House of Hunger by Alexis Henderson: Beautiful Sapphic Destruction.

 

It has been a while lads but I am finally back with a review of the most beautifully grotesque book of 2022. This book is entirely my jam and I cannot wait to introduce you all to it. I recieved this book in exchange for an honest review all thoughts are my own. 

Plot Time: Marion dreams of a better life away from servitude. When she sees aan advert for a Blood Maid she is instantly enticed to the job and is hired to the presitigious House of Hunger. The head of the house is a ill but beautiful artisocratic woman with a deadly secret. All is not as it seems!

Holy moley is this book incredible! It's an intensly gothic thrill ride that gave me some real Vampire Lestat vibes. I honestly could go on for hours but it's really nice to see a resurgance in gothic style literature (think Small Angels, Silent Companions) but especially gothic style literature that is as gay as its historical predessors. Especially now that we are lucky enough that books can be explicitly gay. 

The slightly fantasy period setting really gave this book an edge. It remidned me a lot of the heap House series and with a tinge of Series of Unfortunate Events. The way all these upper class people esentitally enslave the lower classes using their blood is fascinating. This might be the most unqiue vampire adjacent book I've ever read for that reason. I've never seen a book use blood quite like this.

Finally I have to talk abotu our leading lady Marion. She is instantly likeable and desperate to better herself but this comes at a huge cost. In fact all the blood maids were really fascinating characters and watching them slowly compromise themselves for their job was really fascinating and heartbreaking.

Overall this sapphic tale of blood, lust and violence is absolutely worth your time. It's a fantastic feminist tale and definitley a contender for my faviorite book of the year. 

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