Several of the stories feature unnamed female first- or third-person narrators who are leaving childhood behind and entering into complex and dangerous marriages. Although they are not specifically meant to be the same person, they share elements in common with each other and with young women of a particular era and culture. In “The Bloody Chamber,” “The Courtship of Mr Lyon,” “The Tiger’s Bride,” and in some respects “The Company of Wolves,” the narrators are young virgins who are insulated from the terrors of the world by their innocent purity. When that innocence becomes compromised, each is faced with a choice about how to move into the next stage of their lives.

In “The Tiger’s Bride” and “The Company of Wolves” (both stories with animal bridegrooms), the narrators do this by embracing their own inner wildness and learning to love their nontraditional suitors. While the protagonist of the former undergoes a transformation from woman to animal, the protagonist of the latter reveals that the animal existed within her all along. In “The Courtship of Mr Lyon,” another animal bridegroom story, the change is more subtle; the protagonist simply grows up and helps restore the humanity of another.