When I was in eighth grade or so, I watched both the 1956 movie The Bad Seed and the stage play on which it was based --- and I was scared out of my mind. I was thoroughly unsettled by the images of the seemingly innocent little girl who was, at heart, pure evil. Stories like this one still haunted my thoughts after I got older and had kids of my own. It’s every parent’s nightmare, isn’t it? Doing everything “right” but nevertheless having a child who goes on to commit unspeakable acts of evil. Zoje Stage cleverly unpacks this fear while also offering a chilling portrait of a budding psychopath in her debut novel, BABY TEETH.

Suzette has an enviable life. She’s married to a gorgeous, gentle and brilliant man, Alex, a Swede who makes his living designing environmentally sustainable living spaces, like the beautiful modern home the family shares in Pittsburgh. And the two of them have a smart, adorable young daughter, Hanna. But there are things Suzette doesn’t share with everyone. She remains fixated on memories of her own mother, a self-centered, neglectful woman whose poor performance as a parent has left Suzette determined to do a better job with her own child, quitting her promising career as an interior designer to stay home with Hanna. She also suffers from Crohn’s disease, a sometimes debilitating intestinal disease whose periodic flare-ups have resulted in multiple surgeries and an embarrassing fistula that persisted for years before it healed. Again, Suzette overcompensates for what she fears is her dirtiness and smelliness by compulsively cleaning that beautiful home of hers.

"There’s plenty of suspense and horror in store for readers, but it’s these more subtle and sophisticated questions about parental responsibility and regret that elevate BABY TEETH to a novel really worth thinking about."

Most distressing, though, is the fact that seven-year-old Hanna has never spoken and that Suzette can’t quite shake the feeling that Hanna’s silence is stemming not from any kind of physical or intellectual ailment but from an animosity toward Suzette herself. This dread is only heightened when Hanna finally speaks --- but in the voice of a long-dead French witch who seems to bear ill will toward Suzette. At first, Suzette can’t get Alex to believe her --- especially since Hanna is nothing but sweetness and light when her daddy is around --- but as Hanna’s behavior becomes more and more frightening, not even Alex can keep looking the other way indefinitely.

BABY TEETH is narrated in chapters that alternate between Suzette and Hanna’s points of view. The chapters written from Hanna’s perspective are, naturally, particularly chilling, as readers get a glimpse inside the mind of this young “bad seed” and see just how coldly calculating she is becoming. Some may quibble with the language used in these chapters. Even though it’s written in the third person, it can seem jarring to see words and phrases like “misguided expectations” coming from the same narrative voice that uses “smoochy smoochy” to describe kissing.

But perhaps the most intriguing and ultimately unsettling aspect of Stage’s novel is found within Suzette’s chapters. For underneath all of her aspirations to be a good mother and her dread over what Hanna has become lies an undercurrent of regret about becoming a parent at all, a latent desire for the kind of life and love she had with Alex before Hanna was born. Readers may wonder how Suzette might have related to any child, even a “typical” one --- and may also question if Suzette herself carries motivations that are entirely blameless.

There’s plenty of suspense and horror in store for readers, but it’s these more subtle and sophisticated questions about parental responsibility and regret that elevate BABY TEETH to a novel really worth thinking about.