The Woman by Jack Ketchum, Lucky McKee
My rating: 3/5 cats
hmm. i should have realized this was the third part of a trilogy before i read this. i have read reviews of this on here before that explicitly stated this, but for some reason, i just blanked that out when i was choosing my books for “october is spooky.” this is a perfectly fine self-contained story, but i think i might have felt more connection to it had i read the first two and been better able to connect with the characters from their previous storylines.
so, a cannibal woman happily living on her own terms all half-nekkid in nature, hunting and gathering and eating ummm meat, is captured by a perfect-family-on-the-surface whackjob creep, then restrained, imprisoned, tortured, and raped. all—you know, to civilize her.
it is graphic and brutal and as though that weren’t enough (it is), there’s all sorts of other horrific stuff going on out in the barn with the dogs and in the bedroom with the teenage daughter. if it is making you uncomfortable to read this review, just think what the book is like. you know, like the joke goes:
View Spoiler »this isn’t really a book i would feel comfortable recommending to anyone. there are definitely scenes in this that are vile and appalling. but there is also comeuppance. you have to wade through a river of blood and torture in order to get to the comeuppance, sure, but take stock of your personal violence-limits, and if you feel you are up to it, give this a read. i am curious about the first two books, myself, but i will probably wait until next year’s “spooky month” to satisfy my curiosity about “how did these people come to this??
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