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There are currently 40 member reviews
for The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls
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Lani
Absorbing family dynamics
An amazing debut with such authenticity and well developed characters. I became so invested in their lives, feeling like I was in the middle of the turmoil, exquisitely feeling their heartache. The parents, Althea and Porter are upstanding citizens who run a restaurant, until they are charged with a scam and sentenced to prison. This becomes the pivotal nexus on which their sisters, brother and children deal with the complex issues that each of them face within the family structure. Having worked with women in an eating disorders treatment center, I found Olivia's internal dialogue and coping skills regarding her bulimia very genuine, bringing me to tears. The shame of incarceration, the struggle to define oneself within a family covered with warts and all, and the bond that underlines it all made this novel destined to be put on a keeper shelf.
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Julie M. (Golden Valley, MN)
Book Group Worthy
This novel explores what it means to be a mother, daughter, sister, or aunt. There are lots of issues to discuss here such as eating disorders, trust, love, forgiveness, abuse and second chances. I would suggest this book to any book group looking for a good discussion as there is some ambiguity as to what actually happened and why the characters act the way they do.
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Sandi W. (East Moline, IL)
Paying for regret...
Relationships - terrifying! And when they are relationships between a Mother and her daughter they become even more confusing, more highly emotional and possibly more devastating. Then add in relationships with siblings, runaways, lies and prison and you have this amazing debut novel from Anissa Gray.
Right from the first sentence, "You do a lot of thinking in jail.", this book grabbed me and took me on a great ride. I enjoyed both the current and the back story of the characters, feeling that the characters were well developed and diverse enough to be entertaining. The story was not your usual story of a down trodden town in a bad economic turn, but personalized by the hurt and guilt of one daughter turning against her mother.
This is an author that I intend to follow. I find her work in fiction to be page turning and realistic.
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Jean B. (Naples, FL)
The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls
You would think that a title like The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungy Girls would mean you were reading a funny book. Wrong! No humor here.
This is a very serious book about being bulimic, being black and being gay. The author, Anissa Gray, knows what she is writing about as much of this book is autobiographical. She writes, in a note to her readership, that the lives of her characters "are deeply rooted in the world I've known."
The book is about three sisters, one of whom is imprisoned for fraud. In her first novel the novel does a superb job bringing these three to life.
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Lynn W. (Calabash, NC)
Ravenously Hungry Girls
This is the story of what should have been a happy family but poor choices, economic problems and too many family secrets tear this family apart. The story is well written with characters that are very real with their many and various flaws. It is a story that could play out in almost any family.
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Susan L. (Alexandria, VA)
Ravenously Hungry Girls Delivers
The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls is a tale of three sisters and how their lives play out as adults of a tumultuous past and how one sister's children pay the price of her mistakes. It is a raw book filled with trauma, demons and the aftermath of abuse. Gray doesn't ignore any opportunity to raise the stakes for the family. It is not an easy read, but one that will stick with you.
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Iris F. (West Bloomfield, MI)
The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls
Reading this book was like peeling an onion. There were many layers and the author cleverly revealed them one layer at a time which made for an interesting read. Each character with the exception of Joe was flawed which made them more believable. Told through the alternating voices of Althea, Lillian and Viola the story became more compelling the farther I got into it.
It was hard to understand the crime committed by Althea and Proctor who appeared to have lived exemplary lives. First given the responsibility of her siblings shortly after marriage of raising her siblings, building a successful business as well as a charity seems like a perfect and rewarding life. Proctor assumes the responsibility for their crime demonstrates his love for his wife. The one flaw was the weak explanation for Kim turning on her parents. The incarceration was central to the story and Kim's motive didn't seem strong enough for her actions.
Even with a slow start I enjoyed the book. I admired the authors ability to say so much with so few words. I like this family and felt they would all succeed with the exception of Kim. I hoped that she would find her way and have a happy ending
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