Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.67 AVERAGE
3.67 AVERAGE
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I can't decide what I thought about this. I really loved the beginning through the middle...and then it kind of just wraps up and ends. I feel like maybe I need to listen to the end again, because maybe I missed something? Thanks to Netgalley for letting me listen!
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Just add garlic, lemon, and a dash of the one percent.
This smart, biting novel explores what happens when a Haitian American girl uses her previously hidden zombie abilities to exact revenge on the wealthy elites who’ve caused her family pain.
Brielle Petitfour loves to cook. But with a chronically sick mother and bills to pay, becoming a chef isn’t exactly a realistic career path.
When Brielle’s mom suddenly loses her job, Brielle steps in and uses her culinary skills to earn some extra money. The rich families who love her cooking praise her use of unique flavors and textures, which keep everyone guessing what’s in Brielle’s dishes. The secret ingredient? Human flesh.
Written by the storytelling duo Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite, The Summer I Ate the Rich is a modern-day fable inspired by Haitian zombie lore that scrutinizes the socioeconomic and racial inequity that is the foundation of our society. Just like Brielle’s clients, it will have you asking: What’s for dinner?
If I had to describe this YA book in three words, it would be sharp, lyrical and disturbing. This fable is more in line of a social horror, rather than chilling jump scares-here, the reader is tasked to ask oneself, what is right, what is owed, what would you do and, as aforementioned, what's for dinner? I would add this book to social horror canons and pair it with discussions on the same.
This smart, biting novel explores what happens when a Haitian American girl uses her previously hidden zombie abilities to exact revenge on the wealthy elites who’ve caused her family pain.
Brielle Petitfour loves to cook. But with a chronically sick mother and bills to pay, becoming a chef isn’t exactly a realistic career path.
When Brielle’s mom suddenly loses her job, Brielle steps in and uses her culinary skills to earn some extra money. The rich families who love her cooking praise her use of unique flavors and textures, which keep everyone guessing what’s in Brielle’s dishes. The secret ingredient? Human flesh.
Written by the storytelling duo Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite, The Summer I Ate the Rich is a modern-day fable inspired by Haitian zombie lore that scrutinizes the socioeconomic and racial inequity that is the foundation of our society. Just like Brielle’s clients, it will have you asking: What’s for dinner?
If I had to describe this YA book in three words, it would be sharp, lyrical and disturbing. This fable is more in line of a social horror, rather than chilling jump scares-here, the reader is tasked to ask oneself, what is right, what is owed, what would you do and, as aforementioned, what's for dinner? I would add this book to social horror canons and pair it with discussions on the same.
adventurous
emotional
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Addiction, Chronic illness, Drug abuse, Infidelity, Racism, Slavery, Medical content, Cannibalism, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, Abandonment, Alcohol, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Back of the book summary: "Brielle Petitfour loves to cook. But with a chronically sick mother and bills to pay, becoming a chef isn’t exactly a realistic career path.
When Brielle’s mom suddenly loses her job, Brielle steps in and uses her culinary skills to earn some extra money. The rich families who love her cooking praise her use of unique flavors and textures, which keep everyone guessing what’s in Brielle’s dishes. The secret ingredient? Human flesh."
I really enjoyed the Hatian-American representation here. I felt like the authors did a good job showing the experience of someone who is proud of their heritage and family culture but growing up in America, feel a sort of loss of not knowing the place it all comes from. The supernatural elements in the story seemed to emphasize that theme.
Thriller isn't my go-to genre but this one was pretty good. I was pretty immersed in the first 2/3s of the book and while I felt the authors did a good job with pacing out the ending, the ending itself felt kind of disappointing to me. Though the one storyline wrap up I felt satisfied with was the conclusion to the history of Brielle's mother and in turn Brielle and how she came to be so to speak.
I didn't love the romance though I applaud the authors for somehow managing to write what felt a bit like a dark romance that wasn't toxic. And the conclusion of the romance story arc was very confusing to me. Maybe I just missed the point of how the choices the characters made actually caused the results that the authors claimed but it seemed a little too convenient to me.
And lastly, I will say that I loved the audiobook production. The narration by the muses was fantastic. In general, I wish more books had multiple narrators. And the "main" narrator who voiced the chapters from Brielle's perspective was also wonderful. If you're going to read this book, I encourage you to try it in audio format.
When Brielle’s mom suddenly loses her job, Brielle steps in and uses her culinary skills to earn some extra money. The rich families who love her cooking praise her use of unique flavors and textures, which keep everyone guessing what’s in Brielle’s dishes. The secret ingredient? Human flesh."
I really enjoyed the Hatian-American representation here. I felt like the authors did a good job showing the experience of someone who is proud of their heritage and family culture but growing up in America, feel a sort of loss of not knowing the place it all comes from. The supernatural elements in the story seemed to emphasize that theme.
Thriller isn't my go-to genre but this one was pretty good. I was pretty immersed in the first 2/3s of the book and while I felt the authors did a good job with pacing out the ending, the ending itself felt kind of disappointing to me. Though the one storyline wrap up I felt satisfied with was the conclusion to the history of Brielle's mother and in turn Brielle and how she came to be so to speak.
I didn't love the romance though I applaud the authors for somehow managing to write what felt a bit like a dark romance that wasn't toxic. And the conclusion of the romance story arc was very confusing to me. Maybe I just missed the point of how the choices the characters made actually caused the results that the authors claimed but it seemed a little too convenient to me.
And lastly, I will say that I loved the audiobook production. The narration by the muses was fantastic. In general, I wish more books had multiple narrators. And the "main" narrator who voiced the chapters from Brielle's perspective was also wonderful. If you're going to read this book, I encourage you to try it in audio format.
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Thank you to MacMillan’s Children Publishing Group for providing this ARC for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
The Summer I Ate the Rich by Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite is billed as a YA horror story. The book follows a 17-year old zonbi, Brielle, whose mother toils at the feet of the ultra wealthy. When a series of events thrusts Brielle into the midst of billionaires and the Miami elite, she takes the opportunity to level the score.
In concept the story has such promise; revenge, marginalized groups taking their power back, suspected cannibalism, and the toppling of the privileged structures. As a horror fan, I also don’t really think I’m aware of any other stories that center around the Hatian zonbi, and that was also very promising.
This story, however, fell very flat. The fact that there were zonbi characters was the most realistic fact about the story—from there it seemed to be a TikTok social justice fantasy penned by a teenage girl. By chapter 76 my patience was already wearing thin, but following that I could barely tolerate the insane turn of events that dipped its toes into WattPad territory. I will not spoil what happens but I audibly went “OH, COME ON.”
The problems in this story are many, and rather than go into them in detail, I’m just going to list the more egregious issues.
- There is very little horror in this story. While the opening chapter is a somewhat icky description of eating calf brain, but it ends there. The cannibalism is mostly implied and somewhat mild. She’s not slaying people or consuming. Instead she’s sprinkling purloined corpse toe powder into some rice. Hardly the horror I’m expecting from a book billed as such.
- Brielle does not suffer a single consequence. No matter what she says or does, no matter how criminal or impactful or expensive. She either fails up, miraculously is given no consequence or sneaks by with nobody reacting at all. At a certain point this means that there are no stakes. Everything is fine, and any tension is past tense or stated.
- We don’t really ever get a very good explanation of what the full extent of her zonbi powers mean. The story does, through the muses, explain the curse on her father and the general concept. But what does it actually mean? The readers are told her mother is afraid of her powers, or that they’re growing, but they’re never really fleshed out. Roughly 3/4 of the way through we learn she can sort of control people, but this is never really stated. We just kind of know she is interested in raw meat, likes the smell of blood, and has flaky skin. I don’t expect the author to totally explain the whole concept but frankly the book would read pretty similar even without the who supernatural elements.
- The characters are so one dimensional it’s laughable. Marcello has no discernable characteristics besides being a young gay man. He basically spouts social media catch phrases. The rich people are effectively moustache-twirlingly evil. Each character is one thing, and one thing only. They are caricatures written through a deeply immature lens.
This book is about as subtle as a sledgehammer. I do think that there is probably appeal for a certain population of the teenaged reader market that may enjoy this book. I think that this book deserves to be so much more. The pain pill subplot, the use of a supernatural cultural story that isn’t seen much in books at the time, and the desire to overturn the status quo are all great building blocks for a story. Unfortunately, this selection missed the mark for me.
(1/5 with the reservation that I am almost certainly not the target demographic for this book.)
This was a wonderful read, I didn't know how it was going to work out, but I had to read it!
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes