The Starving Saints

Oh goodness, okay this one was rather painfully interesting. rather like a rotting, gaping, wound in all the best possible ways. Creepy, culty, extremely powerful work about three toxically dependent women in a world where a goddess (?) (maybe?) has descended upon the world to give salvation(?) to a besieged castle. 5 stars. Tysm for the arc

“Aymar Castle has been under siege for six months. Food is running low and there has been no sign of rescue. But just as the survivors consider deliberately thinning their number, the castle stores are replenished. The sick are healed. And the divine figures of the Constant Lady and her Saints have arrived, despite the barricaded gates, offering succor in return for adoration.
Soon, the entire castle is under the sway of their saviors, partaking in intoxicating feasts of terrible origin.”

When I tell you this book truly has it all…
- A strange and stinky nun turned sorceress
- A lady knight that is unsure of where her loyalty should lie (she’s also really tall)
- An absolute menace of a girl that seeks revenge for the death of her father above all else
- The dynamics of messy, codependent women that want to kiss/kill each other
- The power exchanges. The YEARNING
- Cannibalism
- Religious icons as a threat
- Kneeling 😏🫡
- Bargaining with a hungry, unnamed malevolence beneath the castle
- A lot of bees

This book is a beautiful and disgusting fever dream and obsessed is an understatement. It’s impossible to guess what will happen next and I fear I will be thinking about it for a very long time. I cannot wait for this book to be out so I can get myself a physical copy. Thank you so much NetGalley the eARC!

The Starving Saints has been described as an intensely atmospheric fever dream of medieval horror, and man, did it live up to that! If you love weird girl, sapphic horror lit-fic, this will be the book for you! Think Ottessa Moshfegh’s
Lapvona, but without all of the fecal matter. It is bloody and sticky and bizarre, and for the longest time, you really aren’t sure what exactly is going on. I love a wild ride when I’m reading a book, and this definitely was one.

The narrators are an excommunicated nun (possible witch?), a Brienne of Tarth-type knight, and a girl playing the long game of revenge for her father’s death. They are all inside a castle that has been under siege for quite some time, and the food has run out. Phosyne (our nun-turned-magic woman) has managed to pull off one magical stunt, and everyone is expecting her to pull food out of thin air. After several failed attempts, it doesn’t matter because the Constant Lady and her Saints (Icons aka Heavenly beings??) show up out of nowhere with a bounty of refreshments. What could possibly go wrong? This book is a wild ride. It is very gory, has a lot of cannibalism, a lot of body horror, and a lot of creepy creatures. You will be grossed out, you will change your opinions about the main characters multiple times, and you will wonder if the ending is happy or not. This is my first book by Caitlin Starling, but I am looking forward to reading more!

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon, and Harper Voyage for this advanced copy of The Starving Saints.

this book was gory and disgusting and beautiful and religious and also distinctly sapphic about it. a novel for the Harrowhark Nonagesimuses of the world.

If you're looking for a book that's drenched in debauchery and brimming with bacchanalian madness, let me introduce you to my latest obsession.

The Starving Saints has it all:
- A lady knight (who has managed to steal my heart, thanks).
- Mind control food.
- Scary bees.
- Cannibalism as a metaphor for... cannibalism.
- Three toxic women who are, you guessed it, toxically dependent on one another.
- Delicious yearning.
- Not so delicious (and I say this positively) depictions of meat.
- A weird, cult-like religion.

When I say that this novel is an exploration of the depths of human depravity, I mean it. It's incredibly visceral--the type of story that doesn't shy away from appealing to your five senses in the worst (best) possible way--and god, the execution of it was just fantastic.

Our three leads are compelling and awful in their own compelling and awful ways, too. I always worry that there might be a character that I hate when there are multiple perspectives in a story, but Ser Voyne, Phosyne, and Treila were all PERFECT. The web spreading between them was also a delight, and I would give anything to read more about their messed up lives and histories if given the opportunity to.

Overall, this was my perfect book and I'm patiently counting down the days until next May when I can get my hands on a physical copy of it. It's easily a must-read for anyone even remotely fascinated by the medieval horror genre, or for anyone who wants to see messy sapphics try to save a starving castle from itself (and possibly each other).

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an early copy in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own :)

this was made for me. like, this was specifically made for ME.

what did we have? stinky and messy women,a lady knight, a poly relationship between three women?? (or god i hope so), body horror, absolute madness, medieval horror, CANNABILISM.

caitlin starling has been on my list of authors to read for awhile now and i'm so mad at myself for not diving in sooner. the writing was beautiful and it felt like reading a dark fairytale.

my only complaint is that i wanted MORE. And also, this is probably just me, but i didn't really care Treila. She was feral and I enjoyed that but besides that?? boooo.

still - i need the physical copy of this BADLY.

The description for The Starving Saints hooked me immediately, after initially being intrigued by the ominous book cover. I have been on a medieval fantasy kick lately, and was curious to try out something a little darker. The Starving Saints did not disappoint. In spite of taking place almost entirely within the confines of one besieged castle town, this story pulls you along at a sharp pace. Shifting between the points of view from Treila, Voyne, and Phosyne, we get a range of perspectives not only from each of their complicated backgrounds, but from their individual perceptions of reality, or lack thereof. I was absolutely eating up the dynamics between these three women. Revenge and loyalty, submission and command, violence and protection...those who enjoy the toxic devotion of Gideon and Harrow will not be disappointed by this book. I thought there was a good amount of detail on how the sinister magic plays out in this story without just giving it all away. Leaving some open to interpretation and mystery made it all the easier to be swept along in the madness, learning and adapting as the characters did. The Saints themselves are beautiful, shifting, creepy, and a very satisfying problem that the knight, serving girl, and disgraced nun must pitch themselves against. The imagery in Starling’s storytelling is unsettling and lush, and I particularly loved the descriptions of honeycomb and how it played a part in the plot.

It's very hard to write a review for a book like this, especially since I ended up liking it so much! The Starving Saints was gory and beautiful and constantly left you guessing what was true and what was not. All three of the main characters fully stand on their own and are fully fleshed-out characters. The way they are slowly built up and you learn more about each of them is done in such a tantalizing way, where you keep reading because you want to know more about them. The entire story feels like a fever dream and you can only watch helplessly as the entire castle falls farther and farther into madness. This story is very atmospheric and incredibly gory. I'm normally someone who doesn't care much for gore, but something about the gore in this is poetic. I just can't explain it, but no matter how bloody a scene got, I was entranced. Also, this book switches between the viewpoints of each main character wonderfully! It was so balanced, that I never got tired of reading one character's point of view. I really loved how the prose was written in this novel, and I'm eager to see what else Caitlin Starling will write down the line!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

First of all, this book is highly confusing and disturbing. I had no idea what was happening for 99% of it.
And it was genuinely fantastic.

PLOT SUMMARY:

The people of Aymar have been suffering for six months, the victims of a siege that has forced them into hiding behind the walls of Aymar Castle. Inside, the people are starving. Ser Voyne knows this and begins putting pressure on the resident madwoman, Phosyne, to produce a miracle to save them all. But when a “miracle” does arrive, it is in the form of saints: Saints that Phosyne did not call on.
As the saints begin wreaking havoc on the residents of Aymar, Phosyne and Ser Voyne form an alliance to figure out who these guests are and what they want. Meanwhile, a servant girl named Treila is desperate to escape and exact vengeance on Voyne. As the saints grow in power, all three women are forced to reckon with their pasts and the future that they may never see.
Will they succeed in stopping the saints before the people of Aymar are lost forever? Or will the Starving Saints pull them into the increasing madness that is so tempting?

PLOT REVIEW:

I have no idea what to say. Nothing in this book made sense, yet it really made me think a lot about the things people will resort to in trying times. In the end, I think this is what this story is all about.
Desire and human nature.
And it all happens in a time of deep desperation, when men and women are eating rats and human flesh to survive.
Did I mention this book is disturbing?
In any case, the premise was highly engaging. From the very beginning, I was immersed in the world of Aymar. There is no actual world-building, as we are, quite literally, trapped behind the walls of a castle in this book. Yet everything still managed to seem so vast and unending, with such vivid descriptions that I could see everything clearly in my mind.
And the plot.
The plot is something highly unique. I’ve read books with dangerous “visitors” who wreak havoc, but I have never explored a story with such deep meaning to it.
Such graphic desperation.
This book, again, was very disturbing and dark, but I also can’t deny that it was beautiful in its horror and depravity.
I loved it.

CHARACTERS:


The great thing about having three POVs is that you get three unique experiences and thoughts within the same plotline. We see Ser Voyne grappling with loyalty, Phosyne grappling with her growing power, and Treila struggling to understand what it is she truly wants: Vengeance or an escape?
It truly was fascinating to be in three different headspaces, looking at the growing danger of the saints through three sets of eyes, all with their own opinions on the situation. All of our characters were also driven by very different things: Treila only values survival, Ser Voyne loyalty and bravery, while Phosyne seems to value literally nothing and everything all at once.
As a bonus, they’re all sapphic and caught in a web of history, betrayal, and lust. They’re messed up and cruel in their own ways, with prejudices that guide their decisions on every page.
But that’s what made me love them.
Characters that are just perfect from the get-go have no way to grow or change. But we see so much change in each of these characters and I LOVED that!
Even better, Voyne is a lady knight and Phosyne is a sorceress.
We love that here.

OVERALL THOUGHTS:

Lady knights? Cannibals? A complicated lesbian throuple?
I’m in.

5 STARS!!! the yearning, the longing, the absolute rotting atmosphere veiled with tension and depravity. this is my perfect book

If someone were to ask me what the most ORIGINAL story I have read this year was, a million percent—The Starving Saints. There is nothing else like it.

Aymar Castle is under siege. The occupants? Starving. One by one, people fall to hunger. Sooner or later, they’ll need to start consuming the fallen if they are to survive.

Then the Saints arrive. Great, bountiful feasts for the people of Aymar to gorge themselves on. But, of course, things are not always as they seem.

Throughout this book, we get to follow 3 amazing female characters. Experience their downfalls and their triumphs as they try to save the castle and themselves.

I laughed. I cried. I wheezed. I gasped. I told people off for interrupting me whilst in the middle of a chapter. I absolutely cannot wait for this book to release in May of next year. Everyone needs to experience this twisted, magical adventure!

*I received an ARC from Netgalley in return for an honest review.*