After just finishing this book and still very much reeling from the experience, I don’t think I have the capacity to be able to explain properly WHY I give it 5 stars… just know that I truly believe it does deserve it. It’s mind boggling, thought provoking, disgusting, horrific, and even beautiful in certain moments. There are a few instances where I was not interested in what was happening, but those don’t detract from the impact of the rest of the story. I’ve also never felt so inclined to veganism as I do now after reading this.

I’m rating for the beautiful and impressive writing and the excellent translation. I’m rating for how much I FELT during the reading experience. I’m rating for how long this will linger with me, I’m sure it’ll be a long time. I’m rating for how disturbed I was, which honestly I do believe was the point of this.

This is the first book I’ve physically tabbed and annotated, as I’ve only ever done that in a digital sense. I’m glad I decided to do this as I believe it enhanced my personal experience to be able to really express my thoughts and feelings during the reading and pause to really take things in while tabbing.

The ending messed me up. That’s all I’ll say about it.

Highly recommend for those who can handled it, which is probably not many. If you don’t like body horror or gore or descriptions of the worst possible things a human can partake in… then do not read this. If you have a high tolerance for those things, as in you enjoy horror movies and true crime and getting literally stabbed in the gut with feelings… then this is the book for you.