Reviews tagging 'Infidelity'

A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers

45 reviews

bbpettry's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Summers really worked me out with this debut - I'm three years late as always, but damn! It's fun, its grotesque, its twisty and while this protagonist is deeply fascinating, there is no point in the narrative that is positioning for forgiveness. Dorothy Daniels is a violent murderer, and she tells us about that in tales of food and sex and plotting. It feels like Summers made this character by taking all the femme fatale career bitch attitude stuff from the 90's and took it all to its logical conclusion. A man-eater. A writer. A woman. Every time the writing was on the verge of losing me in too much gourmet musing (she is a food critic writing from prison, obviously she'd go on endless food tangents)  she pulls it back with a raunchy one-liner or low brow tv reference (Green Acres being my fave.) Somehow with all this book is, one could describe it as a book about the power of friendship and you'd technically be right. Very misleading, but correct.  
Not 5 because

Spoiler

while the end with Emma knowing all and staying loyal was fun, something about the end felt wanting? I wanted a bloodier end somehow, with her having escaped and maybe she's coming to eat you next kinda thing. But this isn't a horror novel, so maybe the end fits but was clumsy.

Spoiler

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Cannibalism, Car accident, Murder, and Rape

Moderate: Death of parent, Infidelity, Stalking, and Cancer

peggy_racham's review against another edition

5.0

"To eat people is to get the taste of a Titan. It’s infinite immortalization. It makes a god out of a woman."

Women's rights but more importantly women's wrongs. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Car accident, Gore, Rape, Cannibalism, Fire/Fire injury, Infidelity, Violence, Blood, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Sexual content, Drug use, Injury/Injury detail, and Murder

prairieraven's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Cancer, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Misogyny, Abandonment, Alcohol, Medical content, Medical trauma, Violence, Cannibalism, Death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Murder, Sexual content, Torture, Toxic friendship, Animal death, Blood, Bullying, Confinement, Cursing, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, and Infidelity

fadeddpages's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cannibalism, Gore, Toxic relationship, Sexual content, Murder, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Car accident, Violence, Death, and Blood

Moderate: Drug use, Alcohol, Fire/Fire injury, Infidelity, and Panic attacks/disorders

abicaro17's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

The last 25% of the book was very gripping and intriguing. Unfortunately most of the book had me checking my progress and seeing if it was over yet. Im usually a sucker for a gruesome murder which this book technically delivers but, the descriptions of literally anything and everything take up most of the book. Its almost repetitive and it took a lot of self control not to skim the book. Plus the amount of times Dorothy was just like "oh yeah this happened anyways back to this food" was annoying as fuck. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Murder, Sexism, Antisemitism, Body horror, Child abuse, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Cancer, Cannibalism, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Gore, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Toxic friendship, Violence, Alcohol, Car accident, Death, Eating disorder, Sexual content, Stalking, Blood, Death of parent, and Classism

poisonousplum's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cannibalism, Murder, and Sexual content

Minor: Infidelity

raisinreads's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

GoDDAMN this woman was horny; is it bad that in the book about cannibalism I was most grossed out by the foot fetish..

Anyways, to quote a queen:
"You're killing people?"
"No, I'm killing boys."

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Cannibalism, Blood, Gore, Infidelity, Murder, and Violence

icarusandthesun's review against another edition

dark funny reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

holy shit. this book was as vile, graphic and brutal as it was brilliant - which is to say, extremely.
cynical, self-conscious, unflinching, and surprisingly profound.
 
dorothy was hilarious, and absolutely crazy. and the worst thing is, the whole book was also incredibly and excruciatingly thrilling. i was having fun watching a mad cannibalist skin her lover. i was having a jolly old time while reading about this psychopathic woman eating human meat and analyzing it as if it were just any other ordinary (and with ordinary i mean sophisticated and *italian*) meal. 
it was horrible and so entertaining.

it was a very slow book though with a lot of detailed descriptions, sautéed in a sauce of names, places and meals i've never even heard of (did i do that right?). it was a little unrelatable, or maybe i'm just uncultured. probably both since i do believe i'm not a psychopath so relating to this woman would be a little disconcerting. 

anyways, fun read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Gore, Cannibalism, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Blood, Confinement, and Murder

Moderate: Animal death and Sexual content

Minor: Infidelity

nkoss's review against another edition

challenging dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I’m sorry but I tried to like it but the author seemed overly concerned with using every pretentious large word in her vocabulary (like, I get it! His head was “brobdingnagian”! Did you really have to use that word more than once?) — Dorothy, I assume on purpose, was unlikeable in every aspect and I can’t help but think that the author was exorcising some of her own frustrations out h the through Dorothy’s annoyance in the evolution of the workplace and how long form content is essentially dead. Felt like everything was written for shock factor when it just became quite boring towards the end. The last few chapters felt rushed that I thought a chapter was missing. It was a quick read so I finished it, but it wasn’t a favorite. Don’t feel like I need to read it ever again. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, Torture, Emotional abuse, Car accident, Stalking, Sexual content, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Gore, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Cannibalism, Sexism, Toxic friendship, Infidelity, and Sexual violence

tatimarie8284's review against another edition

challenging dark informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

it honestly took me a while to get into, the first day i got it i was struggling to read the first chapter because i wasn’t expecting the writing style but after i got past it it was such a page turner! couldn’t put it down! it was so uncomfortably descriptive it made it easy to put yourself in her world even though you wouldn’t want to. definitely one worth reading but not if you have a weak stomach 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Alcohol, Cannibalism, Car accident, Chronic illness, Fire/Fire injury, Forced institutionalization, Stalking, Blood, Violence, Animal death, Cancer, Sexual harassment, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, Terminal illness, Body horror, Death of parent, Excrement, Infidelity, Sexual assault, Confinement, Death, Gaslighting, and Gore