A review by erinbarton
Woman, Eating by Claire Kohda

reflective slow-paced

2.5

i feel like the fact that the mc was a vampire had basically no bearing on the plot - this read exactly like every other ‘sad girl literary fiction’ book with occasional references to the fact that she can only drink blood. 

the blurb describes this basically as a vampire with an eating disorder but this idea wasn’t properly explored in the book. i felt like there were too many plot strands going on and it just took away from the concept. if the mc was trying to resist the blood drinking urges and then caves and attacks people i think this would have been a more interesting read and be representative of a restriction / binge cycle which could be present in EDs. 

overall this just felt a bit too underdeveloped and too many ideas going on. the author seems to throw out too many different ideas that the vampirism could be a metaphor of - eating disorders, generational trauma, colonialism, discrimination as a biracial person, sexual abuse, etc - and the actual intention of the book wasn’t clear. because of this it just felt like a generic literary/contemporary book with the vampire element added last minute to try and help it stand out.
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