THE vampire book of 2025!!! Thank you to Carmilla, lesbians, and pure feminine rage for making this book possible.

It took me longer than I expected to get through the book but at the end, I understood why. The first half of the book dragged on as Lenore’s life dragged on. The importance of having your eyes opened, accepting the dark parts of yourself, acknowledging your own desires and how that unfolds…so good! I’ve already recommended this book to so many people and I can’t wait for it to come out next month.

I don’t know how this book managed to be both ferocious and exceedingly delicate at the same time. It has such sumptuous prose and I loved the juxtaposition of the two main characters. The wife is so structured and austere and then Carmella comes in with her freedom and limitless ideas. I really loved this take on the classic tale. Oh, and a couple of scenes were deliciously spicy! I do hope we all honor our own hungers and seek to indulge. Highly recommend this book!
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

All my thanks to NetGalley and Manilla Press for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Longing, lust, hunger. This book fed a part of me that longs for the vengeful woman and the freedom to do whatever you damn please. Luscious in its prose and characters, Hungerstone delivers on its promise. Aren’t you so terribly hungry?
I loved Lenore from the moment I read her inner thoughts on the page, she isn’t stupid, she is witty and sharp and although she thinks herself useless, when she realises she is a force to be reckoned with, its power all the same.
The setting was exquisite, I have spent many trips in the Pennines and know Sheffield well, so to have this regency-era story folded within the places I know of had a certain charm of mysticism.
Kat Dunn has outdone herself with this one, the feral, blood-thirsty, hungry women in this story ode to a timeless feeling of womanhood and the need to feel free from the torments of the patriarchy.

Hungerstone took a little while to get started but once it did, it made a big impact. For anyone who enjoys vampire stories, this will be a treat.

Towards the end I could not get enough, and the only thing running in my mind was 'good for her.' Female revenge and anger stirred with a patriarchal society and lesbian vampires?? Sign me up.

The only drawback is that I felt Lenores shift was slightly too abrupt, while I understand unleashing years of pent up anger, it still felt too drastic for a character who was so suppressed.

Hungerstone is a beautiful work of literary fiction that utilizes the Carmilla story to tell a tale of feminist awakening and the violence of patriarchy. Ten years into her marriage of convenience, Lenore is finding the fruits of her labor have gone to rot. But in the removed country estate of Nethershaw, a mysterious guest and her cavalier nature awaken a hunger in Lenore that nothing in her current way of life seems to satisfy. As someone who loves vampires and has studied Carmilla, I was excited to get my hands on this retelling and see how the originator of the lesbian vampire trope was reimagined by an author of today. I was surprised to find the story of Carmilla was more a background piece, a backlight to highlight the story of a woman who gave everything to succeed only to realize the patriarchy would never let her. The use of hunger as a metaphor for personal desire and agency and want was very well done. The detailing of all the foods to further elevate the hunger metaphor was a fascinating way to carry on the theme. As much as I recognize the literary art of the book (and highly highly highly applaud Dunn for her work), I am only rating it 3 stars because it wasn’t exactly my cup of tea. If you’re a fan of literary fiction and feminism, this book is for you.

4.5 stars

I devoured this book in 2 days. If you love Jane Eyre and vampires, this book is for you. I particularly loved the portrayal of female rage and the process of self-discovery. Spicy scenes were tasteful and well done. As a history teacher, I also enjoyed the portrayal of the evils of capitalism during the Industrial Revolution.

I absolutely adored Kat Dunn's writing style. Here are some of my highlights:

"To be a woman is a horror I can little comprehend."

"This is the bargain I have struck: to lose my softness in exchange for survival."

"...only in fiction was there logic and sense. Good fortune and bad came in equal measure, the just were saved and the wicked punished. In real life, there was no limit to misfortune."

"...and I would eat the world should it satisfy this empty, keening void where my heart should be."

Looking forward to reading more Kat Dunn in the future!!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Hungerstone was a fun read that caught my eye even though I don't generally read much Gothic/Horror. It's marketed as a vampire romance, but I'd also describe this story as an awakening, a second chance at life for Lenore, who forgot to live her life in between life's many tragedies and being a support to others. Carmilla slowly leads Lenore to her own conclusions that she is alive and she has wants that she can't obtain without knowing herself.

Unfortunately it starts really slow in the first half, with a bit too much setup and background for my taste. We spend a lot of time learning about life in Industrial Revolution England, and going through flashbacks of Lenore's life that add some flavor to the story, but also artificially stop the plot from advancing in moments where I really wanted to know what happened next. That said, once the fog started lifting from the many mysteries and things picked up speed, I can definitely say it was worth sticking with it. By the end, all the plot points are neatly resolved, our main character finally reclaims her life, and the ending is extremely satisfying.

If you're a fan of gothic/horror/romance, love a good vampire story and are looking for a book that will inspire you to live your life to the fullest, this is the one for you.

✨ Disclaimer ✨ I received a free copy of this book and this is my honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this novel in exchange for my honest opinion!

WHAT AN EXPERIENCE THIS BOOK WAS!!!!! I cannot recommend it highly enough; if you wished Carmilla had been explicitly sapphic and are hungering for a main character struggling to revitalize herself (and doing it!!!), this is the book for you! My jaw dropped so many times in the final chapters of this book, Kat Dunn you are INCREDIBLE!!!! I truly think this book will become a modern classic, the amount of care and research that went into the making of this novel shines though and truly sets it apart.

Ahh... Lesbian vampires... What could go wrong?

Hungerstone is a halting attempt to tell the marital crisis of Lenore, a woman ten years into her marriage, who begins to realize her husband is not who she thought he's been. In comes Carmilla, upending the mental framework Lenore has built to withstand her marriage and forcing her to choose (for once) her own future.

The novels main issue is two-fold; up until around 2/3 of the way through the work is terribly clichéd and weakly written, and the entire use of Carmilla as a plot point is unconvincing and smells of an author wishing to have her cake and eat it too. What better way to sell a book than to hint to people that it's a Carmilla retelling? What matters if this particular character's inclusion bears no further meaning to the plot than "vibes"?

Carmilla, as a character, barely works in this novel. She is written as a supernatural being whose essence is a foil to whoever she chooses needs her. This essence, then, serves as a flimsy placeholder for the character, failing to convincingly convey either the depth of her power or the complexity necessary to engage the reader. I think Carmilla should have either been fully supernatural, and leaned into a more literary horror, or a more flesh-and-blood human with human complexity. Her inclusion works as an agent of chaos to facilitate a "unhinged women" trend popular in contemporary fiction right now, which, on a personal level, I find dead and dusted. It is not 2020 anymore. We've seen this idea to its conclusion and it's tired.

As to the "lesbianism" of this novel.... Where!? As I said above, the weaknesses of the character of Carmilla make it completely unconvincing that these two women authentically desire one another. It absolutely feels as if the bisexuality (and before you yell at me, I am also bisexual) of this story has neutered any genuine sexuality, where the desire of these two women come from so, so little, and the build-up is almost nonexistent. I don't know how to put it in any other terms: It does not have the fingerprints of authentically fucking women.

I'm frustrated as well with the historical-fiction-ness of this work, primarily in the prose. Dunn has obviously done her research, and sprinkles proper noun after proper noun to try and manhandle the reader into the late 19th century: it is artless and betrays a lack of sufficient confidence in herself or the reader to construct a breathing past, one where significant mental mores make the past an almost uncomfortably foreign country. The work did not convince me of the its historicalness. It seemed, instead, to remind me constantly that this was a 21st-century author mad-dashing around for any excuse to throw in a dated term or two to make us believe that what we were reading could be set in the past. (In more poetic terms, it is someone learning to paint, who takes a shortcut here and a shortcut there, compensating with brush strokes far too thick and unblended to make out what the picture really is.)

Well... I'll admit. I did kind of enjoy it by the end. The last third of the book (once Carmilla left) is very, very fun. The novel finally began to understand and emulate its material of inspiration (Victorian Sensation literature, the best stuff ever) and lost the former believability issues.
I appreciated and enjoyed the suspense, which finally felt earned.

I think the author has it in her to write a better book if she wanted. I understand why this was published: it has a strong narrative construction, a clear thematic focus, and the author is already in the industry and has proved herself as a writer. I also concede that I got a bit tricked by what the cover promised against the author's other works. I was expecting a more literary thing than I got I guess

Eurgh I couldn’t put this down!! The writing was simply STUNNING! After hearing it was carmilla re-telling, I was a little unsure after reading similar books like Lucy Undying and An Education in Malice. Even though there are references to vampires, it’s more a dark tale about reclaiming your power as a woman. Absolutely ate this book up. Beautifully dark, macabre and gothic!

I was hooked from the first page. It was so evocative of Victorian sensation and horror novels. Well-written and captivating.

Lenore is a proper society wife to her cold, distant husband, Henry. She brought a title and respectability to the marriage, he brought the money--and a decade in, she is lonely and without a child to show she's fulfilled her wifely duties. On their way to their newly acquired country estate, they come upon a woman who has been in a carriage accident--something reminiscent for Lenore of the tragedy that stole her parents when she was a child. The woman, Carmilla, becomes a fixture in the household as she ostensibly heals from her accident, an object of fascination, frustration, and desire for Lenore. Meanwhile, Lenore's young protegee Cora also joins the household. As Lenore supervises repairs to the crumbling mansion before an upcoming hunting party, and as she battles a mysterious illness, secrets and desires come to the surface that will upend lives and transform Lenore.

Told in first person, this novel puts us front and center as Lenore's facade crumbles and she grapples with paranoia, fear, and an aching want for all that she's been denied in her life. The story is a bit slow at times, but Lenore remains a compelling character throughout. As the story picked up momentum, there were a few times where I read something and was like, "oh, [bleep], well THAT just happened!"

I would not characterize this as a romance--if anything, it is a novel of hunger and desire, but anyone picking this up and expecting traditional romance novel tropes will be deeply confused. The good news? It doesn't need the romance tag. It's mysterious, unsettling, and at times delicious.

Clinically addicted to this book. Carmilla changed my life when I read it last year and this seems to have done the same. A more modern twist on the classic but just as haunting, eerie, steamy, and captivating as its inspiration. The relationship dynamics were also part of what made this book so engaging, watching this drama unfold made me want to curl up with popcorn, a glass of wine, and just shut out the world

I was so excited to read Hungerstone, I was desperately hoping to get the ARC and as soon as I received it I just started devouring the pages. It starts so good; the writing is amazing, flowery and sharp at the same time. I couldn’t stop reading until the 15th % when it started to drag. I was very intrigued by Carmilla and her appearance in Lenore’s life, but I was fed only scraps of her mysterious figure and that infuriated me the most. I haven’t read the original Carmilla and I thought it’s probably for the best as her story wouldn’t be spoiled for me here. But there is no story about Carmilla, our protagonist is Lenore and although I liked her at the beginning, she started to annoy me the further I got. She was just unlikable, a flat character and a bad friend. I don’t think she was written on purpose like that. Her relationship with Carmilla was also underdeveloped in my opinion. The plot lines were too predictable and the whole infidelity drama was silly to me. Overall, I didn’t connect to this book the way I wanted. The ending was very disappointing and predictable. The horror scenes were good, but very short; I needed more gore and more vampirism. It’s not a bad book, just my experience with it was not the best, that’s why I would rate it in the middle, as this could be someone else’s new favorite book.
Thank you to NetGalley and Zando for providing me with the ARC.

DNF @38%

I'm soooo bored!! Nothing's happening, everyone's cranky, and ya girl is gay. I appreciate the atmosphere of this book, it is very Dracula-esque. Given that Carmilla pre-dates Dracula too, I feel like this was super well done. But other than that I'm not invested and I don't care what happens though I can imagine what the ending will be.

I picked this up because I'm in my vampire era, and I always love anything sapphic, but it ended up exceeding my expectations. While it is based on Carmilla, it is really more of a gothic exploration of hunger and desire than a straightforward retelling, and that is to its credit.

Lenore lives with her husband in a crumbling country house he bought with his new money as a way to fit into the upper crust of England. She is a devoted lady of the house, running the household meticulously, but when a mysterious stranger named Carmilla comes to stay, suddenly she realizes that she has hunger for a life of her own. This framework is an excellent way to examine class and gender in 19th century England, including the rapid expansion of industry and the new money entrepreneurs that entered society.

Desire and hunger for more out of life is the key theme in this book. With Carmilla's assistance, Lenore realizes she has agency to make her own decisions, and tries to follow her own desires in a way she never has before. In addition, there is a really wonderful look at trauma and how it impacts us, and even sometimes blinds us to others.

The historical setting is also meticulously researched, and I really appreciated that I could trust the author to be basing things in fact- I learned a lot about English society at the time.

Overall, highly recommend this book. It's not a straightforward vampire story, but it uses vampiric themes to approach female life and desire in a very satisfying way. A nice contribution to the genre.

“Who would I be if I was someone who wanted things?”

I only read J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla a few years ago, and I can’t believe I hadn’t done so sooner. The 1870s vampire novella pre-dates Bram Stoker’s Dracula by several decades and is beloved for its enigmatic, seductive title character and her relationship to the young woman upon whose hospitality — and more — the vampire woman preys.

Although Carmilla is not explicitly queer, understandable given its era, there is an undeniable sexual tension simmering just beneath the surface of her friendship with Laura, and therefore it is no surprise that Kat Dunn’s Hungerstone is not the first overtly sapphic retelling of or novel inspired by the vampire classic. But, in my opinion, it belongs at the top of the list.

In Hungerstone, Laura is named Lenore, and she is not an innocent teenager living a solitary existence with her widower father, but the mistress of an estate purchased with her handsome businessman husband Henry. Something is rotten in the state of Nethershaw, however; Lenore is tasked with revitalizing the crumbling manor even as her marriage falls into a state of disrepair.

Theirs was a marriage of convenience, Lenore bringing to it a prestigious lineage but no wealth, Henry offering money but relying on his wife to build his reputation; of course, a heir is essential to solidify Henry’s new standing in society, and by a decade into their marriage it is clear that there will be no child added to their family.

Resentful of and resented by her husband, and yet believing that she must endure her unfulfilled existence in order to exist at all, Lenore might have continued on in this unhappy marriage were it not for the arrival — via a startling carriage accident — of Carmilla Kernstein.

Beautiful, mysterious, uninhibited — Carmilla immediately shakes up life at Nethershaw. As Carmilla draws her under her spell, Lenore is forced to confront her secrets, her fears, and, most importantly, her desires. In some ways, Carmilla acts as the embodiment of Lenore’s inner self, saying the rude yet true things that Lenore will not dare to say, criticizing that which should be criticized, and goading Lenore into indulging in her cravings. This is the story of an awakening in more ways than one, not only of Lenore’s sexuality but also of her independence.

“What is a monster but a creature of agency?” Lenore muses, as she begins to take her life into her own hands to secure her future. As the novel hurtles toward its horrifying, violent climax, the events going on at Nethershaw get more bizarre, more uncanny, Lenore begins to liberate herself from the expectations placed upon her and embrace the strangeness of the happenings, and the beguiling, dangerous woman who brought them there.

The writing in Hungerstone is excellent, perfectly suited to its premise and setting. Sex, violence, and hunger form a triumvirate of themes, with so much overlap between how they are described, and that melding of fears and desires is so fantastically and unsettlingly on display here. From the eerie way Carmilla haunts Lenore in both thought and body, to the gory, brutal scenes of carnage, the novel is full of vivid imagery and visceral feelings.

I love that Hungerstone feels like both a fresh take on a classic story and genre, and like a suitable tribute to the same. Equal parts revulsion and seduction, this is a novel I won’t soon be able to cast out of my mind, much as Lenore couldn’t banish Carmilla from hers.

Many, many thanks to Kat Dunn, Zando, and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review; I feasted on this novel.

Final note — the line “I ate paprika on my tour, and I didn’t care for it” made me laugh. Despite their shared experiences in the company of vampires, Lenore definitely would not get along with my bestie Jonathan Harker.

I had never heard of the Carmilla story before this novel and I'm glad I did a deep dive into the lore before I got too deep into this story. It really helped me enjoy this novel all the more.

You rarely read a Sapphic vampire story and I loved every second of it! The hunger with blood and the hunger towards women was very strong and I just loved it for some reason.

It was a VERY slow start but it picks up in the middle and I couldn't put it down after that!

A beautiful retelling of Carmilla (which I was relatively unfamiliar with prior to reading). The only thing it was missing was more sapphic tension!

"If I am mad, it is only because they have made me so."

I’m a sucker for a Carmilla retelling—I simply cannot help myself. Add in a dash of female rage and women absolutely losing it over their terrible husbands, and I’m all in.

At the halfway mark, I thought this was shaping up to be a solid three-star read. The pacing felt sluggish, and some of the characterizations seemed too simplistic. But then, the second half happened, and it really found its stride. The prose that initially felt slow started to feel deliberate, dragging me down into the same spiral of desperation and madness as our main character.

The symbolism of hunger in this novel is where it truly shines. Hunger in the literal sense—vampires, blood, and all that gothic goodness—but also a deeper, more metaphorical hunger. Hunger for more as women: to be fully ourselves, to feel, to scream, to be mad, to seek revenge, to tear apart the perfectly crafted boxes society forces us into. This duality between physical hunger and longing felt like the novel’s beating heart, and it was captivating.

The setting also deserves its flowers. I’m an absolute sucker for dark, 19th-century Victorian vibes, so the crumbling house, sprawling English moors, and moody, immersive atmosphere were completely my thing. It added a tangible sense of dread that paired perfectly with the story’s themes.

That said, I had a few issues. The pacing dragged in the beginning and early middle sections, which made it hard to stay engaged at first. However, once the pieces clicked into place, the story gained momentum, and I couldn’t put it down. I also felt like Carmilla’s character was left a bit too vague. I know this is Lenore’s story, but some additional depth or background for Carmilla would have filled out her characterization and added more layers to the narrative.

Still, I thoroughly enjoyed this. Retellings can be tricky, but Carmilla is one of my favorites, and I think Kat Dunn did it justice.

Content warnings: This book contains triggering content, including death, attempted murder, murder, blood, some gore, infidelity, verbal and physical abuse, manipulation, and more.

Thank you to the author, the publisher Zando, and NetGalley for gifting me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

thanks for netgalley and zando project for the ARC. :)

I loved it so much, it was an obssession since the first page.
The take on vampire so subtle and mostly being on hunger is probably my favorite now of how we deny how "bad" we can be. i maybe wish Carmilla was a bit more present but Lenore was interesting and seeing her grow out of her cage was beautiful and the prose never missed