What a delightful novel! I really enjoyed this book. The voice is infectious and the pacing is nice and crisp. I think it handled queerness well, and I was intrigued by the ways religion and mother-daughter dynamics played a role as well. The wry humor is great. I would definitely recommend this book.

I'm completely blown away. Erotic, sensual, shocking, brutal in its rawness.

This novel is about Rachel, a nonreligious Jewish woman with an eating disorder, so many body image issues, and a very toxic relationship with her mother. She gains weight and has an affair with Miriam, an Orthodox Jewish plus size shop attendant at a fro-yo store. The two are polar opposites in many ways, most strikingly the fact that Rachel obsessively counts calories while Miriam eats anything she wants and a lot of it.

I loved how sexually explicit this book was, both in act and fantasies. I adore books which do this for the purpose of literary exploration. This makes "Milk Fed" daring, raw and very real, which helped me relate to it so closely. While my upbringing is totally different from Rachel's, I could see so many similarities between us. I ended up falling in love with her character - and constantly thinking of this book whenever I had to put it down.

I highly, highly recommend this novel which was an instant favorite for me,

*Thank you to the Publisher for a free advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Uneven, explicit, sometimes very funny story of an agnostic but culturally Jewish talent manager/part-time comedian with an eating disorder and mommy issues who gains weight and redemption through an intense same-sex affair with the plump, Orthodox attendant in her favorite frozen yogurt shop.

If that summary was hard to absorb, this may not be the right book for you.

On the other hand, maybe you read that summary and thought: "Terrific! The more, the merrier! Could the author add an explicitly described fling with a hunky TV star? What about vapid and back-stabbing coworkers? How about pages of psychobabble, not all from a psychologist? Hebrew? A literal and figurative golem? Faux political correctness? Debates about the Gaza strip? Detailed and loving descriptions of everything and everyone the main character ate? Could the author add that, too?"

If you had the second reaction, then you are in luck. This book offers all of that and more.

I had the first reaction - just too much going on for effective development - which was unfortunate because there is much to like about this book. It is very funny in spots, the portrayal of the main character's eating disorder is painful and realistic, and her estrangement from her mother is wrenching.

Many thanks to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Rachel is a twentysomething assistant in the entertainment industry in LA, while also moonlighting as a stand-up comic. She has a toxic relationship with her overbearing, emotionally abusive mother who has obsessed about and humilated Rachel's eating and weight for her entire life. Rachel has internalized that self-hate and it has manifested as a raging eating disorder which pervades her entire life. She obsessively counts calories, exercises, compares herself to other women, and is never thin enough. It's a self-destructive perpetual cycle and each day is a struggle to eat or not eat and wish she was even thinner.

In a yogurt shop, she meets an employee Miriam, a Rubenesque Orthodox Jewish woman who delights in serving Rachel enormous quantities of food, and consuming them herself. Rachel quickly becomes infatuated with Miriam, abandons her decades-long restrictive habits, and ingratiates herself with Miriam's close-knit family. Miriam is hesitant to engage in a full-on relationship with Rachel, because of her Orthodox traditions.

There is much explicit sex and sexual fantasies throughout the book, and the characters besides Rachel and Miriam seem incidental to the plot; none are fleshed-out enough (pun intended) to be more than bit players in the story.

However, Rachel's eating disorder rings very true to life, and Broder surely knows the subtleties and convoluted emotional details associated with a chronic and debilitating eating disorder.

Ok. I’m the first person to review this for GR. Must do the book justice. First thing first, checking the official description, just so I know what can and cannot be discussed without giving away any of the plot, but the official description is surprisingly bare bones. So I can pretty much talk about whatever I want here beyond the basic food, Jews and lesbians. Alrighty then. So meet the protagonist…a 24 year old East Coast transplant to LA, working in the business management end of the entertainment industry and obsessively counting calories. In fact, Rachel’s entire existence is strictly governed by her relationship with food which stems from her relationship with her mother. Both relationships are terrible. Actually, there are layers of terribleness to Rachel’s mother, from overbearing to controlling to image distorting to guilt riding to emotional manipulation. It’s no surprise that Rachel’s therapist is determined to get Rachel to take some time off, a sort of mother detox. So that now it’s just work, calorie counting and exhaustive daily gym sessions all to maintain a sort of self image Rachel has created for herself. And while I’m a huge fan of self control the way she does it is all wrong. She exercises too much, her diet is terrible, primarily nicotine supplements, power bars and froyo and muffin tops. But then again it’s much more than just a control thing with Rachel, it’s a serious mental problem and it’s consuming her life. The things she can’t consume consume her. And so when he meets Miriam, a young woman who has apparently never said no to a meal and takes great joy in feeding herself and others, it’s a temptation impossible to resist. Seriously, it goes like this…Rachel walks into her favorite froyo shop, there’s a new server, a very heavy positively doughy blonde who insists on overpouring and sprinkles and Rachel’s all like…girl, you got that yummy yum…and no, ok, no, it doesn’t get all cute and romantic. It’s challenging. But Rachel rediscovers food and that’s pretty glorious, she starts binging of junk, gaining weight and confidence and getting more and more drawn to Miriam and her pretty Orthodox family. And yes, religion comes into this in a huge way. Because Rachel is a lapsed Jew and Miriam a practicing one and…well, It’s always so striking how a historically oppressed minority can be so comfortable with dismissing other minorities. Which is to say, Miriam’s family is exciting and welcoming and warm exactly until they think Rachel is exactly like them, albeit a less enthusiastic practitioner. And they have pretty strict opinions on how their daughter should live her life too. And why didn’t anyone watch or read Disobedience? Don’t you know how these things work? Rachel you’d think would have at least checked out the movie. Not Miriam, Miriam lives in a dreamworld of classic cinema. But anyway, the two young women do tentatively engage in something like a love affair, excitingly clandestine and heavily punctuated by food. In a way, Miriam is more like a plot device to help Rachel grow as a person (and not just in dress size. buhdum dum…sorry). And I suppose there is a world where Rachel would have met a nice available lady with a moderate diet and good exercise regimen who might have offered her some third person perspective on her lunatic of a mother, but then again…where would be the drama in that. This way there’s plenty of drama. And sex. So much sex. I read a diverse selection of at least a book a day and can’t remember last time I read a novel featuring so much graphic sex. It works and it does drive the plot, but because the book goes for a very realistic tone, it isn’t the sexiest of sexes either, plus one of the people is obese and the adoration of sweaty fat folds…well, it isn’t for everyone. But having said all that, this was a good read. Compelling, interesting, very hip, very contemporary, very well written. Your level of engagement with the characters may vary depending on so many factors, but you will engage with the narrative itself. It read very quickly. It makes you think…about social and familial pressures, female presentation, etc. There was something about the disenchanted theatre artist who goes to the corporate side of artist management and has a weight obsessed lunatic of a mother rang some bells. Though thank goodness none of it is anywhere near the novel’s proportions. Oh fiction, how close to life you skate. At any rate, this review is much too long as it is and I can only hope it intrigues the readers and invites the to check out the book for themselves. It’s worth a read. Recommended. Thanks Netgalley.