Thanks to NetGalley, Hachette Audio, and Orbit for the ARC. It hasn't affected the contents of my review.
Okay, so I loved this, even though it wasn't Thanks to NetGalley, Hachette Audio, and Orbit for the ARC. It hasn't affected the contents of my review.
Okay, so I loved this, even though it wasn't perfect, and I kind of want to bump my 4.5 stars up to five. I feel like it might be one of those cases where after I read future books and re-read this one, it will be a full five. I want to get a physical copy and annotate! There are a LOT of people who are not getting what this is going for, which is fine if sad. But it's important to go in knowing it's not just a campy, fun time. I think this book is a smart, fun send-up of fantasy as a genre with actual pathos behind it. I can't wait to see what happens with these characters once the author really gets a chance to do things with them.
This is sticking at a rounded up four stars. The stuff I liked is outweighing the stuff I think needed some work. Definitely in for books two and threThis is sticking at a rounded up four stars. The stuff I liked is outweighing the stuff I think needed some work. Definitely in for books two and three.
I kind of can’t believe how much I liked this. Sometimes you just have to try new things! I do not recommend that the new thing you try be eating humaI kind of can’t believe how much I liked this. Sometimes you just have to try new things! I do not recommend that the new thing you try be eating human eyeballs, as our MC is into, but like, try some pig ear soup! Or some menudo. You never had jackfruit? Try some jackfruit (had to throw something in for the vegans). You know! Or like me. Reading a book about a woman who looooooves eating eyeballs, a thing most versions of past me would not have believed I would do, let alone enjoy.
I sat on this review for a little bit because I wanted to see what my subconscious could do with the story after a little stewing (pun not intended—don’t stew eyeballs) and I’m glad I did that, because it has indeed settled in my head, and I think if I read it again, I would bump up my rating even higher.
The Eyes are the Best Part opens with Ji-won and her sister Ji-hyun witnessing their mother falling apart after their father left weeks before. The family is Korean American, both parents are immigrants, and the girls were born in the US. Their father leaving has thrown their lives into chaos. This also coincides with some changes for Ji-won, who is a freshman at college, and is dealing with growing pains of her own. Soon her mother begins dating a man named George, who is clearly an Asian fetishist, and Ji-won begins dreaming and then imagining (and then putting into practice) eating the blue eyeballs of men.
The blurb says the books is about a female serial killer in the making from a Korean American perspective, and that’s accurate, because it’s just as much about Ji-won dealing with being treated and feeling differently due to her race and gender (with a little bit of class thrown in for good measure; her family is poor) as it is about her becoming a murderous monster fixated on eating eyeballs. And the two things are not unrelated!
Something that initially kept me from giving the book five stars is that my brain was having a hard time making the connection between the eyeball eating and the clearly literary-leaning rest of the book, that so accurately and incisively pokes at the social structures Ji-won is straining against, at the men who look at Asian women and see nothing but sex, at the rest of society that puts Asian Americans into very defined categories and doesn’t allow for them to make mistakes (Ji-won is not a good student, doesn’t get into Berkley like her friends, and is put on academic probation in her first semester of college, just to name a few things). Anyway, so I jokingly suggested halfway through the book while trying to piece this all together, is the eyeball eating, is it the gaze??? And you know, it absolutely is. It just took my brain a bit to get there (and this interview from the author solidifies it). She absolutely did this on purpose.
Anyway, I highly, highly recommend this book. The unhinged main character, her outrageous actions, the incisive social commentary, all of it works. I can’t wait to see what Monika Kim does next, I will definitely be here for it.
I would have liked a full novel of this! But I get why she made it a novella. Still, with more space and development room for the characters, this couI would have liked a full novel of this! But I get why she made it a novella. Still, with more space and development room for the characters, this could have been a five star read for me. ...more
Not rating because I didn't get far enough. I'm so sad, this cover is so beautiful. But nothing about it grabbed me, and reading the reviews DNF @ 11%
Not rating because I didn't get far enough. I'm so sad, this cover is so beautiful. But nothing about it grabbed me, and reading the reviews of people who got further than I did, or who finished, I'm glad I'm stopping here. Doesn't sound like I would have enjoyed much about it....more
The worldbuilding in this was a huge, huge problem (why are there HOT DOGS and FINGER GUNS in a high fantasy novel??? WHERE GUNS DO NOT EVEN EXIST), bThe worldbuilding in this was a huge, huge problem (why are there HOT DOGS and FINGER GUNS in a high fantasy novel??? WHERE GUNS DO NOT EVEN EXIST), but this wasn't terrible, and I would read from this author again if maybe they grow as a writer in a few years.
r/Fantasy BINGO: Published in 2024 (Hard Mode - A Debut)...more
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