I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Bonnier Books UK in exchange for an honest review.

What would you give to accomplish your dream?

I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me is the story of Laure, a black ballet dancer struggling to establish herself in Paris despite being the best dancer at her school. Tired of always having to do more, her life is changed forever when a fellow dancer brings her to a god and she decides to strike a bargain. Finally, she will get the recognition she deserves...but at what cost?

This book had so much going for it that I loved. Firstly, it's a horror story about ballet which I am obsessed with. Secondly, the protagonist really is one of the best YA protagonists I've read about in a while. Laure is painfully three-dimensional, so real she could dance off the page and demand why I am not doing more. Thirdly, the whole plot felt very unique to me. I don't read a lot of 'strike a deal' horror books but I think even if I had, this one is still incredibly unique.

Unfortunately, this book had two main flaws and they stopped me enjoying it as much as I did at the start. It is just too long in my opinion or at least, there is too much of the book where nothing is really going on. The beginning was so tight and so intriguing and then it slows to a bit of a halt, only briefly picking up speed again throughout. Related to this, I also found parts of the book to be a little confusing. I struggled a bit to keep track of where characters were or what was happening to them. Laure's parents are a good example of this. She kept on reinforcing this idea that her father had abandoned her and been a terrible parent, but then he kept cropping up and it wasn't entirely clear to me what he had done that was so awful. There are quite a few plot points like this and it didn't help when combined with the pacing.

Having said that, this book is still well worth the read. So many elements are strong and compared to other YA works, it stands out by a mile. I am very excited to see what this author does next as I believe they will only get stronger the more they write, and I hope to be seeing many more books from them in the future. This is a powerful voice and something horror desperately needs more of

Overall Rating:

.5