Grueling. Barbaric. Nauseatingly dystopian yet also painfully possible.
A world without meat — what’s the big deal? I say as a vegetarian. 🌱 Before I made the transition (wink), I had begun to lose the taste for meat. First it was pork, followed by beef, chicken/poultry, and lastly seafood — because you know — if can’t hear their screams, doesn’t mean they don’t feel pain.
Tender is the flesh — intimate, romantic, but as you begin to read, it twists in your stomach perversely like rancid meat.
There were multiple times I had to put the book down, my stomach churning. The slow, clinical passages about the breeding and slaughter processes were reminiscent of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle — though a stark contrast with the painstaking processes in place, compared to the slippery, repulsive walls of a Chicago slaughterhouse in the twentieth century.
The characters are unlikeable. Dull. There are no bright stars to cling to in this endless night of 200 pages of darkness. There are no hero’s. Only villains.
Macros, the narrator, is primarily an observer while others talk, prattle, and brag — as he slowly descends to grief. And madness.
The author snatches any semblance of warmth from the reader before they are allowed to feel any joy.
Warmth and color echo quietly through Marco’s fading memories of his dying father. Of his dead son. Of his absent wife.
Marcos is a shell of a man, or maybe I could say a wind-up toy, going about his marching orders as he battles the rise of nausea of the barbaric business while also unleashing his own string of horrors.
Some trigger warnings: (cannibalism, butchery, assault, and many other atrocities – because, you can’t have an interesting story unless a woman is being tortured)
The female — is nothing but a tool. To be impregnated. Assaulted. Discarded.
The male — is to be plucked, primed, prized, and devoured like a fine meal.
I was surprised that the author was a woman, given the backward way female “heads” were depicted.
If there’s ever a future where there are women limbless and pregnant, their only purpose is to be assaulted and give birth under the most barbaric conditions, I’m outttaaaa here ✌🏽
Female “heads” are vulnerable in the sense that we women are always. Life has always been considered precious, but as we learned with the trans-Atlantic slave trade, life can also mean profit, even to the most devoted.
Greed. Is the sin at the forefront of this novel, as well as ignorance, which should be a sin in itself?
The government says all animals catch a virus. And instead of developing a cure, let’s spend copious time and hours creating laws to eat humans, breed humans for eating, etc (What about saving the bees?!?)🐝
Yes, that makes so much sense. I wonder if that’s the point of the book— how sensibly nonsensical the premise is.
At its core — the bones of the novel touch on the mass hysteria we witnessed during COVID — as people sought answers — and how it spiraled — seeing the desperation and fallacy people swallowed without hesitation — then is it too far off a future where we will end up eating each other?
Cannibalism — a taboo, and people just love a taboo topic when they don’t have many other issues to worry about.
It can be frustrating at times to read a story through the eyes of the privileged.
Boooo! Look at the poor people eating low-grade meat. You can’t buy your own domestic “head”? Loser. 💅
I feel like it could have been more compelling to see the other side of this world — what would you really do if cannibalism were legal and you would do anything for a taste of the best quality?
We see hints with the “Scavengers” who don’t get a backstory. I guess every dystopian world needs a wild class of people to shake up the narrative.
Were these Scavengers people who rebelled and then cast out? Were they always poor? Deranged?
But who cares, right — they are poor. And poor people don’t matter, even in a dystopian novel. Their stories are not interesting 
You know who is — a privileged man who helped compose these atrocious laws.
Marcos is riddled with guilt — good.
He’s a terrible man — surprise?!?
And of course — there’s Race.
Female “heads” who are the most beautiful (you’re telling me these unfortunate humans are beautiful?!?? Treated like dogs, and I’m sure they are gorgeous – GTFO) are pale-skinned—long straight hair. You’re telling me these humans made for eating and breeding have long hair? Are hairless for breeding purposes — why? The “head” you’re keeping in your cellar and slowly dismembering, I’m sure you’re also thinking of giving them a French braid.
Another leak in this sinking ship. 🛳️
The hunting. Maybe I’m looking at this too practically, but how are the male “head” trained to be strong? Are they given weights? 🤔 Is there an obstacle course on the breeding farms so they can become stronger?
Overall, it was a long-winded, gratuitous narrative that was meant to shock and disgust. And it did it’s job. I was already a vegetarian but now I can;t wait to bore people even more about my dietary restrictions.
However, I wish the story had been handled with a finer hand—more finesse—rather than just bearing its wounds for all to see.
The point of the novel was beaten with a hammer (or a club – wink) to death, long before you get to Part 2.
You only need to show me one slaughterhouse video for me to be sworn off meat, but I guess others need a 200-page reminder that animals have feelings. Cuz – once you remove our voices and drug us up until we’re nothing but puppets — we’re animals too 🥺
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Mecca-Amirah Jackson 