[Book Review] Tradwife (2026)

“Maybe I don’t want to raise a traditional wife. Maybe I want to raise a feral woman.”

In August 2025, the word “tradwife” (a portmanteau of traditional and wife) was added to the Oxford English dictionary. The term refers to members of an internet subculture made up of women who promote “traditional gender roles”.  The tradwife subculture has gained traction in the last few years as influencers such as Nara Smith and Hannah Neeleman (better known as ballerinafarm) began posting videos of their lives on social media. It’s a subculture that leans decidedly, sinisterly far-right – and it’s with this thread of baked-in horror that author Saratoga Schaefer gleefully runs riot in their new novel, Tradwife (2026).

Camille Deming is, on paper, a typical tradwife. In her brand-new two-story farmhouse home, she cooks and cleans for her husband Graham while documenting it all for her followers on social media. But behind the carefully crafted shots of her aesthetically pleasing kitchen and golden hour selfies lies a mounting despair. Camille needs to get pregnant. She feels having a baby will both cement her position within her online community and strengthen the weakening bond between her and Graham, whose attention in her appears to be waning.

After another negative pregnancy test, Camille heads out to clear her head and goes for a walk in the wheat fields behind her new home. There, hidden out of sight, she discovers a crumbling, ominous well. Out of ideas on how to fulfil her desire for motherhood, she throws a penny in the well and makes a wish. But in the darkness something otherworldly is listening, and that night Camille is visited in her dreams by a terrifying winged creature.

Schaefer pulls off some impressive feats of storytelling in Tradwife – most importantly in the building of their main character. We first meet Camille as she waits for the results of the aforementioned pregnancy test in her bathroom, setting up her tripod and positioning it precisely so she can film the perfect reaction video for her Instagram page. It’s an introduction that could serve to make you instantly dislike her, yet there’s a vulnerability to Camille which Schaefer wastes no time introducing.

Schaefer writes in the present tense from a first-person perspective, allowing the reader to be inside Camille’s head throughout. As the story unfolds and more details about her relationship with Graham and her life before him are revealed, you’ll be rooting for her to end up burning it all down.

Camille is a fascinating character to follow. Exploring the fractures between the love and community she genuinely desires, and her mounting scepticism of this suffocating lifestyle, makes for heartbreaking and sometimes frustrating reading. Giving her an idol to look up to in the form of her favourite tradwife influencer Mara Shoemaker (an aspiring actress turned mum-of-eight who does things like lie and spread misinformation) adds an extra dimension to Camille’s longing for connection.

Another thing Schaefer excels at is writing detailed descriptions, especially once the horror truly kicks in. There is one scene in particular that will make you feel a bit sick in the best possible way. Schaefer’s description of the winged creature who visits Camille’s dreams is also beautiful to read, even though the mental image it conjures (think giant, metallic, Biblically-accurate angel) will haunt your own nightmares.

Schaefer also wastes no time in letting you know that Graham is essentially a walking parade of red flags in a white button-down, and there’s something rather cathartic about getting to hate this man as Camille grows to hate him too. 

All these elements combine to make a riveting, raw and savage story, and once the book truly gets going you won’t want to put it down.But alongside the fun lies a real scathing critique of the tradwife subculture through the eyes of someone on the inside of it. 

In the book’s acknowledgments, Schaefer says that the rise of tradwives is a symptom of society’s larger, more persistent issues. Capitalism, racism, and sexism, have created a culture that can twist simple things such as aesthetics and lifestyle into something far more insidious. The only way out, they state, is not to just go through, but to devour. To consume, to transform and, in that way, resist.

If you’re despairing at the world around you, and you’re looking for catharsis through the medium of horror, read Tradwife. This book will make you angry. Let it do so. And then go out and devour.

Out in hardback from Bantam Books on February 19th 2026!

RELATED ARTICLES

---

---