Shesheshen has made a mistake fatal to all monsters: she's fallen in love. Shesheshen is a shapeshifter, who happily resides as an amorphous lump at the bottom of a ruined manor. When her rest is interrupted by impolite monster hunters, she constructs a body from the remains of past meals: a metal chain for a backbone, borrowed bones for limbs, and a bear trap as an extra mouth.
Badly hurt by the hunters, Shesheshen's nursed back to health by Homily, a warm-hearted human. Homily is kind and would make a great co-parent: an ideal place to lay Shesheshen's eggs so their young can devour Homily from the inside out. But as they grow close, Shesheshen realizes that eating her girlfriend isn't an option.
Just as Shesheshen's about to confess her identity, Homily reveals something else: she's hunting a shapeshifting monster that supposedly cursed her family. Has Shesheshen seen it anywhere?
Shesheshen didn't curse anyone, so now she has to figure out why Homily's twisted family thinks she did. As Shesheshen's hunt for the monster becomes increasingly deadly, the bigger challenge remains: learning how to build a life
with, rather than
in, the woman she loves.