Shesheshen is an amorphous lump who lives at the bottom of a pool in an abandoned house, hibernates during the winter, and occasionally shapeshifts into something vaguely humanoid, wanders down to the village, and eats people. Only apparently bad people, but I guess you can’t make the carnivorous monster who is the lead of your book unsympathetic by having them eat an orphan or an old lady or a kitten or a puppy or something like that. All goes well until the day hunters come to her house.
Her lair had unwelcome visitors again. They did not even wipe their shoes.
Fleeing from the village soon after (hey, killing hunters is hungry work; a blob pretending to be humanoid-ish has to eat. Besides, what else are they there for?), Shesheshen falls into a ravine, and into the camp of Homily. Homily is like no one Shesheshen has even seen before; large, loud, unshaven, with a truly unique laugh, she’s the perfect future nest for Shesheshen’s young, someone truly worthy of being eaten from the inside out to supply food for the next generation of meat-hungry shapeshifting amorphous blobs. That plan gets derailed when Homily lets Shesheshen in on a little secret; her older brother has gone ahead of her to this area, hunting the monster that cursed their family; has Shesheshen heard anything about a monster? (Did I say killing hunters? Oops, my bad. Not a good start to the in-law relationships here.) Only Shesheshen never cursed anyone; when you’re eating people, why would you bother cursing their families as well? Now she has to help her girlfriend look for her, protect said girlfriend from girlfriend’s own abusive family, find out who started this curse rumor, and maybe discover that it’s better to build a family with someone instead of in someone.
Romance was awful. She couldn’t even murder people anymore.
Homily professed her love by digging a second crossbow bolt of Shersheshin’s body. It was so much clearer a declaration of affection than any of those speeches spun by poets or playwrights. And stuffed into the mouths of actors who pretended to be enamored. One could only pretend to love in language. True love was a woman sinking up to her elbows in her viscera.
Plus, Shesheshen has a blue-furred bear named Blueberry. Blueberry is the best part of the book, and must be protected at all costs.
This probably would have been a much better book in the hands of another author; as it stands, it reads incredibly stilted and wooden.
(Me throughout the book.)
When one of the lines in the book is
I’m not intimidated by books. I would crush them in a fight.
And all I could hear in my head was
I knew I was in trouble. Yes, I understand the whole “family can damage you with lasting scars (physical and emotional) like no other”, and “humans are the real monsters in the world”, and “abused children need to learn to raise their children differently/better than they were raised” messages, but write them better, please! Shesheshen (and boy, am I tired of writing that name out) was not a great thrill to read, and Homily was just an exhausting one. Not taking into account that for a flesh-eating monster, S. (I am not writing that name out again) would make a killing as a therapist; I was waiting for her/them/it to tell Homily she needs to go low, preferably no contact with her toxic family, and maybe read Adult Survivors of Toxic Family Members. Not that S is wrong; there is not one member of Homily’s family that does not deserve a horribly gruesome death. None of them have any redeeming qualities, and the “big reveals” about two of them are horrible and made me feel sorry for Homily and S, but alternatively; I. Did. Not. Care.
I did not care about the plot twists. I did not care about the reveals. I did not care about the romance (plus for aro/ace representation, minus for making me actually think at one point, “Coward! If you’re going this far, go whole hog and go The Shape of Water!”). I did care about Blueberry. I did like a couple of lines here or there. I do realize that I sound like I’m about to discuss boxes, socks, eggs, ham, and people named Sam. But do you know what I care about most of all?
I care about the fact that out of the back synopsis, 3/4 of it was the first 76 pages, the last 1/4 was 210 out of the remaining 349. That was just ridiculous. I care about the fact that the author compares his book to Gideon the Ninth
(sorry about the Harry Potter reference; unfortunately, the sentiment fits.)
To sum it all up; some people might enjoy this book; I did a little. But overall, it reminded me of some fanfics; great idea, good bones, just overshadowed by a not so great author.
No young woman of means has gone through her entire life without at least once surveying her opportunities and wishing for a dragon instead.
Weaknesses were a human invention. They called it your weakness if they fantasized about murdering you with it.
Nobody actually helped each other. That’s why people had religions, hoping gods would provide help where people refused.
