The Book Eaters

CW: body horror, gore, explicit violence, domestic abuse, violence against children

I've been very intrigued by this book since I first read the premise but I was disappointed when I didn't get the arc. What nice luck do I have though that I got an audio advance copy just a few days before the release and I devoured this book (pun totally intended) in just a couple of days. But I'm still pondering on my feelings about it.

I can't deny that the writing is bewitching, the world created by the author is both atmospheric and horrifying, that we are excited to know more but also hate the parts we do get to know. Each chapter is preceded by an epigraph which are quotes from various fairytales and other books and a character's journals and they do an amazing job of setting up the tone of the upcoming chapter, almost building up to the tension. The story told in alternate timelines also works well in keeping our attention because we wanna know how our main characters ended up in their current situation. While the story is set in our world, our characters feel like they belong to an alternate world because they are so isolated and have their own sets of rules and traditions, and revealing all of it little by little was neatly done by the author. And ofcourse the whole idea of this feeling like a fairytale at times and then the author subverting those familiar tropes was quite fascinating to read.

Undoubtedly though, what's stays after finishing the book or even while reading is the kinds of questions that arise in our head. The book eater world is very misogynistic and women are rare in their community and treated like “princesses”, but we quickly see that being a princess here also means having absolutely no agency over their lives or bodies, being confined to forced arranged marriages and being vessels for breeding children, and then also being separated from said children at the age of three. It was very hard not to think of the current scenario of abortion rights in the US and how laws are being made every day in states to force women to give birth with no consideration to what they want.

The book eaters/mind eaters are also very much inspired by vampire lore as the author has mentioned many times in interviews and that was another interesting aspect of the story - getting to know vampiric characters in a new light. Most of the characters we encounter here are some form of monsters and once we see their actions and how they came to be that way, we start to wonder if there are good and bad monsters, and if we can really root for some of them.

This is ultimately the story of Devon, her son Cai and how motherhood transforms her life. We see the progression of her arc from being a carefree child who thinks she is a princess to one who realizes she has no freedom to make her choices, including the desire to want to be with her child. Once her son Cai turns out to be a mind eater, she is compelled to run with him for the sake of protecting him from everyone.

She makes choices and decisions one after the other which left me questioning (and her as well) if what she was doing was right and I don't think we ever get any answers. She loves her son; while his nature might be monstrous, he is an innocent; so she will do whatever it takes to help him live his life. The author really digs deep into the idea that a mother's love is love - it can't be defined as good or bad, it just is. I had some trouble getting used to this idea of a mother's love because while motherhood is always exalted across cultures and it's always said that a mother will do anything for her child, I'm not a mother and I've never felt such maternal instincts ever in my life. While Devon did struggle with what she had to do to feed Cai, she always chose what was necessary for his survival, and I sometimes found it hard to follow along with a character who could kill people and do many other destructive things along the way for her son.

There are other characters in the narrative, some who help Devon and others who hinder her but everyone has some sort of effect on her mindset and her decisions. I don't wanna talk too much about them but I also think it would have been more interesting to have some of these side characters fleshed out a bit. They have just the necessary amount of interactions with Devon and it sometimes felt like they were all plot devices rather than characters themselves. But it's also ultimately Devon's story, so I guess it works fine for the overall narrative.

In the end, I can say this was a dark and engaging horror-fairytale story with a particular emphasis on the role of female agency and motherhood in a highly patriarchal world, and what does it actually mean to be good or bad in a world full of monsters. Whether the book leaves you fascinated or uncomfortable, it'll hold your attention throughout and keep your mind whirling with more thoughts and questions as the pages go by. I also have to mention the audiobook narrator Katie Erich because she brings a unique voice and richness to this story and while it took me little time to get comfortable with her Northern England accent, it felt perfect for the story and I'm glad I got to listen to it.

The writing and pacing have momentum but the content is thwarting. The mythology is preposterously systemless and does not stretch imaginative potential to not be a mirror world full of patriarchy. Intimate moments and observations are equally inconsistent regarding character relationships, and all conflict is resolved with violence.

This could have been a 5 star book, but it was missing...something.

The universe in this book was unique. I loved the world building and the idea that these folks live among us just undetected.

That said, it felt like there was space for depth and allegory that just got missed. I wanted more emotional investiture. There were moments that made me feel deeply moved, but those were because of my own life experiences rather than the writing.

A good book, but definitely a snack when it could have been a nutritious meal.

CAWPILE SCORE
C-8
A-5
W-7
P-7
I-6
L-8
E-7
TOTAL-6.86/10

CAWPILECharactersDevonCaiVictimsRamseyJarrowKillockHesterAtmosphereWritingSo many good gut punches and emotional moments. With beautiful writing bringing it homePlotGood story Logical conclusionInvestmentInvested more in the emotional relationship between cai and DevonLogicEnjoymentVery much enjoyed this book. The horror is there, but not overpoweringMiscOnly one spot where I felt Cai was “bad” near the end it felt like his personality shifted for extra drama.
I will be talking about it on Libromancy https://libromancy.podbean.com/ on 10/01/2023

“For Chrissakes, I'm a grown-up. Swearing is my privilege!”

I don't generally read urban fantasy (too “real” in a way I can't really describe, and it tends to bore me), and I definitely don't read vampire/gothic horror stuff (too romance-riddled). But I guess when you throw those genres in a blender with a unique magic system and some found-family LGBT elements, it made the whole thing a whole lot more interesting.

Devon is a book eater, a small, secretive clan of people who, rather than reading books and eating food, eat their books. Like, literally, page by page, cover to cover, omnomnom down the hatch, eat books for sustenance and knowledge. They're a very small clan and predisposed to giving birth to more males than females, so the rare females of the clan live a pampered life of a princess–doomed to arranged marriages and being treated more like property than as people. Not content with this life, Devon escapes with her second child Cai, who himself is a mind eater. Mind eaters are genetically different book eaters, and instead of eating books, eat minds instead. Like, brain matter. Memories. Personalities. That sort of thing. The clans of book eaters generally deal with these aberrations harshly, either training them as weapons or killing them outright. Devon is determined to escape the life she was born to, but still needs to procure ‘Redemption', the medicine manufactured by one of the book eater clans that keeps mind eater hunger at bay.

I'm a sucker for a unique magic system. The author fully fleshed out the lore of these book eaters, with the different genres having different tastes, incorporating the knowledge aspect into the story, and having numerous epigraphs at the beginning of each chapter adding to the book eater/mind eater lore. It was really well done. I liked Devon as a main character, and loved the found family/attraction aspect between her and Hester. The book eater clans also had different stories behind each one, though I wish there had been a bit more of that lore fleshed out as well. I thought the story was compelling and interesting, and I appreciated how the current day story was weaved into Devon's story from ten years ago. The side-by-side telling was well done.

I really only wish there had been some inclusion or closure on the Salem aspect. The author has said here that this was intended as a stand-alone and is not supposed to have a sequel which is a little disappointing, but entirely understandable.

I had a lot of fun with this book, and I'm glad I gave it a chance.

Sinds ik over dit boek hoorde, stond ik te popelen om het te kunnen verslinden. Een verhaal over mensen die letterlijk boeken moeten eten om te overleven, wat een leuk en buitengewoon fascinerend idee!
Jammer genoeg weet ik niet of mijn verwachtingen gewoon te hoog waren, maar het overheersende gevoel na uitlezen blijft teleurstelling.

Daar is vast en zeker de marketing heel hard de schuld van. De manier waarop dit boek werd gepromoot, doet echt verwachten dat het verhaal zich zal verdiepen in de fascinerende wereld en het ontstaan van de boekeneters. Helaas blijven deze gedurende het hele verhaal grotendeels onontgonnen. Heel oppervlakkige hints of terloopse informatie wordt wel gedeeld, maar alles blijft heel oppervlakkig. Achteraf gezien blijkt ook dat die boeketers eigenlijk totaal niet hoefden te bestaan voor de auteur om haar verhaal te kunnen vertellen. Vervang hen gewoon door gelijk welk andere strenge hiërarchische sekte, en niets in het verhaal zou opgeofferd moeten worden.
Dus ja, ik ben echt gefrustreerd dat zo'n cool idee gewoon verspild werd.

Het uiteindelijke verhaal was wel ok, maar niet echt origineel als je vergat dat het over boeketers ging, wat niet moeilijk was om te doen, gezien ze weinig impact hadden op het verhaal.
Ik kon de aangesneden thema's en hun verkenning wel waarderen, ook al vond ik ze nogal oppervlakkig en een beetje over gebruikt.
De belangrijkste thema's die ik uit het verhaal haalde, waren hoe het moederschap iemands perspectief kan veranderen en hoe je je eigen persoon kunt worden, ondanks wat de mensen om je heen van je verwachten. En vecht tegen het patriarchaat. Dat was duidelijk ook een thema, lol.

Al met al, hoewel ik er toch enigszins van heb genoten, blijft het een feit dat dit niet het verhaal was dat mij was beloofd en teleurstelling is het enige dat ik kan voelen als ik naar dit boek in mijn boekenkast kijk, ondanks mijn fantastisch mooie editie.

Pros: brilliant world-building, interesting characters, fast paced

Cons:

Raised as a princess in one of the 6 remaining book eater houses in England, Devon Fairweather learns at her first marriage, that being pampered is not the same as being free. Now, she’s trying to escape the families along with her mind eater son.

The book alternates between scenes in the present with Devon on the run and scenes from the past that explain how she got to this point. The pacing is great and there is a mix of highly tense moments an downtime where you really get to know the main characters.

The world-building here is great. The book eaters are unique, and the mind eaters terrifying. The author does a great job of blending their curious and often antiquated style of living, with the modern day world. I also loved how she worked in knights and dragons.

Devon is a complicated woman. She loves her son, enough to get him humans to feed on, while also being scared of that need to feed. In some ways she’s suffered greatly, in others she’s still weirdly naive. I didn’t quite agree with some of her principles, but despite her crimes she still comes off as sympathetic and you still want to see her succeed.

It’s a strange book, telling about a strange people, and is wildly entertaining if you like darker urban fantasy.

Edit: with time away from this book, my problems with it bother me more, and I don't think my rating reflects my experience with it.



After finishing this, I think I respect it more than I liked it. It's a book I could see recommending to people, but it didn't really do the things I was hoping or expecting, and didn't make the thing it actually was compelling enough for me to overcome that. Also there were just little things that bothered me. Like, the book eaters only eat books. I couldn't get past this. I know it's the premise. But otherwise they are entirely human! I think it's because the book was so clinical about facts otherwise. There's a scene where a woman sticks it to an angry husband for having a daughter that “the sperm dictates the sex of the baby” and I'm like okay so biologically you are human then BUT HOW ARE YOU GETTING NUTRIENTS. It just kept taking me out of it. And there's a video game sub plot and I don't know for sure but I think Sunyi Dean doesn't play video games, or doesn't often, it just felt inauthentic. A line like “I guess I'll never know how Final Fantasy ends” which I can never imagine a gamer thinking. BUT the prose was great, the concept was great, the book felt very fresh and I felt the themes were expertly done, especially for a debut. There was a lot of really poignant or thought provoking stuff about love, family, motherhood, knowledge, culture, feminism...I'm not sad I read the book, but it also never really made me want to keep reading it, either.

Since finishing, I have thought about it a fair amount, but a lot of my thoughts revolve around missed opportunities. I don't feel like the book gave us enough of (or, perhaps, just not what I wanted to see) of the “Book Eater” culture. In general, you could basically take the book eater element out of the story and have the story not really change, which I didn't really like.

6/10 (previously was 7/10)

One more heart wrenching and a bit frustrating book this year.
I have a lot of questions, but still the book managed to grip me and made me think about some things related to motherhood.

But all the things that were bad! All the injustice and complete lack of good options! At some points this book was very difficult to read. And it has a bit of sour aftertaste.

What would you do to save the one you love. How far can love carry you and your actions.

Interesting book. I felt it dragged on, and was a bit long. Maybe because I just never got really into it. I felt the ideas were interesting. I couldn't help to draw some parallels to recent world events and the subcultures presented in multiethnic environments. I don't think it was the authors intentions to do so, but I felt in some ways that the way an entirely different “species of humans” lived off-grid within our society was a commentary on the worlds status.

All in all, a good book. I felt it in my bones at times, and the things our main character(s) must do to survive left me provoked and uncertain about how far I would go myself.

3.5 ⭐️

I started this book not knowing anything about it and not expecting much.
And I was pleasantly surprised by my unexpected enjoyment of it.

The story starts with the standard - woman wronged by patriarchy, which I find myself kind of fed up with, being that I see it in every other book. It was original for a while, but I can certainly feel the over saturation of this trope.
However, I did like the spin the author put on it, as well as the fact that she was not afraid to make the characters grey and not cookie cutter good or bad (in the general case).
What I liked the most here was the writing style - very subtle and easy to go through, while still beautiful.
I liked the suspense and rhythm of the story as well. The ending sequence especially was very satisfying and kept me on the edge of my seat.

The book is not perfect, but it was quite an enjoyable read. And I sincerely hope we will get a continuation of the story (the ending certainly makes that possible).

This book was one big giant yes.

I'd had my eye on this book for several months before it came out and was lucky to get a copy through work. And, to bring back a tired turn of phrase in relation to this book, well, I ate it up. I loved the characters, I loved the tangle of motivations going on throughout the book, and I loved the Gene Wolfe inspired asides and insights.

She could tell them about the relief that alcohol brought as the months had dragged on; about the guilt-ridden dreams, and the compass with Salem's picture that weighed heavier than chains. About all those nights standing over her son's sleeping form as she thought about smothering him, then stopping herself. About the discarded victims she'd carried, one by one by one to a slew of homeless shelters over the months.

But if Devon talked about any of that, then she'd have to talk about how you really could get used to anything, with enough time and motivation; how her crimes swiftly dwindled from horrific and extraordinary to a facet of her everyday reality.

She had worked out at some point that this was how the Easterbrooks conducted their trafficking without breaking a sweat; how the patriarchs overlooked the suffering and servitude of the mother-brides they destroyed; how humans could continue to exist in an infrastructure of misery. Trauma became routine, and cruelty mundane. Just life, innit.

The Families were not on her side. This realization struck Devon like a bellringer with a gong mallet, shaking her all the way through even as her lungs burned and her feet pounded the underbrush, nose full of the scent of evergreens and fresh snow. The Families were her blood relations, people she loved and had been loved by; her entire world. They were now her Great Enemy.

In fact, they always had been. However loving her childhood, her flesh was still theirs, her goods for the selling. Like pigs or chickens raised for the slaughter, she had developed affection for her keepers, and they for her. But that did not stop her from being consumed; pig farmers still chewed their bacon with enjoyment. Affection only made cruelty rueful.

I've got to assume it's the writing that worked for me here because there's so much about this book that I shouldn't/didn't like. There's something about a dual time period told story that really endears me to short chapters - you don't feel like you're slogging along too long without hearing from the other parallel narrative, especially when one is filling in blanks for the other, but a bit too handmaid's tale for my taste overall.  For such a brutal world depicted, it's not quite made up for by the imaginative way the different books are described as tasting, down to the type of paper and covers used, as well as the genre and subject matter.  Tricky to sympathize with any character other than Jarrow, even knowing Devon, most characters actually, had no good choices - comes back to my disconnect with vampire fiction maybe - hard to relate when the world described has you labelled as disposable prey.  A strong theme paralleling several characters: to sacrifice for your family, and lose yourself at the same time - choices and consequences they can't come back from.  I don't know whether this story raised any flags with Romanian readers, I can't speak to the rep - will have to look out for own voices reviews.

 La historia cuenta sobre una raza de seres sobrenaturales que viven entre nosotros, pero que sólo comen libros. Es una historia muy atrapante sobre princesas que deciden rescatarse a ellas mismas. El worldbuilding es muy copado, los personajes tienen un muy buen desarrollo y la trama va saltando del pasado al presente, dando a conocer el trasfondo paulatinamente. Muy recomendado 😄