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emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Eating disorder, Mental illness
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is a really odd story, but one I practically fell into, as I read it in the course of one evening, only pausing to eat dinner. After finishing it, I'm left with a kind of melancholy emptiness. The most striking theme in this story to me is one of grief, both for youthful ignorance lost, and for realizing you never found the words to unlock your family members, the same people who sat alongside you and spoke to you daily for years upon years, and never really got to know the most important pieces to them, until suddenly you had run out of time. As confused as this book made me feel during some chapters, I think those are pains most of us can relate to, although we wish we didn't.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body horror, Infidelity, Medical content, Dementia, Death of parent, Toxic friendship
Minor: Eating disorder, Sexual content, Alcohol
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Content Warnings
Graphic: Eating disorder, Mental illness
Moderate: Ableism, Confinement, Infidelity, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Grief
Minor: Addiction, Body horror, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Terminal illness, Death of parent
The addiction I perceive in this book is so nontraditional, even magical, that I didn't give it more than a "minor" designation, but to me, the theme of addiction is pervasive.
The disordered eating in this book is similarly magical, but because the book is centered around food and eating and the protagonist's struggle with these things, I marked it as 'graphic.'
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Honestly, it's been a few months since I read this, but it made a huge impression on me, but I saw there are a lot of negative reviews of this book I have to leave my thoughts here. I'm guessing you've read the summary, so I won't go into the premise. So, a few things: this is not a super-hero story. It's not about a girl who gets a superpower and then fixes everything. The gift of tasting peoples emotions in food (and not just that, she can taste the entire production chain, really) is treated much more as a disability most of the time. Which it is, if you think about it. She has to eat. But every time she does she has to deal with someone else's pain. A nice detail of a subtle coping mechanism is her love of vending-machines. This is a story of someone having to deal with acute involuntary empathy, isolation and a very complicated relationship with everyone in her family.
I personally spent this book just getting gradually more heartbroken for it's characters. I usually hate depressing books, but it's beautifully written, with great empathy and though the premise might invite cynicism, it never becomes the tone of the story. It has whimsy, but it's not a light read. Not for me at least. I bawled my eyes out towards the end of it, and there were a few moments that I found quite horrifying. Also, the magical realism is a bigger part of the story than you expect it to be in the beginning. But there's no radio-active spiders, magical theory or science-stuff explaining it, there's almost no testing the limits, no training-montages, there's no fighting some great evil. It's mostly just dealing with whatever it is this gift demands from you.
I personally spent this book just getting gradually more heartbroken for it's characters. I usually hate depressing books, but it's beautifully written, with great empathy and though the premise might invite cynicism, it never becomes the tone of the story. It has whimsy, but it's not a light read. Not for me at least. I bawled my eyes out towards the end of it, and there were a few moments that I found quite horrifying. Also, the magical realism is a bigger part of the story than you expect it to be in the beginning. But there's no radio-active spiders, magical theory or science-stuff explaining it, there's almost no testing the limits, no training-montages, there's no fighting some great evil. It's mostly just dealing with whatever it is this gift demands from you.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Eating disorder, Grief
Minor: Suicide