The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls ★★★★☆

The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls (Click Here To Buy)

★★★★☆

The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls by Anissa Gray is the story of the Butler family, who are struggling to hold together amidst troubles brought on by prison, addiction, and abuse.

I read this on loan from the Seattle Public Library on my Kindle and gave it a rating of 3.5 rounded to 4 stars.

The book is told from the perspectives of three sisters. Althea has just been sent to prison along with her husband and left their teenage twin daughters in the care of Lillian, who is trying to get over her husband’s death as well past abuse by Joe, their brother. Viola comes home from Chicago to try and help with the girls, but is having marriage problems with her wife as well as experiencing a relapse of her bulimia.

As you can tell from the synopsis, there is a lot going on in this book. Essential themes are forgiveness and identity. Althea is struggling to forgive her daughter Kim for calling the police on her while at the same time trying to figure out what kind of a mother she is from a prison cell. Lillian is struggling to move forward, unable to voice the abuse she incurred as a child as well as trying to forgive herself for cheating on her husband, who is now dead. Viola is struggling to find forgiveness in the relationship with her wife as well as using the tools she has from treatment and as a therapist to work through her bulimia.

Gray really shines in her character development and has created complex, believable roles in an emotional family drama. Gray writes pieces of the characters from her own personal experience with bulimia and growing up in Michigan. An essay she wrote following the ending is worth the read.

If you liked The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls, I also recommend American Marriage by Tayari Jones, The Nickel Boys by Colton Whitehead, Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn, and Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King.

Happy reading!

Ms.Bjork