Reviews with content warning for Violence - Woman, Eating

Reviews tagging 'Violence'

Woman, Eating by Claire Kohda

17 reviews

askirmishofwit's review against another edition

challenging dark funny tense slow-paced

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

3.0

I appreciated what this one did and the fact that, for something so weird, it was also very funny. It's just not for the faint of heart re: body horror and is a pretty depressing read given you're in the head of a starving (physically and emotionally) young woman/vampire as she fights against hunger that she's been told is her human and demon sides fighting to take over from each other. Ultimately, all of it reads like a pretty well-crafted extended metaphor of a character dealing with self-loathing, emotional abuse/manipulation by a parent, sexual harassment, ennui and dissatisfaction, body dysphoria and disordered eating, but wrap it all up in a book seemingly about vampirism that doesn't shy away from some body horror and, frankly, too explicit of a description of a dead duck. But it's just very ~literary fiction~ about the whole thing, IYKWIM.

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celestial_starboy's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad 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

5.0

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libellumartinae's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring sad tense medium-paced

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

3.5

Before going any further with my review I'd like to say that when I started this book, I made a mistake as I don't think that it was appropriate for the period, albeit it was quite comical that I started a book about adulthood after starting my first week of work. Still, this book proved quite too much content heavy for me and I also had my very - high - expectations completely disappointed.

I think it's extremely innovative and interesting the way the author has portrayed vampirism as a metaphor of growing up sheltered and suddenly having to grow up, alongside the whole complex of choosing on which side to land on as the child of immigrated parents; it's definitely a charming idea but I feel like it should have deepened, as so many - important - themes were only brushed superficially. I did enjoy her portrayal of mother-daughter's relationship, but I definitely felt like her whole relationships should have been better deepened (and f*ck you, Ben).

An interesting recount of - suddenly - growing up, that still stayed a bit too dull and unshaped for me!

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ashrosereads_'s review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

3.75

“Woman, Eating” is one of those novels that lives in a very dark corner of my literary world. This book feels like it exists in the same world as “American Psycho” with its dark themes and existential focus. Lydia struggles with, what I’ve interpreted to be, mental and emotional abuse strongly centered around the concept of being and whether or not she deserves to live at all and what that means to her. It’s a heavy read but can feel slow and redundant but if you yourself are contemplative and enjoy complex perspectives on the themes mentioned above then I recommend!

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nyxlexica's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

2.0

Really brilliant underpinnings, and I keep thinking about this book even months after finishing it, but I wasn't wowed by the execution.

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applesodaperson's review against another edition

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Ran out of time before Christmas break! I will get it after.
Update: So I checked this book out again after break and didn’t like it at all. I got tricked by the cool premise and the awesome cover art. But the story did not live up to expectations. The main character was not believable as a vampire at all. Like she is literally immortal, and is older than she looks, but literally has zero communication skills at all, and can’t stand up for herself or interact with strangers. It felt very unrealistic in the context of the circumstances. I also do not understand why the mother decided to turn her daughter into a vampire if she hated herself so much, but to be fair maybe that was described later in the book.
I also did not like that vampirism was being used as a weird metaphor for anxiety?? When vampires had pretty much always been used a metaphor for sexual promiscuity. It felt weird and not well thought out.
Another problem I had was the food. A huge part of the plot is that she wishes she could be human and she craves to eat human food. And so I expected lots of beautiful descriptions of food and hunger, that make the reader feel the emptiness or craving. But there wasn’t. She literally just listed the different foods she wanted to try, or just stated that she was hungry. I was expecting A Certain Hunger level of writing skill, and the skills just weren’t there at all.
Read from the Provo library.

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