3.5
I really debated between rounding my star up or down, but after some consideration, I'm going to have to round down.
The story itself was enjoyable enough, but the two things that it suffers from is the fact that there are a lot of unnecessary flashbacks, as well as the fact that the book's pacing is way too slow for what it actually is. These two issues directly relate to one another.
The main character who we are getting flashbacks for only really ever has two things that she talks about - her traumatic childhood / living with her aunt, and how she grew up and thought she was doing well by finding a husband to marry. The flashbacks were fun at first, but get very repetitive very quickly. At least a good 20 pages could be shaved off of this book with no considerable loss to the story.
In fact, I feel like these flashbacks at a certain point only work to drag down the pacing of the story. I know that part of their purpose is to put you into the mind of the main character and her despair and descent into self-doubt and loathing, but that only really works if the flashbacks are actually providing something new and fresh to the plot. Most of the time, it simply re-iterates what we already know but through a slightly different event.
This, in turn, makes the first 56% or so of the book very repetitive and slow, and things really only start gaining steam after this point. Where the first half was at first interesting but eventually turned slog, it becomes really riveting after the halfway point.

Although I am pleased with the conclusion of the story, I still felt the relationship between our main character Lenore and the mysterious stranger Carmilla to be lacking. Or rather, I expected something a little more from it based off of the description. Throughout the book, these two actually have a surprising lack of interactions, because Lenore is either purposefully avoiding her, or Carmilla sometimes has a habit of just disappearing for a day or two before returning back to Lenore's residence. I expected their clash of personalities to be a little bit... more than what it was. To me, I can't say much more about the pair except that Lenore is bewitched by her. I didn't see much more to their relationship besides that. I would go so far as to say that Carmilla herself ends up falling into the typical tropes of a manic pixie dream girl, though I know that was not the intention, but now that I've made that connection in my head I can't seem to shake it.

I had an easy enough time imagining everything that was going on since Kat Dunn certainly knows how to write a vivid description, but in the aspects of pacing and character development, it's a little rough around the edges. I would be interested in reading more from her in the future, but this one fell just a little below target for me.

I wanted to like this one, but it feels very standard vampire story. In the way where I feel like I'm reading a modern Carmilla still set in the past. There's some interesting historical elements, like an opening that talks exclusively about periods, but other than that, it felt repetitive.

I support women’s rights AND women’s wrongs. This Carmilla retelling is set in the moors of England and centers a sapphic storyline as well as a story of Lenore’s self discovery and vengeance on those who have wronged her. Love love love!

Special thanks to NetGalley and Zando for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was outstanding. The writing in this book transports the reader into the time, place, and characters. It is intimate without being overly revealing. It emulates classics such as Dracula and the Yellow Wallpaper while still maintained its own identity. I can see this book being a future classic and would highly recommend it.

This book is a must for everyone who likes gothic literature, Horror and angry women!

I'll be honest: When I started this book, I didn't think it was going to be quite this much Horror. But most of the Horror parts happened towards the middle of the book and the rest of it was totally fine. So even people who don't read a lot of Horror (like me) can read and enjoy Hungerstone.

The athmosphere of the book was phenomenal. It's dark and moody and mysterious. And I loved how Kat Dunn used hunger as a metaphor. Lenore was a super interesting main character and I still wonder if maybe she was an unreliable narrator. It would definitely fit.

Honestly, I can't say too much about this book without giving anything away but just now that it was amazing and that I definitely recommend it! Extra point because it was sapphic.

This was a must read for everyone who loves Carmilla.
It was atmospheric, it had good characters.

I need more stories like this one.

There was not a single moment in this book where I knew what was going to happen. The premise was so incredibly intriguing and I appreciate the subtlety of the vampire element, however, for me I would have loved it if it played an even larger part in the novel. I did feel the story dragged a little between 40-70% but from 80% onwards I was unable to put it down. The ending was very neat while still leaving some questions for the reader to ponder on (without them becoming too frustrated). Overall a wonderfully enjoyable read.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!

y'all know how I feel about Carmilla. lesbian vampires. GOTHIC lesbian vampires. not only did Hungerstone deliver this in troves, it expanded on this. the way Kat Dunn delved into the realm of women's hunger and appetites that are so often suppressed, had me looking at my life and asking, for what do I hunger? how she exemplified hunger, from the consuming of hair, to flesh, to the leg of a chair. Carmilla's visceral impact on the people around her was fascinating, and something entirely unique to Dunn's imagination.

my only complaint is I wish we'd had more time with Carmilla, and less time of Lenore flashing back to the Aunt Daphne. this is a personal problem though, i'd rather see more gayness than whining. other than that - the prose was exquisite, the atmosphere tangible, and Henry? oh girl. he deserved worse. Lenore's growth was wonderful, and I wish we could've seen even more of it at the end.

oh boy this was really fun! it took a while for it to get going and it wasn’t as atmospheric and/or creepy as i expected it to be, but it was still pretty good nonetheless. i really liked lenore (more so than carmilla, who i wish was a little bit more defined as a character) and the ending was just deeply satisfying, so yeah. a big win for sapphic vampire enthusiasts!

“I am a woman woken from thirty years slumber, and I would eat the world should it satisfy this empty, keening void where my heart should be.”

“Hungerstone” is a Carmilla retelling that explores the meaning of hunger, desire and liberation. I’m going to be honest, it’s been years since I read “Carmilla” so my memory of it was hazy, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying this book - I absolutely devoured it.

The story follows Lenore - a woman stuck in a loveless, decaying marriage to a cold man, a union stranded by her inability to give him a child. Lenore’s life has never been a happy one. Orphaned after a tragic accident that haunts her still, left at her aunt’s mercy. She’s been overwhelmingly lonely and never experienced real love. She grew up learning to make herself small and insignificant. In her marriage, she represses her desires while meticulously fulfilling her wifely duties, clinging to the societal status she worked so hard to achieve.

Everything changes when on a stormy night, Lenore and her husband encounter a carriage accident while travelling to their new home. They rescue a mysterious woman, Carmilla, who becomes a guest at their mansion while she recovers. Carmilla is strange and unsettling but at the same time becomes an unlikely friend to Lenore, pushing her to face her buried hunger.

“You are feeding the wrong hunger.”

The first half of this book is very slow, but I don’t mean that in a negative way. I was completely immersed in Lenore’s quiet, mundane days as she slowly starts to realise her life is crumbling around her. This is my first book by Kat Dunn and definitely not the last. The prose is stunning, perfectly crafting the gothic, haunting atmosphere.

If you’re looking for stories about female rage, you need to pick up Hungerstone.
This book has it all - pure feminist rage, sapphic vampires, revenge AND killing men. You know I love to see women in male dominated fields ;)

“Men conspiring in dark little holes like vermin, chittering their spiteful thoughts to one another, make the world like this, hurt people like that. I hate them I hate them I hate them.”

tightly claustrophobic and intense as a novel. carmilla is one of my favorite classics, and hungerstone brings the same vibes into a dramatic and more fully elaborated novel. 5 stars. tysm for the arc.

Hungerstone is a novel that can be read in one sitting, capable of immersing the reader in the pages and making the story come alive, thanks mainly to Kat’s writing style, which is not only objectively excellent and well-crafted, but also manages to portray bloody or sexy situations without descending into vulgarity. The story develops well, sticking to the plot and how we expect it to unfold, without ever becoming trivial or predictable. The characters are not written to please you and to act how you would them to, but to feel real. Every single choice and line must be questioned until the end; I wouldn’t go so far as to say the narrative is unreliable, but it’s certainly not an open book - I loved this aspect. The ending I highly appreciated, consistent with the development of the story and the protagonist's character arc.

I am so excited for this book to come out and sit along side and be praised with other sapphic gothic stories. I absolutely loved the atmosphere of this book and love the concept of a Carmilla retelling with even more suspense.

Thank you so much to Zando and NetGalley for an ARC in return for an honest review!

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4 stars - a slow simmering yet gripping story about hunger, choice and rage

“Pain and blood, grief and hunger. To be a woman is a horror I can little comprehend.”

Hungerstone is a bit outside of my usual comfort zone, and I am so glad I followed my gut and gave it a chance. Came for the Carmilla retelling, stayed for the way it shook me with its twists and turns.
It felt a bit slow and heavy to read at times, but the writing is beautiful and detailed and I felt like I really got to see the world through the eyes of the female main character as I was reading. The story is angry and weary and fearful, and at the core of it all is the returning theme of hunger.

“To want is to surrender to uncertainty. To step into the unknown.”

I don’t have the words to explain how or why or what worked for me in this story, it just did. It will stay with me for a while as I process and chew on it, and perhaps one day I will return to it and better be able to put into words why it resonated with me as much as it did.

“What is a monster but a creature of agency?”

Absolutely loved this. It was so sensual and mysterious and had me hooked right from the first pages. I loved the way the story developed (it added to the sensual elements) and found it really hard to put down

I LOVE that the sapphic vampire romance genre is growing, and this is an excellent addition to the list!

Sooo good! It definitely dragged a little in the middle but i think that was part of the effect of feeling exactly what Lenore felt throughout the book. I was filled with hunger, loneliness, desire, and rage right alongside Lenore. More sapphic vampire stories pls

I was immediately gripped by the writing in this book. It was lyrical, strong, and so atmospheric that I was immediately teleported into the story. The narrative voice was so strong that I was there, feeling Lenore’s growing rage over her husbands dismissal of her domestic labour and the pains of being a wife that go unacknowledged. I loved the metaphor of blood woven throughout the book from the first line, and how blood is a constant for many women. This entire book felt like a dark and stormy night, a classic 19th century sort of gothic.

Wow, this book was so good!! The writing and characterization of the main character was incredible. I felt so in her shoes at every point of the book, filled with hunger, loneliness, desire, and rage right alongside her. This book is sapphic, but it’s much less about the sapphic relationship rather than the main character developing her agency and carving out the life she wants for herself. I absolutely loved her fierceness, but also definitely would have loved to see more longing/lust/romance for Carmilla! So this gets a 4.5 rounded up for me, but I definitely recommend it.

Also a note that while it leans more towards horror, it’s more bodily violence and gore rather than frightening plot lines.

🌈Queer rep: pan/bi female main character, FF relationship.

Hungerstone is such a good book. I had the time of my life reading it. Such a good read! I recommend everyone to read this book as fast as they can.