Tender Is the Flesh
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3.9 • 87 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
THE RUNAWAY NATIONAL BESTSELLER AND INTERNATIONAL SENSATION
Working at the local processing plant, Marcos is in the business of slaughtering humans—though no one calls them that anymore.
His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the “Transition.” Now, eating human meat—“special meat”—is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.
Then one day he’s given a gift: a live specimen of the finest quality. Though he’s aware that any form of personal contact is forbidden on pain of death, little by little he starts to treat her like a human being. And soon, he becomes tortured by what has been lost—and what might still be saved.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Argentine writer Bazterrica's uneven English-language debut disturbs with a vision of human cruelty and moral flexibility. Bazterrica efficiently establishes the premise: an animal-borne virus has led to the mass slaughter of all livestock, forcing the hungry populace to look for protein elsewhere ("At a chilling speed the world was put back together and cannibalism was legitimized"). Marcos Tejo works for a processing plant that slaughters genetically modified humans, or "head," for consumption. Marcos is a dour character, emotionally hollow after the death of his son and working in a profession he despises to support his ailing father. After one of his clients gives him as a gift a "First Generation Pure" female captive-bred, non-GMO human livestock he begins to lust for her, though it's a capital crime to "enjoy" females meant for breeding. Bazterrica is best when clinically describing the mechanisms of the harvesting process, from breeding to killing to butchering. These entrancing scenes normalize the brutality with euphemisms, demonstrating the Orwellian potential of language to "cover up the world." The prose, though, can be overwrought at times notably during a sex scene taking place on a bloody butchering table but Bazterrica's purposely unappetizing conceit makes for a powerful allegory on the human consumption of animals. Still, the execution will leave a bad taste in the reader's mouth.
Customer Reviews
Not as wild as I expected.
This book was hyped up online and I was intrigued by the premise. There are some shocking chapters, but overall the build up throughout part 1 is better than the payoff in part 2. The writing style is cold and clinical (possibly partially due to the translation), which plays well with the subject matter, but isn’t conducive to character development. I finished the book feeling like I didn’t know the main character any better than when I started the book - perhaps this was intentional. That being said, I did finish it in less than a week… it is definitely compelling.
Disappointing!
Wow. What an amazing book up until the last page. Then it just feels cut off too early. I felt another 4-5 chapters were missing. Character decision making at the end feels out of character. So close but so far away.
Where’s the rest of the book
bought this book and can only read two chapters what a rip off