Want to learn the ideas in The Bloody Chamber better than ever? Read the world’s #1 book summary of The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter here.

Read a brief 1-Page Summary or watch video summaries curated by our expert team. Note: this book guide is not affiliated with or endorsed by the publisher or author, and we always encourage you to purchase and read the full book.

Video Summaries of The Bloody Chamber

We’ve scoured the Internet for the very best videos on The Bloody Chamber, from high-quality videos summaries to interviews or commentary by Angela Carter.

1-Page Summary of The Bloody Chamber

Overall Summary

In The Bloody Chamber, a young woman moves into her husband’s castle. She finds sadistic pornography and loses her virginity to the Marquis. He then leaves for business and entrusts his keys to his wife, forbidding her from one room. Upon entering that forbidden room, she sees the bodies of the Marquis’ three previous wives.

A young woman (the heroine) tells a piano tuner about her encounter with the Marquis. The Marquis comes back and prepares to kill the heroine, but her mother shoots him first. She inherits his fortune and lives happily ever after with the piano tuner and her mother. In “The Courtship of Mr Lyon,” Beauty’s father finds refuge from a snowstorm at an empty mansion on his way out he takes a white rose then the Beast appears in lion-like form. He makes Beauty come for dinner where he asks if she will stay with him promising that her father’s fortunes will be restored if she does so. She agrees and spends time alone while talking to the Beast during their nights together when they become rich again she leaves without telling him before winter ends only returning when he is dying in bed kissing his hands which turns into a man.”

A Russian man gambles away his daughter to a nobleman called The Beast. The valet takes the heroine to a mansion, where she must disrobe and show herself naked in front of The Beast. She refuses and is put in an automated room with a robot maid. During their next outing, The Beast transforms into a tiger and licks her skin off as she turns into one as well.

In the play “Puss in Boots”, Figaro is a clever cat who helps his master get into bed with another man’s wife. The young, promiscuous master falls for a woman whose husband is very protective of her. Eventually, the cat trips up the husband and he falls to his death while having sex with the young woman next to him.

In “The Erl-King,” a girl wanders into the woods and is seduced by an elf king. He lives in harmony with nature, has many birds in cages, and she learns that they were once girls. She strangles him and sets the birds free.

In a story called “The Snow Child,” a Count creates a child out of his hopes and dreams. However, the child dies because she pricks her finger on a rose thorn. The Count then has sex with the dead child’s body until it melts away.

A young soldier is lured into a mansion by a beautiful girl vampire. The Countess cuts herself on some glass and the young man kisses her wound, making her mortal and die. He takes a rose from her as he heads off to war.

In “The Werewolf,” a child travels through the forest to visit her grandmother. She is attacked by a wolf and cuts off its hand. When she reaches her grandmother’s house, she finds that her grandmother is missing a hand, so the neighbors kill the grandmother. In “The Company of Wolves,” a child goes to visit her grandmother and meets a handsome huntsman on the way. The huntsman gets to the grandma’s house first, transforms into a wolf, and eats his grandma. The child arrives and seduces him before he can eat her too. In “Wolf-Alice” an abandoned girl named Alice grows up with wolves but then nuns take in Wolf-Alice (the nickname given to Alice because of how much time she spends with wolves). They give Wolf-Alice back to werewolves who run away from them when they see Wolf-Alice licking their wounded leader’s wound clean; this action turns him human again instead of killing him like it would have if done by anyone else other than someone bitten by another werewolf or half werewolf like herself

The Bloody Chamber

The heroine thinks back to the time she left Paris with her new husband. She remembers leaving her mother, who was strong and independent, having fought pirates in the past and killed a tiger. The mother asks if the heroine loves him; she admits that she does not love him, but still feels compelled to marry him because he is rich. The mother accepts this as something that will help their family out of poverty, since they are poor and need money from his wealthy status.

The Bloody Chamber Book Summary, by Angela Carter