Sunyi Dean

This book is a darkly incredible foray into abuse that has trickled down from past generations to the future ones. I couldn’t help but identify with Devon’s struggle to break the cycle with her own son Cai, especially with her lamenting when she fails to live up to the person she wants to be—a role-model she never had, trying to create a better world for her son than the one she grew up in.

This is a contemporary fantasy that takes place in England, but it’s split storyline. While show more the present-day Devon’s storyline takes place in or near present-day, there’s also another storyline with her younger self in childhood, and the way the two are woven together is absolutely masterfully done. Dark, terrible things happen to Devon bringing her to her present-day quest to save her son, but they aren’t lingered on or described in detail. Instead, the reader is distanced from the events as Devon distances herself from what happens, as a way to survive.

I loved the way the culture of the Book Eaters was explored and revealed, with its struggle to stay unknown in a modern world that moves increasingly fast. I also appreciated the way dark subjects were dealt with, neither glorifying or shockingly, but also without shying away from them: things like emotional abuse and its effects, sexual assault, and physical abuse.

Devon was raised as a princess, punished only by being forced to eat dictionary pages instead of fairy tales, but with the full expectation that once she was grown she would fulfill her duty and give two other Families a child each, after which she could come back home and do as she pleased.

But Devon’s son is a mind eater. To the Family, mind eaters are monsters who must be shut away and quelled firmly by Knights who are trained in how to break their spirits and “train” them to obey. Devon’s not about to let that happen to her son, though.

The only way to save her son is to secure him a drug that will allow him to eat books instead of minds. A drug that has become impossible to find in recent years. Impossible, however, is merely a suggestion for Devon.


CW: physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual assault, body horror, gore, explicit violence, domestic abuse, violence against children


I was given a copy of this book, but that has not affected my review to the best of my knowledge. show less

Devon is a Book Eater, a separate species of human which eats books instead of food, who is on the run with her young son Cai, a rare type of Book Eater who eats human minds instead of books. She’s searching for a secretive family of Book Eaters who have invented a medication that will allow Cai to live without eating minds, while also evading her own family who want to take Cai away from her. Through their backstory we learn about the Book Eaters’ strange society, how Devon got to this show more point, and why she longs to break free.

A great read! Really interesting world-building and good characters. The Book Eaters have very cult-y vibes - they live in remote enclaves hidden around England and the rarity of their species gives the patriarchs complete control over their families (especially child-bearing women). Devon is an intriguing character - she's very pragmatic because, as she and we are told, Book Eaters are incapable of creative thinking. But is that really true if she can imagine a better life for her son? Many parts of this story are very dark - victims can't survive for long after Cai eats their minds, but Devon is not willing to let him suffer and die so she has no choice but to find victims for him. However, Devon finds kinship with others who have suffered under the strict society Book Eaters society, so not all is hopeless.
I very much enjoyed the writing style and I can't wait to read what the author writes next, whether it's in this world or another. show less

What a concept: people among us who must eat books for nourishment, and thereby retain all of the knowledge inside; juxtaposed with others who must eat human minds and internalize their victims' personhood. Devon, the main character, is a book eater with two children -- a daughter whom she has been forced to leave behind with the father, and a young son Cai who is a mind eater. As Cai grows and requires increasing numbers of human minds, his internalized intelligence makes his 5 year old show more self into an adult intellect. Devon will be required to "harvest" more and more humans for Cai unless she can obtain a secret miracle drug that is kept hidden by a rival family. The cultural norms of the book and mind eaters offer interesting comparisons to current times, and the struggles in behalf of and in spite of family raise universal issues. I found the world-building to be rather slow-starting, but once the pace picked up it was an enjoyable read, and I look forward to the likely sequel. show less

Scattered around the world are small, isolated communities of book eaters, who take nourishment from books instead of food. They also absorb the information of every book they eat, with nearly perfect recall.

In Britain, the book eaters are the Six Families, each living in a large family manor. With so small a community, marriages are carefully planned and arranged to maintain genetic diversity as much as possible; in order to keep the women docile and obedient about these arranged marriages, show more girls are raised on a limited diet of fairy tales and damsels in distress.

From childhood, Devon has been sneaking into her uncle's library and eating books she shouldn't, which has made her an unusually rebellious young woman, unwilling to follow the usual protocols and abandon her children when she is moved into a new marriage/breeding opportunity. When her son, Cai, is born with a rare mutation that makes him a potential danger to other book eaters, she is determined to rescue him from the restrictions of life among the other "dragons" and give them both an independent life away from the Families.

Very entertaining blend of fantasy (*) and thriller. The world of the book eaters has been smartly thought out, with interesting details that never feel like mere "oh, wouldn't this complicate things nicely!" contrivances. Devon and Cai are well rounded characters, and the supporting players are crisply and quickly drawn, given enough depth to feel like more than pieces to be moved around the gameboard.

(* -- One could quibble about whether the book eaters are fantasy creatures or SF creatures. The Families' own understanding of how they came to be on earth is that they were placed here by aliens, which I suppose would technically make this SF, but there's a lot of ambiguity about that explanation. It falls somewhere in the realm of myth or legend for the Families, who are for reasons that Dean explains not given to keeping accurate historical records. Whatever genre you choose to slot the book into, the story works.)

There is perhaps one "but you didn't know that I was really working for..." reversal too many in the final chapters, but aside from that, the thrills work, the villains are thoroughly hissable, and Dean does a fine job of building suspense.

I went into this book with modest expectations. I'm not a big fantasy reader, and what I knew of the premise sounded like something that could easily get too twee for my tastes. So this was a delightful surprise, and I look forward to seeing what Dean does next. show less