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A review by livlamentloathe
Hungerstone by Kat Dunn
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
First of all, I have a bone to pick with Kat Dunn for not using the word VAMPIRE even once in the text!!! WTF!! I THOUGHT IT WAS A PRETTY SAFE BET THAT IT WOULD INCLUDE VAMPIRES! . I can fully accept and logically understand why it wasn't used. BUT I can logically understand something and still be peeved about it.
Henry was so incredibly insufferable. I was mad at him every moment he was on the page. Poor poor Lenore, trapped (to say the least) by that loser. That said, it must be a sign of good writing for me to hate him so much. To understand and see him for the evil spineless fuckboy he was. I was hoping it would end bloody for himand I was soooooooo glad to be right! :) .
Carmilla's relationship with Lenore was beautiful. At times, toxic and based on power dynamics, but more often it was lovely and queer. As queer as queer gets. The things Carmilla did were unspoken but rotten at their core. I enjoyed the way she treated Lenore's society and the men as a big show. She would move the characters around at her leisure, but ultimately, she let freedom be Lenore's choice alone. And though she did help her in many ways, she allowed Lenore to come upon her autonomy on her own and to grasp it herself. She never handed Lenore the answers even when it would've saved all of them a lot of stress and violence. It's not in the nature of a vampire to play at being human.
Despite how powerless Henry had Lenore believing herself to be, women held the real power in this world. If not his wife, Henry would've embarrassed himself a thousand times over. Yes, men control the systems of authority and machines and law, but women are the unseen caretakers of everything else. Lenore's POV made it clear how much women did during this era, and how much of a toll it took from her. It's also an incredible strain to carry all that Lenore did. Yes, the doctor in the story was a quack (weren't they all at this time?), but I do think there's something to women developing "hysteria" after becoming a Wife and leader of the house/manor. Women must've carried such heavy loads, and when they showed their stress, the men in their lives often didn't believe them or even sent them away for it. Women have long deserved better. Truly, I loved the way hunger was used as an allegory for power and freedom. I could speak at length of the smart ways the text both told and showed the machinations of hunger and craving, but this review is long enough as is.
I still haven't read the original story of Carmilla, but it's probably time now. I greatly enjoyed this fucked-up, lovely story about power and a woman's role in society and in marriage.
Henry was so incredibly insufferable. I was mad at him every moment he was on the page. Poor poor Lenore, trapped (to say the least) by that loser. That said, it must be a sign of good writing for me to hate him so much. To understand and see him for the evil spineless fuckboy he was. I was hoping it would end bloody for him
Carmilla's relationship with Lenore was beautiful. At times, toxic and based on power dynamics, but more often it was lovely and queer. As queer as queer gets. The things Carmilla did were unspoken but rotten at their core. I enjoyed the way she treated Lenore's society and the men as a big show. She would move the characters around at her leisure, but ultimately, she let freedom be Lenore's choice alone. And though she did help her in many ways, she allowed Lenore to come upon her autonomy on her own and to grasp it herself. She never handed Lenore the answers even when it would've saved all of them a lot of stress and violence. It's not in the nature of a vampire to play at being human.
Despite how powerless Henry had Lenore believing herself to be, women held the real power in this world. If not his wife, Henry would've embarrassed himself a thousand times over. Yes, men control the systems of authority and machines and law, but women are the unseen caretakers of everything else. Lenore's POV made it clear how much women did during this era, and how much of a toll it took from her. It's also an incredible strain to carry all that Lenore did. Yes, the doctor in the story was a quack (weren't they all at this time?), but I do think there's something to women developing "hysteria" after becoming a Wife and leader of the house/manor. Women must've carried such heavy loads, and when they showed their stress, the men in their lives often didn't believe them or even sent them away for it. Women have long deserved better. Truly, I loved the way hunger was used as an allegory for power and freedom. I could speak at length of the smart ways the text both told and showed the machinations of hunger and craving, but this review is long enough as is.
I still haven't read the original story of Carmilla, but it's probably time now. I greatly enjoyed this fucked-up, lovely story about power and a woman's role in society and in marriage.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Domestic abuse, Misogyny, Sexism, Blood, Gaslighting, Dysphoria
Moderate: Confinement, Death, Infidelity, Sexual assault, Violence, Murder
Minor: Homophobia, Forced institutionalization, Car accident
I'm including homophobia because of course this was a time when being with another of the same sex was forbidden, but I can't recall it coming up. There was so much else going on that no one spoke ill of Lenore/Carmilla's developing relationship. The car accident refers to Lenore's childhood trauma but it wasn't a "car" -- it was a carriage. On that topic, there was a great deal of PTSD-related trauma Lenore experienced, but there's not a tag for that.