Reviews with content warning for Animal cruelty - A Certain Hunger

Reviews tagging 'Animal cruelty'

A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers

25 reviews

blackcatkai's review against another edition

slow-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

CW: blood, violence, antisemitism, murder, ableism, fatphobia, food/body shaming, classism, racism (slurs and otherwise), sexual content, rape and other types of sexual assault/harassments, gore, animal cruelty and death, sexism, gaslighting, infidelity, alcohol and drug use, passages that may read a bit homophobic and/or transphobic

no. i get that it's supposed to be a satire overall and youre not meant to like the main character, but my biggest issue was how boring the entire novel is. and technically, it's only a satire in regards to the universe of food in real life, not the sexism or murder or sex or society as a whole or whatever. so maybe if it had JUST been about that, it would've been more successful for me. then the character of Dorothy would've read better with her vapid, self important, condescending, holier than thou bullshit. but not here, not when you throw in everything else.

pacing? all over the place, mainly slow. cannibalism and violence? well, its THERE, technically? but it takes forever to get to the gruesome bits and then theyre lackluster at best. this doesnt feel feminist or inclusive or a biting commentary on anything other than narcissists suck. there's also a ton of nuanced information presented in a non-nuanced way that feels like im reading an incomplete wikipedia page with no sources and missing key context. we get it, the author learned about a lot of things and wanted us to know about them, even if some info was left out, leading to what feels like misinformation, even in a fictional story.

this is more a book about gratuitous sex, fancy food, and trips to europe because its the best (except new york city, of course) than it is about cis-female empowerment, cannibalism, or violence. its repetitive use of simile, speaking down to the reader, and infodumps, left me disengaged, bored, and desperate for the end.

basically, this book was not for me, and im so glad its finally over. thank you.

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eglantinem's review

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dark funny reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

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caylorquinn's review

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dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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fijibubbels's review against another edition

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dark funny medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

So fucking weird, but like in a good way? The writing is in incredibly graphic and therefore captivating, but Dorothy is so messed up that it becomes a little sickening at some points. I guess that’s the point of the book, so props to the author from me.

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lqne's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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toofondofbooks_'s review

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challenging dark funny reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book was beautifully written and grotesque. It was both funny and unbelievably unhinged. It made me laugh and cringe, and feel sad. It was just so good. There were some sections that were difficult for me to get through but as a whole this is such a solid piece of literature and such a good addition to the "unhinged woman" literary sub genre.

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ephemeral_remi's review

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challenging dark emotional funny reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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luise96's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

I am not so sure how to feel about this book. It was hard for me to get into the book, I liked the middle part but then I was kind of waiting for it to be over. The writing is the most unique part of it I would say, very over the top at times with many difficult words I had to look up. The writing fits the story and the protagonist and is what had me going most of the time. The protagonist felt mostly like a stereotype psychopath, with not a lot of dimensions until maybe at the end. Not a bad book, but I expected more.

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raquelcanread's review against another edition

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challenging dark funny reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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ennui_09's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Where should I start? I am not a native English speaker, but I consider myself fluent or properly fluent in understanding texts and having conversations with people. This being said…I struggled to read some bits in the book because of the word choice. It was pretentious. I had to stop, put the book down and google the definition of the said word which took me out of the story and took away from the whole experience. I learned some new words from this, I will give it that. I don’t know if it’s because the author is or used to be a teacher or because she did it on purpose to make Dorothy seem extra pretentious. Either way, it made me curious to see what other people had to say and it made me feel better to see other people’s reviews (native English speakers) state the same feeling about the language used.
There was another thing that got annoying after a while and that is the enumerating (?) or repetition of something but said in different ways, put in different words to emphasize what the author wants to say. I understand doing this with a few comparisons to get your point across but it happened so so so often in the first couple of pages. It stopped towards the middle.
I think this book is perfect for someone who loves food, who understands and knows what the dishes Dorothy is speaking about are. Who is familiar with cooking techniques and who has knowledge about food. Dorothy names the foods by their names, most of the time it’s in Italian and then she goes on to explain what the food is, sometimes she doesn’t but often times I found myself a little lost? I am not blaming the book for this, I think the descriptions were well done but I am not one to speak since I’ve never had those foods in my life and I don’t know how accurate it was. To me, it was nicely described although it got a lot here and there. I got a little annoyed at her for complaining so much about the food in prison, which…is my fault. Of course, a food critic and someone who’s a gourmand would complain about it so much. I think I would too if I was in her place.
I was very hooked from the start then towards the middle it kind of dragged out a little, when we got to the story about Marco I was over the description about the cattle and the whole process. I was tempted to skip those few pages but I sucked it up. I just didn’t really care about the dude’s business, not gonna lie and it dragged out. There’s also an explicit description of a cow getting killed for meat in case you’re sensitive to stuff like that. I found the part about Alex interesting, same goes with Emma. I wish we saw more of Dorothy’s friendship with Emma. It was pretty interesting.
For some murders, I found it a bit weird how she got away with it. Are the cops lacking so much to not look more into it or am I missing something? I was a little skeptical about it.
I know this review sounds like I hated this book which makes no sense since I gave it a 3-star rating BUT I liked the take on female killers, and how society sees females fit for motherhood but not able of violence. I found some quotes I really liked that got me thinking about stuff. Oh, what I liked is that at times Dorothy is speaking to the reader and calls us out. I think this happens a lot these days, I mean people got so interested in true crime and read books on it or listen to podcasts. And I felt like she was calling out people like that. I liked that part. Not gonna lie, at some parts, I was in a way rooting for her? I am not justifying what she did but I guess reading about an unhinged woman can be a little empowering.
I liked reading about her family too although dysfunctional and not the healthiest. This is all I can think about for now but if you’re someone who loves food, loves something graphic, and read about unhinged women then I think this is for you.
Maybe I would have given it more if it wasn’t for the word choice which led to me taking forever to finish this book then just made me wanna be over although it got better towards the end.

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