The New York Times Book Review - Carina Chocano
…luminous…An uncompromising look at the specific, often paradoxical details of [Gay's] embodiment, the book examines the experience of living in her body in the world as through a kaleidoscope from every angle, turning it over and over into myriad new possible shapes. At its simplest, it's a memoir about being fat—Gay's preferred term—in a hostile, fat-phobic world. At its most symphonic, it's an intellectually rigorous and deeply moving exploration of the ways in which trauma, stories, desire, language and metaphor shape our experiences and construct our reality…Unlike most stories about weight, hers is not a story of triumph over her "unruly" body…It is…the story of a different kind of triumph, a narrative one. Gay wrestles her story from the world's judgment and misrecognition and sets off on a recursive, spiraling journey to rewrite herself. The story burrows in on itself while expanding exponentially…It dawns on you that the writing itself is a reclaiming, an act of rehumanization. It reads like a memoir of her victorious, if not frictionless, journey back to herself, back into her body, from the splitting off of trauma.
Publishers Weekly
★ 05/15/2017
Novelist and cultural critic Gay (Bad Feminist) writes of being morbidly obese in this absorbing and authentic memoir of her life as “a woman of size.” Born in l974 in Omaha, Neb., to Haitian immigrant parents, Gay initially lived a comfortable life in a loving family. After a group of boys raped her when she was 12 years old, Gay’s world began to unravel, and she turned to overeating as a way of making her violated body into a safe “fortress.” Ashamed to tell her Catholic parents what had occurred, she harbored her secret for more than 25 years. In the course of this memoir, Gay shares how her weight and size shade many topics, including relationships, fashion, food, family, the medical profession, and travel (the bigger her body became, the author notes, the smaller her world became). She suffered profound shame and self-loathing, and boldly confronts society’s cruelty toward and denigration of larger individuals (particularly women), its fear of “unruly bodies,” and the myth that equates happiness with thinness. This raw and graceful memoir digs deeply into what it means to be comfortable in one’s body. Gay denies that hers is a story of “triumph,” but readers will be hard pressed to find a better word. Agent: Maria Massie, LMQLit. (June)
From the Publisher
A gripping book, with vivid details that linger long after its pages stop. . . . Hunger is arresting and candid. At its best, it affords women, in particular, something so many other accounts deny them—the right to take up space they are entitled to, and to define what that means.” — Atlantic
“A work of staggering honesty . . . . Poignantly told.” — New Republic
“The book’s short, sharp chapters come alive in vivid personal anecdotes. . . . And on nearly every page, Gay’s raw, powerful prose plants a flag, facing down decades of shame and self-loathing by reclaiming the body she never should have had to lose.” — Entertainment Weekly
“Bracingly vivid. . . . Remarkable. . . . Undestroyed, unruly, unfettered, Ms. Gay, live your life. We are all better for having you do so in the same ferociously honest fashion that you have written this book.” — Los Angeles Times
“Searing, smart, readable. . . . “Hunger,” like Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “Between the World and Me,” interrogates the fortunes of black bodies in public spaces. . . . Nothing seems gratuitous; a lot seems brave. There is an incantatory element of repetition to “Hunger”: The very short chapters scallop over the reader like waves.” — Newsday
“Luminous. . . . intellectually rigorous and deeply moving.” — The New York Times Book Review
“Her spare prose, written with a raw grace, heightens the emotional resonance of her story, making each observation sharper, each revelation more riveting. . . . It is a thing of raw beauty.” — USA Today
“Powerful. . . . fierce. . . . Gay has a vivid, telegraphic writing style, which serves her well. Repetitive and recursive, it propels the reader forward with unstoppable force.” — Lisa Ko, author of The Leavers
“This is the book to read this summer . . . she’s such a compelling mind . . . . Anyone who has a body should read this book.” — Isaac Fitzgerald on the TODAY Show
“Unforgettable. . . . Breathtaking. . . . We all need to hear what Gay has to say in these pages. . . . Gay says hers is not a success story because it’s not the weight-loss story our culture demands, but her breaking of her own silence, her movement from shame and self-loathing toward honoring and forgiving and caring for herself, is in itself a profound victory.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“Hunger is Gay at her most lacerating and probing. . . . Anyone familiar with Gay’s books or tweets knows she also wields a dagger-sharp wit.” — Boston Globe
“Wrenching, deeply moving. . . a memoir that’s so brave, so raw, it feels as if [Gay]’s entrusting you with her soul.” — Seattle Times
“It is a deeply honest witness, often heartbreaking, and always breathtaking. . . . Gay is one of our most vital essayists and critics.” — Minneapolis Star Tribune
“Searing.” — Miami Herald
“This raw and graceful memoir digs deeply into what it means to be comfortable in one’s body. Gay denies that hers is a story of “triumph,” but readers will be hard pressed to find a better word.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A heart-rending debut memoir from the outspoken feminist and essayist. . . . An intense, unsparingly honest portrait of childhood crisis and its enduring aftermath.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Displays bravery, resilience, and naked honesty from the first to last page. . . . Stunning . . . essential reading.” — Library Journal (starred review)
“A work of exceptional courage by a writer of exceptional talent.” — Shelf Awareness (starred review)
Praise for Bad Feminist:“A strikingly fresh cultural critic.” — Ron Charles, Washington Post
“Roxane Gay is the brilliant girl-next-door: your best friend and your sharpest critic. . . . She is by turns provocative, chilling, hilarious; she is also required reading.” — People
“[Gay is] hilarious. But she also confronts more difficult issues of race, sexual assault, body image, and the immigrant experience. She makes herself vulnerable and it’s refreshing.” — Tanvi Misra, Atlantic, "The Best Book I Read This Year"
Atlantic
A gripping book, with vivid details that linger long after its pages stop. . . . Hunger is arresting and candid. At its best, it affords women, in particular, something so many other accounts deny them—the right to take up space they are entitled to, and to define what that means.
Lisa Ko
Powerful. . . . fierce. . . . Gay has a vivid, telegraphic writing style, which serves her well. Repetitive and recursive, it propels the reader forward with unstoppable force.
The New York Times Book Review
Luminous. . . . intellectually rigorous and deeply moving.
New Republic
A work of staggering honesty . . . . Poignantly told.
|Los Angeles Times
Bracingly vivid. . . . Remarkable. . . . Undestroyed, unruly, unfettered, Ms. Gay, live your life. We are all better for having you do so in the same ferociously honest fashion that you have written this book.
USA Today
Her spare prose, written with a raw grace, heightens the emotional resonance of her story, making each observation sharper, each revelation more riveting. . . . It is a thing of raw beauty.
Newsday
Searing, smart, readable. . . . “Hunger,” like Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “Between the World and Me,” interrogates the fortunes of black bodies in public spaces. . . . Nothing seems gratuitous; a lot seems brave. There is an incantatory element of repetition to “Hunger”: The very short chapters scallop over the reader like waves.
San Francisco Chronicle
Unforgettable. . . . Breathtaking. . . . We all need to hear what Gay has to say in these pages. . . . Gay says hers is not a success story because it’s not the weight-loss story our culture demands, but her breaking of her own silence, her movement from shame and self-loathing toward honoring and forgiving and caring for herself, is in itself a profound victory.
Isaac Fitzgerald on the TODAY Show
This is the book to read this summer . . . she’s such a compelling mind . . . . Anyone who has a body should read this book.
Entertainment Weekly
The book’s short, sharp chapters come alive in vivid personal anecdotes. . . . And on nearly every page, Gay’s raw, powerful prose plants a flag, facing down decades of shame and self-loathing by reclaiming the body she never should have had to lose.
San Francisco Chronicle
Unforgettable. . . . Breathtaking. . . . We all need to hear what Gay has to say in these pages. . . . Gay says hers is not a success story because it’s not the weight-loss story our culture demands, but her breaking of her own silence, her movement from shame and self-loathing toward honoring and forgiving and caring for herself, is in itself a profound victory.
USA Today
Her spare prose, written with a raw grace, heightens the emotional resonance of her story, making each observation sharper, each revelation more riveting. . . . It is a thing of raw beauty.
Los Angeles Times
Bracingly vivid. . . . Remarkable. . . . Undestroyed, unruly, unfettered, Ms. Gay, live your life. We are all better for having you do so in the same ferociously honest fashion that you have written this book.
Isaac Fitzgerald on the Today show
This is the book to read this summer . . . she’s such a compelling mind . . . . Anyone who has a body should read this book.
Boston Globe
Hunger is Gay at her most lacerating and probing. . . . Anyone familiar with Gay’s books or tweets knows she also wields a dagger-sharp wit.
Ron Charles
Praise for Bad Feminist:“A strikingly fresh cultural critic.
Miami Herald
Searing.
Seattle Times
Wrenching, deeply moving. . . a memoir that’s so brave, so raw, it feels as if [Gay]’s entrusting you with her soul.
Shelf Awareness (starred review)
A work of exceptional courage by a writer of exceptional talent.
Tanvi Misra
[Gay is] hilarious. But she also confronts more difficult issues of race, sexual assault, body image, and the immigrant experience. She makes herself vulnerable and it’s refreshing.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
It is a deeply honest witness, often heartbreaking, and always breathtaking. . . . Gay is one of our most vital essayists and critics.
People
Roxane Gay is the brilliant girl-next-door: your best friend and your sharpest critic. . . . She is by turns provocative, chilling, hilarious; she is also required reading.
Miami Herald
Searing.
Associated Press Staff
Powerful. . . . fierce. . . . Gay has a vivid, telegraphic writing style, which serves her well. Repetitive and recursive, it propels the reader forward with unstoppable force.
Booklist (starred review)
It’s hard to imagine this electrifying book being more personal, candid, or confessional. . . . In 88 short, lucid chapters, Gay powerfully takes readers through realities that pain her, vex her, guide her, and inform her work. The result is a generous and empathic consideration of what it’s like to be someone else: in itself something of a miracle.”
The New Republic
A work of staggering honesty . . . . Poignantly told.
The Atlantic
A gripping book, with vivid details that linger long after its pages stop. . . . Hunger is arresting and candid. At its best, it affords women, in particular, something so many other accounts deny them—the right to take up space they are entitled to, and to define what that means.
Ann Patchett
It turns out that when a wrenching past is confronted with wisdom and bravery, the outcome can be compassion and enlightenment—both for the reader who has lived through this kind of unimaginable pain and for the reader who knows nothing of it. Roxane Gay shows us how to be decent to ourselves, and decent to one another. HUNGER is an amazing achievement in more ways than I can count.
Library Journal
★ 06/01/2017
Gay (Difficult Women; Bad Feminist) states at least twice in this searing book that she's not as brave as people think she is. Yet, this memoir of her body—still reeling and hiding from the sexual abuse she suffered decades earlier as the result of a gang rape at age 12—displays bravery, resilience, and naked honesty from the first to last page. The essays range from describing the events that contributed to her current body weight to the sexual attack and her ensuing secrecy about it to short entries on the various indignities and difficulties involved in being a person of size in the world. We each have a body, she says, and we can all benefit from a close examination of our relationship with it. VERDICT Buy plenty of copies of this stunning work because it will be on every end-of-year best list; essential reading after Gay's debut novel, An Untamed State, as it explains the emotions behind that brutal story. [See Prepub Alert, 1/4/17.]—Henrietta Verma, National Information Standards Organization, Baltimore
JUNE 2017 - AudioFile
There’s no better person to narrate this audio than Roxane Gay herself. Her calm, consistent inflections are juxtaposed with the content of the audiobook, which unfolds her conflicts about her body, both from external and internal perspectives. Her narration is filled with careful intentions—as if every single word stated and not stated explains her existence spatially. She analyzes terms like “obese” and being a “victim” versus a “survivor” of rape. She is repetitive in her sharing. And it’s painful to listen to but necessary. She creates safe spaces the best way she knows how—unhealthy or not. Most of all, her story is felt because content and narration explore the concept of un/control of the body, self, and existence through her voice. T.E.C. © AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2017-05-02
A heart-rending debut memoir from the outspoken feminist and essayist.Gay (Bad Feminist, 2014, etc.) pulls no punches in declaring that her story is devoid of "any powerful insight into what it takes to overcome an unruly body and unruly appetites." Rather than a success story, it depicts the author, at 42, still in the throes of a lifelong struggle with the fallout from a harrowing violation in her youth. The author exposes the personal demons haunting her life—namely weight and trauma—which she deems "the ugliest, weakest, barest parts of me." Much of her inner turmoil sprang from a devastating gang rape at age 12. "I ate and ate and ate in the hopes that if I made myself big, my body would be safe," she writes. Gay painfully recalls the "lost years" of her reckless 20s as a time when food, the anonymity of the internet, and creative writing became escapes and balms for loneliness. The author refers to her body as a "cage" in which she has become trapped, but her obesity also presents itself as a personal challenge to overcome the paralyzing psychological damage caused by rape. Broken into clipped, emotionally resonant chapters, Gay details a personal life spent grappling with the comfort of food, body hyperconsciousness, shame, and self-loathing. Throughout, the author is rightfully opinionated, sharply criticizing the media's stereotypical portrayal of obesity and Oprah Winfrey's contradictory dieting messages. She is just as engaging when discussing her bisexuality and her adoration for Ina Garten, who taught her "that a woman can be plump and pleasant and absolutely in love with food." Gay clearly understands the dynamics of dieting and exercise and the frustrations of eating disorders, but she also is keenly in touch with the fact that there are many who feel she is fine just as she is. The author continues her healing return from brokenness and offers hope for others struggling with weight, sexual trauma, or bodily shame. An intense, unsparingly honest portrait of childhood crisis and its enduring aftermath.
