She's Always Hungry is a collection of short stories from Eliza Clark exploring body horror, futures, and, above all else, hunger. In eleven varied stories, characters explore the edges of their desires, whether for better skin, a plant that might save the planet, or human flesh. Most of the stories are pretty conventional in structure, though a variety of genres, but one is comprised entirely of reviews of a mysterious takeaway (and is a very fun addition). A few are speculative fiction and it's exciting to see Clark writing in a genre quite different to her novels Boy Parts and Penance, even though I typically am not a huge fan either of speculative fiction or most short stories, with these focusing on very specific moments rather than worldbuilding.

Overall, this is a collection that has a clear presiding theme, but which explores it in a plethora of ways, not sticking to the same styles of story or similar characters. As I expected from Clark, there's some fairly dark stuff and some moments of body horror, but also a lot of playfulness, especially when taking things to extremes (like the almost ridiculous 'The King' with a cannibal protagonist excited for an apocalypse). There's some fun little details—I loved that 'Nightstalkers' was set in Santa Carla—and generally this collection lived up to what I might've hoped for, even though some of the stories were perhaps a little tamer or more predictable than I wanted.

She's Always Hungry is a truly exceptional collection of stories. There was no standout story for me, because they are all incredible. Covering a range of topics such as body image, feminism, space exploration, cannibalism and climate change, Clark somehow creates complex and believable world's and characters, many villainous and others simply troubled, but all unnervingly complex, I was completely absorbed throughout.

This isn't a collection for the faint of heart, featuring a lot of graphic depiction of injury, illness and violence. But if you're a fan of the dark, weird and the outright horrifying, I highly recommend this book. Somehow it delights and terrifies simultaneously, leaving the reader blown away at each conclusion.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.

First off, I want to say that I've never really been one for short stories. However, Eliza Clark is one of my favourite authors and after loving her previous 2 novels and being sent an ARC of 'the shadow over little chitaly', I was actually excited going into this one and seeing what the rest of the stories had to offer.

Like always, these stories show Clark's talent for witty and gritty literature which I love, and she does exceptionally well. I really do have to pause her creativity, diversity, and the wide range of ideas she brings to each novel she publishes.

Despite loving the story I was sent last week, this collection as a whole sadly did fall flat for me. I always find that there's a handful of stories that I LOVE, but then with short story collections there's always an equal amount that I don't really enjoy which is unfortunate and therefore pulls the rating down. I really enjoyed 'build a body like mine', 'the problem solver', 'the shadow over little chitaly', 'goth', and 'shake well'. However, some of the other stories just didn't reel me in and some of them I did unfortunately find myself skim reading at times.

This is difficult as I've always struggled with short stories anyway, so maybe it just wasn't meant to be. But what I will say is that I do think Clark writes gore and horror very well, and some of the themes she dabbled with here I really would like to see her bring to another novel one day.

I’ve only read Penance by Eliza Clark but this debut short story collection is like the British version of Sayaka Murata who wrote Convience Store Woman and Earthlings.

Lots of body horror, some sci fi and some downright weird stories.

I actually really enjoyed this book and going down the weird route with it and would only recommend if you’re into the kind of things that it talks about.

Was really excited to read this as a huge fan of Boy Parts and Penance, but unfortunately this was a bit hit or miss.This collection contains stories that fit firmly in the horror genre, with a focus on body horror, and others that are less graphic. There’s a focus on womanhood, some stories are scifi/speculative, and there was a story that was apparently set in the 70s but I didn’t pick that up when reading.

I’ve been reading a lot of short story collections recently, and it's expected that some stories will resonate more than others, but with this I do wonder why some of the stories were included. I especially felt this way about the opening two stories, they felt rather weak, though it’s hard for me to put my finger on exactly why. I did like some of the stories, especially the ones with a comedic tone, my favorites were Goth GF, Little Chitaly, The King, and Hollow Bones. Fans of Eliza Clark will probably still want to pick this up, but I wouldn’t make this the first thing you read of hers.