4 Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐



The Hungry Gods by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Format: Audio ARC (NetGalley) + eBook | Narrated by: Emma Newman.



Earth is ruined, poisoned water, unlivable air, and humans barely scraping by in animal-named tribes like Rabbits, Seagulls, and Cockroaches. Amri, a nobody among the Rabbits, is forced to scavenge for survival. But when four “gods” descend from space, once-human tech visionaries who left Earth behind, everything changes. They come back with grand ideas to remake the world, but none of them care about the people still living there. Amri’s world is torn apart, and she finds herself pulled into the clash between mortals and self-appointed gods.

🌍 My Thoughts

This was my first Tchaikovsky book, and I can see why people recommend his novellas so highly. The story blends sharp allegory with a quick, action-driven plot. It is about survival, hubris, and what happens when the people who thought they were too important for Earth return to claim it again.

🐇 What I Liked

• The metaphors: Every tribe and god felt symbolic but still worked in the story itself.
• Amri’s arc: She starts fragile, overlooked, even written off, but grows into someone who refuses to just run and hide.
• The pace: A go go go story, fast, urgent, and relentless in a way that fit the world.
• The ending: The 15-year time jump gave perspective and weight, showing how everything echoed into the future.

🐜 Bugging Me a Little

Because it moves so quickly, some scene transitions felt jarring. I had to pause in places to re-orient myself. It did not ruin the read, but it left me wishing for a few more breathing moments. The time jump at the end was impactful but also a little abrupt, which made the shift feel uneven.

🎧 Does She Have a Cold?

I originally had the audio ARC from NetGalley, but since I am only just getting to this after release, I picked up the eBook too so I could tandem read. About two chapters in, I saw a review that said the narrator sounded like she had just gotten over a nasty cold, which made me laugh because once I noticed it, I could not un-hear it. At first I thought it was a flaw, but as more characters were introduced, it became clear the voice was meant to capture Amri’s frail and fragile nature. Later in the book, that “cold” tone disappears. For me, it worked more as a performance choice than a distraction.

📚 Final Thoughts

The Hungry Gods is a fast, metaphor-heavy dystopian novella that mixes survival, myth, and tech hubris. It was not perfect, I stumbled a little with pacing and the big time jump, but it was memorable and rewarding with an ending that landed well. I am definitely excited to pick up more of Tchaikovsky’s novellas after this.

🌱 Recommended if you like: stories that mix allegory and dystopia , fast-paced survival tales, and underdog main characters who grow stronger as the world falls apart. If you enjoy sci-fi that feels mythic yet relevant, with “gods” who are really just arrogant humans trying to reshape what they abandoned, this one will hit the mark. It is short enough to read in a sitting but layered enough to leave you thinking afterward.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tantor Audio for the audio ARC.

A sharp, thought-provoking novella that made me curious to explore more of Tchaikovsky’s work.

As a first time Tchaikovsky reader, I understand the hype. This book was so short yet contained so much world building and character growth that I would have been down for so much more.

In the distant future Earth has been decimated and the survivors live amongst the rubble.
Amri, a member of the Rabbit tribe, is one of the few survivors from her village when a weapon from the sky destroys their home.
What follows is the arrival of four gods, each with very different ideas of what they want for the world.
This was an engaging little sci-fi novella with some interesting ideas, and I had a good time with it.

I've wanted to read Adrian Tchaikovsky for a while and this novella was a great introduction to his work!

Four self-proclaimed "Gods" come back to a post-apocalyptic Earth, each of them with a vision to turn the devastated world into their own utopias. The humans that still live in the ruins of civilization will have to adapt and ally with them if they want to survive.

The world building in this novella is amazing, the author manages to paint a layered and complex picture of this world in just a few pages, and it leaves room for many other stories to be told in this same universe.

Although the beginning was a bit confusing, I thought the concept was really interesting once it's fully fleshed out. I could fully believe these former tech CEOs were so arrogant as to believe themselves gods. That they’re so above all laws and judgement from humanity that they had the right to decide what the perfect world and society should look like, and who lives or dies in order to achieve that "perfection".
I never knew where the story was going and I really enjoyed that, I didn’t think it was predictable, and although the overall story was somewhat bleak, the ending was satisfying.

I listened to the audiobook version and I have to say the narrator was excellent! I loved how I could discern the personalities of the characters just from the narrator's acting, it added an extra layer to the story that I really enjoyed.

I'm even more excited to dive into other works of this author after reading this book!

I can’t shout enough how much I love this author! This novella is yet another example of the incredible creativity and world building of this author. I think this is a very beautiful way to explain humanity’s greed and appalling behaviour, especially when great minds are involved, once they’ve lost their touch with reality.

I loved the societal structure of a ruinous Earth, with people living like animals and calling themselves as such. Until something terrible happens, signalling the arrival of four Gods coming from the stars. As one God is set to destroy all the others with a promise to all inhabitants to defend them, one of the people, a seagull, still has access to records of the past that suddenly shed a different light on the self proclaimed Gods.

The writing is superb as is usual with this author. The dynamics between the characters are so full of meaning, and every action described has a purpose. Our main protagonist Amri is formidable, transforming herself from a scared little rabbit at the bottom of her group, to a fierceless leader, having learnt how power really works and what being a God really means.

I loved this novella and the narration by Emma Newman was truly good!

Thanks to NetGalley and Tantor Audio for the audiobook and this is my honest opinion.

DNF @ 88%. The problems that I had with the book are purely my own.

The audio, done by Emma Newman, is 4 hours and 59 minutes long. This is my first time experiencing Newman, and I wasn't all that impressed. Her style of narration sounds like she's on the brink of crying, and I couldn't get over the 'woe is me' role she gave herself. Sad to say, but I'm not a fan.

I couldn't get into the book. I was trying my best to follow the story and how it all connected to the human population being decimated, and the twists and turns were there to throw off my premeditated guesses on how, but between describing the beef between rabbits, roaches, plants, and seagulls, it got to be too much for me.

In a post climate apocalypse world, four men who set out to create a paradise in space return to earth as gods. In their plans to recreate Earth as they see fit, they are unconcerned with the lives of those who still live there, like Amri whose people were destroyed in their landing.

I thought this was a really great novella about what happens when you believe "great men" can single handled save humanity from destruction.

"We left because the world was dying, exhausted, mined out, poisoned.
Despite our best efforts, despite everything we'd done to make people's lives better, the damage had already been done. We could see the future, gods as we were and because we were gods we could make the future too. A future in other places than the crippled world we had been born into, and so we left this world and went into space, and built our paradise, a new world to our specifications with none of the engrained flaws that had destroyed the old. A world where people would be free to live without shackles and barriers."

In The Hungry Gods, Adrian Tchaikovsky paints a haunting vision of a ruined Earth where the remnants of humanity survive in scattered tribes, each taking on the names and instincts of animals. Rabbits run, Seagulls fight, and Cockroaches scavenge.
Amri, a young member of the Rabbit tribe, lives by that rule of survival: flee and live another day. But when her home is obliterated by a falling weapon from the sky, she finds herself bound to a mysterious figure who calls himself a god.
This fallen god, Guy Vesten, seeks vengeance against the others who betrayed him, and Amri, caught between grief and desperation, steps into a role she never could have imagined, his companion, his priestess, and perhaps, his conscience.

The story is so beautifully written, I would gladly reread it handfuls of times. The Hungry Gods is filled with reflection & resilience. Tchaikovsky shows how fragile humans can still adapt and find new ways to resist. I loved how the so called gods weren’t divine at all, but echoes of humanity’s past hubris, powerful figures returning with visions of grandeur, completely blind to the people who endured the ruins of the world they left behind.
Amri is such a well written and unique main character. Through her eyes, the world feels both terrifying and strangely hopeful even when the world around her is crumbling. Her growth from terrified survivor to someone who learns to wield her voice against overwhelming odds made this story deeply compelling.

I listened to the audiobook version of this story. Narrator, Emma Newman is outstanding, i would listen to anything she narrates. Her performance accurately portrayed Amri's vulnerability and strength that drew me in from page 1.
The pacing felt natural, her tone captured the tension of the wastelands and the arrogance of the returning “gods,” and I found myself completely immersed in this world thanks to the writing and narration. They fit hand and hand so beautifully, Emma was the perfect choice.
The Hungry Gods is another brilliant blend of sci-fi and myth from Tchaikovsky, imaginative, darkly funny, & layered with meaning.
5 stars hands down.


"It isn't enough to fear- Fear on its own did not save you, because the things that you should fear could strike you down anyway, nobody has legs fast enough to outrun the end of the world. And so maybe being curious about the strange was better, because then you could understand it, predict it, fight it."

Thanks so much to RB Media and & Galley for this advance audiobook.

This novella wasn’t even on my radar until I saw it pop up on NetGalley. Adrian Tchaikovsky is incredibly prolific, but it was the striking cover art that really drew me in. I went in blind, expecting a fairly standard post-apocalyptic survival story, but it turned out to have far more depth than I anticipated.

While I can't say I loved it in the traditional sense, it absolutely made me think. As the story unfolds and its central premise is revealed, I found myself genuinely reflecting on the direction the world is heading and what those in power might be capable of in the name of control or progress. It’s unsettling in the best way.

Emma Newman’s narration was stellar. She brought the cast to life with a grounded, believable tone that matched the story's mood perfectly. Quietly intense and highly skilled in its delivery.

No one writes alien civilizations like Adrian Tchaikovsky and The Hungry Gods encompasses Adrian's strengths as a super creative sci-fi storyteller.

In the distant future, billionaires have left a sick and dying Earth behind, believing everyone would have died behind them. They come back to discover humans continue to live, although primitively. Using 'god-like' technology, each of the billionaires attempts to remake the Earth in a specific and very unhuman-like image.

I love that this story is from the POV of one of the surviving humans who worships a 'rabbit god', in terms of responding to situations like a rabbit. Running and hiding. So when these 'gods' arrive, our main character's response is very timid, but their character growth throughout this novella is what keeps the story propelling forward.

Emma Newman does a great job narrating this story and easily navigates the many different voices/characters throughout the book.

What to expect
🐇 Hungry Gods
🐇 Eco-horror-scifi
🐇 Fascinating main character
🐇 That ending?!
🐇 Amazing audiobook

This book is best read while watching your pet rabbit scream at mushrooms.

As a science fiction reader, I am a big fan of Adrian Tchaikovsky which is why I requested this novella. Unfortunately I did not like the audiobook narration and so have decided to dnf this version because I don't want unfairly give the book a lower rating from reading it in the wrong format. I will try to find a physical/ebook copy instead.

I requested this one because it might be an upcoming title I would like to review on my Youtube Channel. However, after reading the first several chapters I have determined that this book does not suit my tastes. So I decided to DNF this one.

First off thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook! That being said my review is my own.

This book was ok. I didn’t really hate it but I didn’t love it either.

This story is set in a post apocalyptic world. The story follows a god who fell to earth and girl whose home and everything she knew is destroyed. And together they plan their revenge against the Gods.

The story is fast paced and interesting. And I enjoyed the world this is set in. And I liked the idea of creating a new world that the gods are trying to do. The sci-fi stuff was really fun. And I enjoyed the fights scenes when they happened

The characters honestly felt really flat to me and I had a hard time caring about anything that was happening.

I also was really confused for most of the story, I didn’t know if these characters were ppl or animals. As they refer to them as rabbits, roaches, and seagulls. Half the time I thought they were for sure ppl then other times I was really unsure.

I also found the ending a bit predictable. That said I still thought it was a decent read. This is only my second book I’ve read by him. It’s ok.

Another wildly creative tale from Adrian Tchaikovsky—his imagination with alien worlds never disappoints. Here, Amri, a “rabbit” (air quotes!) does what rabbits do best at first: run, run, run. On a planet ruined by gods who return in spacesuits, survival means choosing sides in their endless wars. Of course, Amri isn’t just another helpless creature—she manages to fool the gods themselves and somehow take the lead. But really, is there ever such a thing as “the winning side”? And if not, whose side are we supposed to be on?

Thank you to Tantor Audio via NetGalley for the ARC. Emma Newman’s narration brought the atmosphere and characters to life beautifully. This is my honest opinion.

In typical Tchaikovsky form, the world building is incredible and expansive. However, with it being a novella, there are a lot of gaps or conveniences that go unexplained in order to fit everything into such a short story.

The beginning of the story is a bit confusing regarding their worship of different animals. Especially if you've previously read Shadows of the Apt or Echoes of the Fall, it's understandable that you would think the people somehow had actual physical traits of the animals they worship. However, I don't think that is the case. I think it's simply people who choose to live following the philosophy of how they see those animals.

The story was also a bit predictable, but still enjoyable and had a great message about how the tech giants of today's world seem to be more focused on how to create their own utopia rather than actually helping solve any of the worlds problems and how they view common people as nothing more than tools to accomplish their own goals.

Overall, this was right in line with what I would expect from a Tchaikovsky novella.

Adrian Tchaikovsky is quickly becoming a sci-fi writer I love diving into. Though some of his books are intense and a bit dark and intricate, there is something about his humorous post-apocalyptic writings which seem to hit me in all the right ways.

Amri is a member of the Rabbit clan (not really a rabbit animal - I was a bit sad) and she is considered the smallest toe which means she is the most expendable and the one they would remove should the clan be threatened. She is doing her best to try and prove her worth gathering resources when she is accosted by the the Seagull clan and she flees back to the burrow of the Rabbit. However, on her way back, she sees something fall from the sky and slam into the ground where the Rabbit clan is. Amri flees from the vines which start to consume the burrow and soon finds herself alone. Until she runs across a spaceman named Guy Vesten who claims to be a god who travelled to the stars to set up a Utopian society. However, something happened in their dream space society, and now he and his "friends" have returned to establish their own versions of civilization in the ruins of Earth.

With Guy taking the lead, Amri and some of the remaining members of Rabbit, Seagull and a few others, help the "god" take down the other "gods" who were once his friends in order to try and establish himself as the supreme deity of the the remnants of earth.

Though this is a novella, this was such a fun ride. I even loved the ending but I am not going to spoil it for you. I highly recommend giving this story a chance!

Short, a very on-the-nose allegory of what happens when billionaires aren't burned at the stakes. Some parts are very funny, though the overall story is depressing as fuck.

At this point, if Adrian Tchaikovsky writes it, I’ll read it. This was another imaginative story full of humor and pathos. It tackles Big Ideas without being too preachy. It is writing with a point but the point doesn’t get in the way of the story. If you read speculative fiction to be emotionally entertained AND intellectually stretched, this is what you are looking for. Emma Newman’s sensitive reading enhances the story’s emotional heft. Thank you to the author, narrator, Tantor Audio, and NetGalley for the audioARC.

I’m always amazed by Tchaikovsky’s productivity and the way each of his books feels distinct in tone and style. That said, this one didn’t quite land for me. While there are some intriguing concepts at play, the plot treads well worn sci-fi territory. It reads more like the seed of a novel, an interesting premise that perhaps lacked enough depth to be fully fleshed out, so it was instead became a novella. Still, it’s a quick, easy read if that’s what you’re after.

Thank you to RBmedia for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

If you're looking for a short hard hitting sci-fi this might hit just the spot.
The characters are interesting, hard to connect with and get attached to, but still interesting. The writing is dry and detached but it works for this story because it's not very long. It really makes the dystopian despair ever present.
The longer I think about it the more I like this book. The dry writing style isn't something I gravitate towards, but it really works for this story.
The social commentary about knowledge and power giving people a god complex is just an excellent bonus. And the ending is fantastic, it absolutely satisfied my soul.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tantor Audio for providing this ALC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

The world is in ruins and poisonous. People are old at 30. There is little drinking water, wells are mostly empty. And the drinkable water they can find will eventually kill them.

Amri belongs to the tribe of Rabbit. If you want to survive, you run. There are also Seagull fighters, Pigeon traders, Cockroach scavengers and Rats.

Something strikes from the sky, her village is destroyed and she meets a god. His name is Guy Vesten, he wears a suit with a helmet and he has returned from space. The „worthy“ had left, because the Earth was dying. Now he has returned.

Oh my, does Guy‘s voice and tone remind me of Kern… Ok, yes, the same audiobook narrator. Guy seems to be a bit of a fallen angel, because the other three big scientists cast him out.

We go on a journey. Amri discovering herself. The other gods showing up. Conflict.

It did not work for me as a audiobook. Maybe I would have liked it more in print. As it was, I never connected with Amri or any of the other characters. The story ambled along without ever really raising my interest.

The ending was nice, I give you that…

Meh. 🐇🐇🐇

I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher or author through NetGalley. All opinions are my own and I was not required to give a positive review.