User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
I have always believed that in our capitalist, consumerist society, we devour each other. - Agustina Bazterrica
This story is really disturbing, and it isn't until the very last page that it becomes clear just how deeply disturbing it is.
Tender Is the Flesh is an Argentinian import from an author who is apparently very popular in her own country. After reading this, dare I ask what other horrors she has created? This dystopian horror story is set in a world that feels so close to our own, except a zoonotic virus has made it so that all animals have had to be destroyed. To fill the gap in the meat market, people start to breed and farm humans for their meat.
It is as horrifying and gory as it sounds. Extra warning for those sensitive to scenes of sexual assault and animal cruelty. But while it is hard to stomach at times, I was morbidly fascinated by what Bazterrica had to say about the way humans take advantage of other humans because they can get away with it. The book is horribly convincing and believable. We only have to look to our own real world to recall the excuses humans have made to enslave other humans and to shuttle them off to extermination camps. It does not take a huge suspension of disbelief to imagine the events of this book could happen.
The book also focuses on the way language is used to make humans feel better about committing atrocities. No one is allowed to say "cannibalism" and the meat in the book is packaged as "special meat". There's some dark humour, too, with a few prods at the hypocrisy of humans being outraged by slavery at the same time as imprisoning and eating other humans.
It is told in third person limited and follows Marcos Tejo who works at a meat plant. He takes us through all the horrors involved with breeding, killing, flaying and packaging humans, whilst also dealing with the loss of his own infant son.
For such a bleak tale, it is surprisingly compelling. All the time while reading I was wondering what on earth the conclusion of this nightmare could leave us with, but I think it was even more effective than I could have imagined.
Rating: really liked it
One of the most relentless and ugly books I've ever read. A book that describes a society where humans are slaughtered for meat, in more detail than I was ready for. This novel willfully refuses to allow itself to fall into any category of fiction that would make it easier to take as a reader. The flat direct style of its prose didn't allow me, as I read along, to think of it as horror, or satire, or a metaphorical representation of social injustice, or a nihilistic moral thesis about humanity. It is exactly what it is. Never boring, it managed to continue to shock me until its final pages.
In 2010 Roger Ebert reviewed the cult movie
The Human Centipede and wrote:
I am required to award stars to movies I review. This time, I refuse to do it. The star rating system is unsuited to this film. Is the movie good? Is it bad? Does it matter? It is what it is and occupies a world where the stars don't shine. That goes for this novel, as well. If forced to give stars, I would give it five stars, for the way it relentlessly fulfills its purpose.
Rating: really liked it
FUUUUUUUUCK ok the ending got me
Rating: really liked it
Completely disgusting and beautiful at once. Humans are animals. My stomach churned the entire time, but I could not stop reading this book. And no, I did not, could not predict how it ends.
Rating: really liked it
The best final line in a novel since PET SEMATARY.
Rating: really liked it
Many might say that a book dealing with the level of brutality and horrific subject matter that makes up this book could never be thoughtful or highbrow. I disagree with that. I definitely think literature depicting graphic violence doesn't automatically disqualify it from being anything more than an assault on the senses or torture porn. I think it can lay out valuable examinations of so many aspects of society that deserve to be scrutinized, all while remaining allegorical. Battle Royale by Koushun Takami (as well as its film adaptation) is just one example of a successful novel of this nature.
Unfortunately, Tender Is The Flesh didn't live up to that expectation for me.
It truly
is brimming with brutality. In fact, that's all it is, is brutal. A virus that turns animal meat poisonous to humans causes humans to slaughter every non-human animal and factory farm human beings for food, testing, etc. You would think that a concept such as:
"imagine what the world would be like if humans were treated the way we treat animals in factory farms" would have a lot to say. Just think about the fact that in the western part of the world, most people don't think twice about eating certain animals as food, but will get disgusted, enraged and even downright racist when other cultures in other parts of the world eat animals westerners don't view and 'food animals'. Or the fact that most people eat fish, have no qualms with the concept of fishing, but will protest whale hunting as it applies to various Indigenous cultures, particularly Inuit. I could go on and on. The point is, a book with this concept could tackle some serious societal issues - environmental destruction, racism, health, food insecurity, speciesism, etc. As I entered this book and continued reading through it, I often wondered, "are we going to examine which humans are deemed 'food humans' in a meaningful way? Does it even matter? Does race, class, sexuality, or
anything come into play in this near-future dystopian world that so closely could resemble our own?"
And the answer is no. Because this book unpacks
nothing.
There were certainly minor suggestions toward some things, but they were quickly set aside in order to either continue describing the horrific acts inflicted upon these farmed humans, or to meander on about mundane things in the main character's personal life that ended up having little to no significance on the overall story. We didn't even really get anything in the way of showing how people came to accept this cannibalistic way of life, how those who work in these factories are affected in their personal lives. The closest we get to a glimpse of this is the main character essentially being described as not caring one way or another, human or non-human slaughter, because he was only in the industry in order to pay for his father's nursing home. I'm sorry, but that is just not well-rounded enough for me as a reader. There was even the compelling hint at an ongoing conspiracy theory that the virus was faked by governments in order to deceive society into cannibalism as a means to alleviate overpopulation. However, this subplot peters out pretty quickly, but only
after having a group of teenage boys briefly bring up the conspiracy's existence in conversation while (graphically) killing a litter of puppies they found in an abandoned zoo. Again, it's brutality for the sake of brutality and seemingly nothing else.
Of course, I don't need -and I know many other readers don't need- literature or any form of entertainment to have a big, glaring moral spoonfed to me/us. Despite all that I've said, I hope it doesn't seem like I'm implying I didn't like this book because it didn't hold my hand while leading me through a clear and precise commentary of my own biases. I don't need that. But if a book is to be this grotesque in its depictions, I do think it should either go completely nihilistic (and thus let
that speak for itself) or have at least something compelling to show for it. I think, overall, this book felt incomplete to me and
that's my biggest gripe. The author certainly had ideas, but because her world-building was weak and her writing offered little in the way of depth, those ideas never really broke the surface and ended up fizzling out before anything of interest or import could come of it.
Underneath all its gruesomeness, shock value and gore, it's actually a super boring book.
Rating: really liked it
in order to believe this book is anything other than disturbing for disturbing's sake, you have to buy into its worldview even a little.
and i don't!
i just don't see the world this way, i don't believe that humans are this unendingly susceptible to propaganda and unempathetic in their hearts.
it feels like a creative writing 101 allegory to me - oh, factory farming is bad, so let's make animals replaced with humans and then people will REALIZE it's bad! it's neither necessary nor new nor altogether an accurate metaphor.
this got more and more difficult for me to read not because it's grotesque and awful and ugly, but because it's, to me, very silly!
and at the end, only more so!
i'm sorry but i don't think cannibalism is the same as carnivore-ism and i never will :) not even for the sake of a thrown together literary horror.
bottom line: i disliked a cool girl book. who am i. (besides not cool, which has been obvious since the day of my birth.)
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currently-reading updatesquick word of advice:
i picked this one up to start during my lunch break today.
don't do that.
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tbr reviewdon't mind me, just adding another hot girl book to my to-read list
Rating: really liked it
A mysterious virus has eradicated animals to the brink of mass extinction. Left with no meat source to cultivate, humanity has turned to cannibalism to whet its appetite, satiate its ceaseless hunger for flesh and blood. Humans are now domesticated, mass produced, slaughtered, and sold for "special meat." Pickled fingers, barbecued ribs, broiled tongue served over kimchi and potato salad, taste humanity dressed in herbs and spices.
Marcos is from the past generation. He was among those who witnessed the animals decimated and humanity slowly regress back to its primeval instincts choosing to savagely devour their kin than be without meat. Practically raised in an animal slaughterhouse his father owned, Marcos found his expertise needed in this new industry asking for mass murder. Thus Marcos swallowed the bitter reality in front of him and did what he needed to survive until fate brought him despair to awaken his dulled senses, and then beauty to remind him of his humanity.
The concept of cannibalism is nothing new to us. Civilizations of the past from the mighty Aztecs of Mexico, to the great tribes of the Pacific Islands and Southeast Asia, and even the great Pharaohs of Egypt have displayed behaviour involving the use of human meat as food source. The concept of human beings being sold and treated as commercial goods we have seen and eradicated as well in the form of slavery. But the combination of cannibalism, mass production of humans, and commercialization of human meat - an entire industry devoted to making cannibalism efficient and profitable - is a hard idea to grasp.
As you read through the book's pages the inital shock factor wears off and you are left with a curious feeling of resignation. Gradually you realize that your mind has accepted this behavior and what used to induce revulsion has now affected a normalcy. The infinite capacity of human beings to adapt is a powerful phenomenon, and to an extent our ability to survive is infinitely pronounced by the alternative darkness presented here. But at the same time our tendency to set aside our morals, our code of ethics, at the smallest sign of discomfort is in perfect display as well. If this book has an idea as its driving force, it is that we need to accept that we are nothing but beasts. Man is an animal. We are capable of feral acts, and the unconscious desire to erase all we have learned through civilization and revert into savageness is ever present. This is why our society will never be perfect. Because while most educate themselves out of their beastly instincts. Others cannot let go of their aggression, cannot deny their barbaric urge for violence, and suppress their predatory thirst for blood. In just an instant the overcoat of civility can be dropped to reveal an untamed animal: brute, wild, murderous, ready to eat its own kind. This we cannot let happen.
Sink your teeth into this gritty and often jarring piece of literature. It can be therapeutic - a small taste of the gory to quench the monstrous urge within. Better encountered in literature than manifested through actual violence. Indulge in this mortal feast. Behind its depictions of human slaughter and cannibalism you'll find yourself intoxicated by its morbid truths. Before you realize it you begin to relish the revoltingly raw images in your mind, like a predatory beast inevitably drawn by the hypnotic scent of fresh blood.
Rating: really liked it
i can't contain my thoughts right now but a fuller review to come
Rating: really liked it
Bold. Subversive. Punchy. Nauseating. Provocative. Challenging. Excessive. Polemical. Gruesome.In 1729, Jonathan Swift published a sustained Juvenalian satire called A Modest Proposal in which he solved in one move the economic and social woes of the starving poor, especially in Ireland: all they had to do was sell their children to be eaten by the rich, and not just would they become wealthy, but the population over-crowding would be eased as well. One line that has always stayed with me is this: 'A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout.' It's a line that might well serve as a fitting epigraph for this book.
Bazterrica offers to us a world in which cannibalism rules, now called the Transition and covered over by linguistic euphemisms to make it, er, palatable. The thing is this isn't really a dystopia as I've seen it described: it reflects all kinds of realities, albeit pushed to extremes. The conveyor line killing sounds like the process that animals go through, stunned, slaughtered, turned into leather, fertilizer, as well as prime cuts of meat. The mass transits that bring 'heads' to the killing centres remind us of the Nazi death-trains, complete with the occasional 'head' trying desperately to escape before being shot. The laboratory doing medical experiments on live specimens reflect our own pharmaceutical and medical protocols. The Scavengers are the have-nots, socially ostracised and kept outside of social structures like the homeless on our streets. And the 'game-hunting' and people-trafficking are just a step away from what we read about every day. Bazterrica's vision may be excessive, and shockingly so, but only just: and the book asks provocative, uneasy questions about what exactly it is which separates the human from animal.
This is no 1984 or The Handmaid's Tale: it doesn't have the extensive, convincing world-building and is shorter, more polemical - but for a short read-it-in-a-few-hours book it's punchy and oh so provocative. (And yes, that'll be veggie burgers for me, thanks).
Rating: really liked it
In its scathing and visceral indictment of factory farming,
Tender is the Flesh seems to forget that politics and (in)justice extend beyond the—still important—realm of animal cruelty and capitalism.
There is not nearly enough interrogating of broader themes in this book to justify its shock value, self-righteous narrator, and disgusting, dehumanizing portrayal of women and marginalized people.
Rating: really liked it
reading vlog: https://youtu.be/AXpfik6Q72gThe love I have for this book has me looking at myself in a whole new light.
THIS is my horror. I have found my perfect cocktail of disgust, intrigue, logic, and humanity.
I am a firm believer in the government conspiracy side of this book. This has sparked so many good conversations for me with so many people. This might be a favorite of all time.
Rating: really liked it
It's always a delight to read science fiction in translation and even more that ava raris, Latin American science fiction. Latin American lit is so often crushed into the mold of magic realism that, like a black hole, publishing sucks up all the works that do not ascribe to that category and condemns them to darkness. But Tender is the Flesh is definitely science fiction. It would sit prettily (or disturbingly) next to The Road or Under the Skin. It has that quality of a literary, high-quality dystopia that academics like to feast on. It's also entirely engrossing.
The plot is basic. In a near-future (or alternate reality?) dystopia, cannibalism is a common occurrence. People are bred for meat consumption and graves are ransacked for tasty cadavers. A man who works in a meat processing facility suddenly finds himself with a costly luxury gift: a human who should be consumed for her meat. Cue moral dilemmas and ruminations.
White audiences often demand 'authentic' Latin American novels. By which I mean they want a word italicized every paragraph and enough 'local color' to render a text into the equivalent of a cheap, plastic Frida Kahlo statuette. Tender is the Flesh obviously does not evoke any of those plastic concerns. It's bold, nasty and entirely it's own thing while also reflecting an era that I like to call New Latin American and Hispanic Fantastic, which has little to nothing to do with magic realism (see Michelle Roche Rodríguez and others).
It's a very interesting book and one that any science fiction fan should pursue with the obvious warning that it's pretty dark material.
Rating: really liked it
So bleak and horrifying!! That ending had me like 🤯
Reading vlog where I read it: https://youtu.be/ZuJK4T4tkRQ
Rating: really liked it
This is vile, bold, dark, vicious, gory, bloody, disturbing, eerie, volatile, provocative!
Let out your screams! Prepare to sleep with lights on! If you suffer insomnia or still believe in monsters hide under your beds ( I personally recheck my closets and bed before going to bed) this book is not great fit for you ( when I still look my face paler than snow owl and bloodshot eyes make me great candidate for any B rated horror movie star, I absolutely agree to this opinion. Why the hell I chose to read this ?)
As Thomas Hobbes mentioned in his DeCive “That Man to Man is a kind of God; and that Man to Man is an arrant Wolfe.”
Imagine a dystopian world: the animal meat is toxic but it is legal to eat special meat: yes, as you guess cannibalism is approved by government! Hurray! I think Hannibal Lecter may be the president candidate for this forthcoming ominous future!
So human will be categorized into two types: some of them will be feeders as other half of them will be the eaters! Let the hunger games begin!
Marcos is the main character who tries to resist that human massacre, working at the plant but he also witnesses the batshit craziness occurs in front of his eyes with graphic details including women’s massacres including cutting limb, draining blood and shipping process ( don’t you ever dare to read this book at the same day your husband decides to have his BBQ party at the backyard! Oh gross! )
And let’s not forget the cult members visit him to contribute their sacrifices. Marcos tries to be observer without joining this vicious mess destruction, becoming our eyes during this horrifying, bleak, hopeless, dark dystopian journey!
The ending was a quick, unexpected stab in the chest! You keep screaming, trying to gather your wits, close your wide open mouth, slow down your heart rates! WTH!!!
That was true thought provoking, realistic, terrifying story will haunt you for days !
It was challenging, complex, giving you Orwell book vibes including Animal Farm, 1984!
Presenting us pessimistic, wild, bleak, haunting future world. I cannot imagine anything is predicted in those chapters become real! But it can... unfortunately it can... that makes the book one of the most scariest stories you ever read!
