaks out at night and attacks a cruel gang of teenage boys, the pressure of the situation increases, and Dorothy fears she might not be able to save the beast after all. The novel explores domesticity, isolation, empathy, the media, and mental health.