The Glutton
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Average rating4.3
A New York Times EDITORS’ CHOICE | Shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize | MOST ANTICIPATED by The Guardian • Paste Magazine • LitHub • The Millions • Library Journal From the prizewinning author of The Manningtree Witches, a subversive historical novel set during the French Revolution, inspired by a young peasant boy turned showman, said to have been tormented and driven to murder by an all-consuming appetite. “Obscenely beautiful…Every sentence is gorgeous...Powerful and provocative.” —The New York Times Book Review “This year, I found myself seeking one quality above all others from the books I read: escapism. And no book plunged me into another world quite so bracingly as The Glutton.” —Vogue 1798, France. Nuns move along the dark corridors of a Versailles hospital where the young Sister Perpetué has been tasked with sitting with the patient who must always be watched. The man, gaunt, with his sallow skin and distended belly, is dying: they say he ate a golden fork, and that it’s killing him from the inside. But that’s not all—he is rumored to have done monstrous things in his attempts to sate an insatiable appetite…an appetite they say tortures him still. Born in an impoverished village to a widowed young mother, Tarare was once overflowing with quiet affection: for the Baby Jesus and the many Saints, for his mother, for the plants and little creatures in the woods and fields around their house. He spends his days alone, observing the delicate charms of the countryside. But his world is not a gentle one—and soon, life as he knew it is violently upended. Tarare is pitched down a chaotic path through revolutionary France, left to the mercy of strangers, and increasingly, bottomlessly, ravenous. This exhilarating, disquieting novel paints a richly imagined life for The Great Tarare, The Glutton of Lyon in 18th-century France: a world of desire, hunger and poverty; hope, chaos and survival. As in her cult hit The Manningtree Witches, Blakemore showcases her stunning lyricism and deep compassion for characters pushed to the edge of society in The Glutton, her most unputdownable work yet.
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Thank you Netgalley and Publisher for letting me read this ARC in exchange for an unbiased review!
The Glutton follows Tarare, a young peasant boy and son of a prostitute. After leaving home (not so willingly), he becomes a freak show act to a charismatic man (pimp?), then French soldier and spy. Flipping back and forth from present and past, we watch Tarare grow, suffer, and succumb to his insatiable hunger. The Glutton stretches the myth into an incredibly empathetic, explorative, and touching narrative. Tarare transforms from a small, naive boy to a somewhat pessimistic and knowledgeable man.
Immediately into reading, this reminded me of Lapvona by Ottessa Moshfegh! If you liked that, you might enjoy this too. This is ultimately more lyrical and with a more philosophical, humorous plot. It is well researched. The history, landscape, and language is very detailed. It's SO well researched that some of it definitely went over my head—you need a dictionary on hand for this. This is pretty fast paced in general but looking up vocab/translations slowed the reading down quite a bit for me.
Characters come and go, and I cared for each of them in the same way (even when I totally hated them). I loved that Tarare was queer/questioning. I loved his epiphany on love nearing the end of the book. I loved Tarare's curiosity and unique insights and somewhat socially awkward quirks. In the end, I just wished he had more joy. But I can't imagine joy was much of a reality for him.
The Glutton is obviously a bit gross (I mean, c'mon he eats a kid), but it was not unbearable or unnecessary in its detail. And it's obvious that, most of the time, the grossness is thrusted upon him for the entertainment of other characters. But if the sheer idea of live animals being eaten is a hard no, this is not the one for you.
The most impressive thing about The Glutton is the writing. It's accessible but so poetic. I'm left with a handful of the most profound and beautiful quotes, but I'll share my favorite:
“I am lost on a sea of hunger, blue and black and heaving and full five fathoms deep below and rarely, rarely do I feel anything besides hungry, rarely, rarely does a jolt of feeling or emotion pierce the hide of my hunger, and never, never have I been able to live the life God presumably gave me to live, to dance and think and remember and kiss, no, all my life I have stood at the threshold of my life waiting to be let in”, which unironically describes how I've always felt as an obese woman, as a binge eater. I weirdly resonated with the outlandish descriptions of hunger. But besides this, I think this really shows Blakemore is a poet at heart. I didn't know they actually WERE a poet (as in, has multiple poetry collections out!) until I was finished. This has me so excited to read the rest of their stuff.
