A mix of urban fantasy, horror, and fairytales, The Book Eaters is a fascinating debut that provides a new take on vampires and explores some really interesting themes around motherhood and otherness, whether that be queerness or neurodiversity.

This is a fairly quiet story and I think your mileage may vary depending on how well you connect with Devon as a main character, as while there are some bits we see beyond her we are predominantly in her head and she is quite single-minded. That being said, I loved the way Dean wrote flashbacks that allow us to see Devon's whole life, so we get to watch as she learns that the fairytales she has grown up with are a lie and watch her fight for a better life for her son. I also think the provides space for discussion about what exactly makes a monster. The ending in particular was heart-wrenching.

I thought the atmosphere was great and the emotions were so well balanced. It is a slow book but Dean does a great job of placing tidbits throughout that kept me engaged through the whole thing and I found that I really grew to love the attention to detail she used when creating this Book Eater society and how they related to the humans who are unaware of them. I also loved Katie Erich's narration! Her accent fit the tone and location of the story perfectly and I loved how she was able to differentiate between the characters and even between young Devon and present time Devon. This audiobook provided a conversation between Dean and Erich at the end, and I really appreciated hearing about their processes. Some of the things they talked about made me go back and revisit the text with a different context and it made me enjoy the book even more.

Overall, I thought this was a very impressive debut and I will definitely be looking for whatever Sunyi Dean writes next.

"And so she looked down at her son and loved him with the kind of twisted, complex feeling that came from having never wanted him in the first place; she loved him with bitterness, and she loved him with resignation. She loved him though she knew no good could ever come from such a bond.”

I slowly but surely devoured The Book Eaters; no pun intended :). I do wish I would've read this as an ebook or a physical book because the dual timelines confused me at some point ( i listened to it as an audiobook).Regardless of that I really loved the atmosphere, the writing and the story. We follow Devon and her son as they attempt to live a life among the humans. Devon belongs to a clan of Book Eaters, a line of supernatural book eaters that consume books to gain knowledge. After her first born is taken from her, Devon flees with her son Cai, who is a mind eater.

I'd recommend this to readers who like dark fantasy and fairytales, and who enjoy the exploration of themes like the sacrifices mothers make, the cost of love and trying to survive outside the bounds of patriarchy.

- contains Asexual rep

I was super excited to read this book. I only got about 36% of the way through it and was not a fan. This book is for someone else not me. This does not mean the book is bad, but the book was not for me. The person reading the audiobook was not very entertaining. I have read a lot of audiobooks in my lifetime and this person did not make the book enjoyable for me. I plan to read the book eventually, but will probably physically read the book vs the listening to the audiobook.

I saw this book compared somewhere as Hannibal x The Handmaid's Tale which is what really sold me on wanting to read it, and soon.

I loved this book. I loved the quotes at the beginning of the chapters, and the character of Devon, and the themes of understanding oppression, motherhood, family, hunger, and fairytales. The structure of this story felt like reading a childhood favorite fairytale, full of happy endings and whimsy, and slowly understanding the true horror within the story - the propaganda of submissiveness and women's roles and happily ever afters ending in marriage and rescue.

There were gothic elements to the story that I really enjoyed - from manors (some luxurious, some crumbling), to craggy English countryside, mysterious interactions behind closed doors, rumors of monsters. And there were notes of Arthurian legends as well! Basically, The Book Eaters hit on every single theme that I love in stories.

Five stars -- right to the favorites shelf.

Loved this disturbingly dark fantasy/fairytale. It's a very clever take on vampirism, with rich, complex characters who make impulsive decisions that lead to heart-pounding action.

The underlying theme of a mother's love for her child is beautifully told alongside the dark tale of a creature fighting to survive in a world trying to kill her.

The narrator for this audiobook did such an excellent job too! I highly recommend this one to horror, fantasy, or fairytale lovers.

Clever and creative! I enjoyed the magical realism and Bookeater culture in this book. The plot itself wasn't particularly unique, but I enjoyed the story from beginning to end regardless. I definitely recommend this one and hope we get another book about the Book Eaters. A few moments were a rather disturbing though, so check the trigger warnings.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Books for this ARC!

Be still, my gothic loving heart! This book has ripped it from my chest and left it in fleshy, pulsating pieces in the dirt. And of course I mean that in the very best way.

The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean is an incredible, atmospheric fantasy adventure that had me completely consumed from beginning to end. A modern/urban vampiric story, book eaters bare their “book teeth” to feast on books for sustenance (gaining knowledge from the pages) and mind eaters unfurl a long tongue to consume, well, the minds of humans in order to survive (gaining memories, experiences, languages and trauma from their victims). Sounds insane. Is completely insane. But it’s also original and unique and engrossing beyond belief. Yet at the heart of this madness is the feminist story of a woman who refuses to be a fairy tale maiden, and will stop at nothing to ensure the survival of her son. The Book Eaters is dark and disturbing, but also somehow brimming with love, determination and the fiercest kind of bravery.

The audio book version of this novel was exceptional. Read by Katie Erich, with her gorgeous Northern England accent, The Book Eaters was absolutely impossible for me to put down.

A ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ read for me and one of my top 5 books of the year by far!

Thank you to @macmillan.audio and @netgalley for the audio copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

#TheBookEaters by @sunyidean is another enthralling audiobook that I was lucky to listen to this past week, narrated by the very talented @katie.erich!
I have strayed very far away from fantasy lately but I'm finding my way back to it finally, and a book like this was just the thing! All of us readers are in love with this title and intrigued: what is a book eater? Well the book eaters are another species from humans but look exactly like us. They hide in their own communities, in which they eat books for sustenance, but also absorb everything they read into their memories, it becomes a part of them. Cool right? Except in this community, most book eaters are women, and the books they are given are carefully curated by a heavy authoritative Patriarchy. They can read Fairy Tales and believe themselves all to be princesses, and indeed are well taken care of by a collective community, but once they become of a certain age, they are expected to marry in an arranged marriage, breed and nurse the child until the age of 3, then walk away and do it all over again with another husband. The child and mother are forever separated at that point and #motherhood is not really a thing. Devon, the young woman we follow in this story, cannot bear the separation between herself and her first born daughter, and although she tries so hard to keep her, she is thwarted and sent to breed again. This time, she breeds not a book eater girl but a boy, and one with a rare hunger ...this time, for human minds. As a mind eater, as he consumes the blood and brain, he takes on that identity into himself which afterwards changes his personality for a while until he finds his true self again. Knowing that boys like this are usually destroyed, Devon must decide to leave their kingdom and go out into the modern world and hide among the humans. There is some LGBTQ representation in this story as Devon comes to recognize her sexuality is for other women.
In the end, I feel that the story felt as if there is room to continue but had sufficient closure to be a stand alone. Highly recommend!

Devon Fairweather has secrets. She has left her home, her former family, and she is complicit in murder. Devon is a Book Eater, a race of beings made by the Creator who survive on ink and paper, ingesting the knowledge within the books they read. She requires books like we require food.

Devon has a son for which she will do anything. Cai is a Mind Eater, and if the mother and son had remained in their remote community, insulated from the outside world, Cai's only hope would be to become a Dragon, a tool for training the mysterious force that upholds the Eater's world and laws. Cai is only five, so for now he can sustain on one mind a month, but as he grows he will need weekly and even daily sustenance. For him to feed, his victims endure a fate perhaps worse than death, if they survive, all essence of their mind is gone. Mind Eaters cannot be trusted in Eater communities. Freedom for them is not an option.

So Devon runs, for Cai but also for herself. Women in Eater communities are rare. They are a race that is dying out, therefore women are conscripted into marriages for short periods of time with the express purpose to create heirs and then leave. After producing three or so heirs Eater women finally have some freedom, but nothing close to what Devon wants.

Devon has bigger dreams. She wants independence, knowledge, and maybe even love, though she has never hoped for so much.

This book was darkly delicious and honestly the most unique concept I have encountered in a long time. I loved being pulled into Devon's world.

CW: violence, domestic/child/emotional abuse, alcohol, grief,

Thank you so much to Sunyi Dean, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to an advanced copy of the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

I'm going to tell you all up front- I was blown away by this book. The concept intrigued me so much- a secret lineage of people who eat books and absorb the information after eating. But everything else drew me in. When I started listening, I was so taken by the immersive world-building and mystery. It reminded of reading Neil Gaiman and Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials for the first time. But even drawing likenesses to other authors, Sunyi Dean's debut feels truly original and poignant.
This book may be a prime example of why I wanted to start reading ARCs. I fell in love with it, will most likely buy it, and it's definitely one of the best books I've read this year. Also! I've been interested in reading more books involving the disabled/neurodivergent community in some way (as I'm also in that community). At the end of the audiobook was a conversation between the author and the narrator, which was so cool! They spoke about representation with having a Northern English accented narrator, which isn't very common. But they also talked a bit about their experiences with autism, dyslexia, adhd, and the narrator gleaning the struggle with ableism in the story. Listening to that conversation brought it full circle for me. I will absolutely be reading this again and sharing it with all of my SFF friends!

I was super excited about this one. I really struggled to stay invested in the story. It's an interesting premise. I enjoyed the idea, but I struggled to invest in the characters.

4.5 stars

This book was definitely strange, but in the best possible way. It was a fascinating concept with a good plot underlining the fantasy world, and it contained interesting character development as well as representation of different queer identities. The book as a whole was complex and is definitely more literary than not; it’s not a quick, light read (and, with that in mind, the writer includes content warnings for the novel). I think I might need to reread this book in order to fully appreciate it and it’s depths, but I really enjoyed it.

Creepy, dark and bizarre. Think. A Handmaid’s tale with more deeply disturbing imagery and gory details. And even as I make that comparison I can honestly say I’ve not read anything like it. I loved it.

Wow. It reminds of T.J. Klune Mother trying to save her son in the world where they are not accepted. “This is not a novel I ever though I’d write, but then this isn’t the life I ever though I’d lead.”- I love this authors quote from goodreads- it trully describes the book.

I devoured this book in a day, and was so intrigued by the unique premise. So many aspects of this book were truly unique to itself, and I wanted to know more about book eaters and mind eaters, which incidentally is why this wasn't 5 stars for me, because I really wanted more information and sadly didn't get as much as I'd hoped. This really is more of a story about the main character, Devon, who is a book eater, and her son, who is a mind eater, and their continuous struggle to survive. I loved how the book is a conversation about patriarchal roles and the arbitrary rules we let ourselves follow in the world, and how we defy them. More than anything this felt like a fierce story of survival for a mother, which was done incredibly well, but isn't my main choice when reading something this unique.

Excuse my lame pun but I devoured The Bookeaters in one tasty sitting!

As soon as I saw the title I knew I had to read/listen to this book without even reading the description. I'm so glad I trusted my instincts as this book was amazing. I was horrorfied in the best way reading this story of these human-like beings devouring various works of literature.

There was so much going on here with the blatant misogyny, patriarchy and "Handmaiden Tale" like rituals of this strange society, that the fact they eat paper seemed the least strange thing about them.

But of course the strangest and scariest of all things was still to come - the brain eaters...

Overall, with its excellent narration, The Bookeaters is a delicious wicked horror and a thoroughly entertaining listen. I was so entertained and wonderfully horrified listening to this book, I had to buy the hardback!

Thank you MacMillan Audio for giving me this amazing ALC.

The Book Eaters was a different take on vampires and other worldly beings. I liked some of the elements in the book, but also felt like it didn't have to be drawn out so long. I did appreciate the audio version that I received via NetGalley and the publisher!

I enjoyed devouring this book so very much. This is the first book I have read by the author, and I would absolutely trust her to navigate me through another story. She was witty and dark and clever. The story is a fast paced yet meandering tale that to me was quite a bit of Bridgerton meets Fairy Tales meets Vampires meets Literature, and all of the best bits of each fit incredibly well into this tale about a single mother trying to save her child.

Kai is born into the Bookeater society with a genetic abnormality that causes him to, instead of eating books, consume minds. His mother (our main character) Dev, serves as guardian angel, accomplice, hit man and above all, mother. Her story is dark and sad and tragic and she is very much a dispossessed princess, who doesn’t want to live in a fairy tale anymore. I loved it and her. While it’s a bit gory, and I don’t typically like gory, I had no problem with it at all.

I read this as an audiobook and the narrator was absolutely lovely. I felt she perfectly captured the characters and their struggles and I would without hesitation trust her to guide me through another story in the future. I hope she chooses to narrate more books, we don’t have enough books with Northern UK accents and listening to her was lovely.

Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for providing me with an advance review copy of this book for free in exchange for my honest review.

Book: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Narration: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

[blurb] Out on the Yorkshire Moors lives a secret line of people for whom books are food, and who retain all of a book's content after eating it. To them, spy novels are a peppery snack; romance novels are sweet and delicious. Eating a map can help them remember destinations, and children, when they misbehave, are forced to eat dry, musty pages from dictionaries.

[Content Warnings] infant death & murder

[Plot] THIS BOOK IS SO GOOD! When you read as much as I do. There becomes a familiar theme in books. Familiar tropes. No hate on them. I love a romance HEA. But a book that takes your breath away from the sheer newness of it is so rare. That is this book. This book is incredible. Absolutely amazing. Knowledge vampires. Both with books and with brains. Not zombies. Vampires. It's just freaking stunning.

Then you add in the single mom trying to save her son from the world trying to kill him. A world that was set out to not be built for him, and I'm just ::insert standing ovation here::! This is one of those books that I'm so in awe over that I'm struggling to find the words. Honestly, It's just so good!

Thank you netgalley & Macmillan Audio
Thank you Sunyi Dean for writing this impressive and shocking book. I will be recommending this book to everyone.
Thank you Katie Erich for lending your voice to this book! You did INCREDIBLE! I know you said you struggled to sit still, but OMG. You couldn't tell in your voice. It was as if you were running and jumping. Fantastic work!

#thebookeaters by #sunyidean was quite the adventure and I really enjoyed the ride. Will be suggesting this one to a friend or two. Thank you #netgalley for the privilege of listening to this audiobook.