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This book was visceral - it made me think and feel so much about being a woman. The expectations that others have for women and how those expectations shape our desires. Maybe it‘s true that women cannot have it all, but we should at least get to choose for ourselves what we do get to have. Piglet definitely took the long way around to that conclusion, but I‘d like to think she‘s going to create a beautiful life for herself on her own terms now.

“It would be fine, because she could make it so, imbibe it, consume it, until it was true.
She had eaten her heart out.
It had not changed a thing.”
Sometimes a character has so much of you in her, that the story becomes intensely relatable. I devoured this one. It was painful and beautiful and lonely and powerful.

I didn't love this. There's a lot of body shaming and eating disorders. It was kind of cringe. But maybe not in the way the author intended. It gave me anxiety. I don't normally stop an audiobook and walk away willingly. Surprised I made it to the end, actually.

I loved this book - in some ways it was quite a typical, slightly surreal book about a neurotic millennial woman Going A Bit Strange a la Nightbitch. The thing that made this feel really fresh and cool to me was the class aspect of a woman from a working class background ‘marrying up‘ to a more upper middle class guy and it all coming out monstrously in her relationship with food. I loved it

#wintergames #holidaybookdragons

Very detailed and rich description of food and cooking but purposefully vague in other respects. It more or less worked IMO. Piglet is a childhood nickname which has stuck. She‘s now late 20s - early 30s and her life is magazine-spread perfect - which is impossible to maintain and Piglet has appetites, not only for food, which have been sublimated in her attempt to achieve such perfection. It‘s going to crack, and when it does, it won‘t be pretty…

Piglet is getting married to Kit and she is a cookbook editor and loves to cook decadent meals. Her fiancé tells her that he did something bad (we never find out what, which is one reason why I didn‘t like the book) and she begins to eat her feelings. The best part of the book is the amazing descriptions of the food she eats and prepares, even though I didn‘t know what half of the food was. If you like weird, quirky books then read this.

Piglet is a brilliant, unflinching look at the tortured inner-child that lives within. We follow Piglet as she passionately cooks her way to her wedding day, and as she plummets into despair when made aware of a betrayal. I was moved by the exploration of the way in which our childhood defenses are awoken from slumber when we feel powerless in our adult lives. The little kid in us is always lurking right beneath the surface, poised to devour.

Changing things up from my usual thriller reads and trying something different, hopefully it will be just what hits the spot. I've heard good things. Excited to update after I know more!

What a debut. So heavy, but also so very relatable.

A compelling, readable story about class, ambition, desire, appearances, and blowing up your own life. For most of the novel I wasn‘t sure whether the obscurity of the key plot point was going to work, but in the end it did for me. This isn‘t a novel about what specifically happened, but rather how complicated and wrought it is to cross class boundaries, and to create a life that perhaps looks like what you desire, rather than feels like it.

Called Piglet all her life by her family (because how dare a woman love food?), our MC is an accomplished cook and editor who is about to get married when a revelation throws everything into question. I appreciate what this book was trying to do in exploring how men and women are treated differently to the degree that women‘s desires are seen as grotesque, but it could have pushed it further. Low pick for me.

So honest & relatable!!

"But her eyes were still watering and the only way she could think to stop them was to eat until her stomach felt like it was made of stone, until she was so full she couldn‘t feel anything else."

"There were some things that you could not tell your friends. She knew that truths, once spoken, had the power to strip her of the life she had so carefully built, so smugly shared."

4/5 🌟

This book resonated with me as I followed Piglet's journey through her struggles and conflicted emotions amidst major life events, raising vital questions: Are our choices driven by personal desires or external pressures? How do we know if we've chosen wisely? Are we pursuing 'having it all' or our genuine passions? Through Piglet's story, the book thoughtfully explores self-discovery and decision-making amidst societal expectations.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

A feel-good read, this is not - but it certainly made me feel! Hazell describes Piglet‘s story as “domestic claustrophobia”, richly exploring themes of class, cuisine, control, and the things we crave and consume. What will it take to feel satisfied? It‘s visceral, messy, and ravenous - full of tension that ratchets up to a show-stopping croquembouche crescendo!

Piglet, actually called that throughout the whole novel, has it all. We meet her in the grocery store picking out gourmet food items to create a lovely dinner for her friends. The friends remark about how Piglet can manage it all so effortlessly with her fiancé, job, and household. This is her driving force: the need to be admired and portrayed as having it all, until her fiancé ruins it! Wedding fallout ensues. Point made, good not great.

Having a woman who talks about being large (but probably isn‘t by description) and loves food/cooking then starts binge eating called Piglet was a bit problematic for me. Plus the middle third dragged. Low pick. #aardvark

Just two weeks before the wedding Piglet finds out her fiancee has been having an affair. As she decides what to do about it, she has some issues with binge eating and destroys her life a bit. 🤷🏻‍♀️

What sentence would pierce him while leaving her intact? She had built her life so carefully around him. To say something, to do something, to feel something, would be to self-destruct.

#aardvarkbookclub #jointoday

Piglet learns devastating news weeks before her wedding.

Hollow ✨ Unraveling ✨Ravenous

For fans of Milk Fed

One of the best book covers I‘ve seen in a long time!

There were some things that you could not tell your friends. She knew that truths, once spoken, had the power to strip her of the life she had so carefully built, so smugly shared.

#aardvarkbookclub #jointoday

A stylish, uncommonly clever novel about the things we want and the things we think we want, Piglet is both an examination of women‘s often complicated relationship with food and a celebration of the messes life sometimes makes for us.

#aardvarkbookclub #jointoday

So excited for this month‘s @AardvarkBookClub picks!! Piglet was on my TBR anyway, and most of their SciFi picks have been winners for me, so I wanted to try Baby X. I‘m already in line for Wandering Stars at the library, but it sounded good, too. 👍🏻👍🏻 #aardvark

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This started OK but I had more and more issues with it as the story unfolded. Piglet, so-called because she ate a lot when she was younger to cover up her sister‘s eating disorder, is still a binge-eater but the book skims over this. Her fiancé reveals a terrible secret just days before their wedding but we never find out what it is.

All of the characters are obnoxious (other than the best friend) and sometimes this works ⬇️

#netgalley #arc