“On my fourth birthday, I plucked six severed fingers from the shower drain.”

Margot lives with her mother, Ruth, down a country lane somewhere in England. From a very young age, Margot knows that her world is different. Well, different is putting it mildly. Ruth is a cannibal (and, by default, so is Margot.)

Nestled between the groves, we spent our days waiting for strangers to find us.

[…]

We’d had all sorts of strays here. Some of them had come away from car crashes, but what they didn’t know was that Mam had a little habit of leaving nails and glass on the back roads when she left the house. Some of the strays were lost, trying to hike across the fells without knowing that this gloom was where they’d spend the rest of their short lives.

[…]

That night, they didn’t scream much. It must have been quick.

If you are at all squeamish, Lucy Rose’s debut The Lamb might not be the book for you. I knew from the very first couple of pages that I was going to be icked out and I absolutely was. There’s lots of talk of turning body parts into pies and bones into broth and how delicious a crispy finger is.

But, this is also a story about a mother and daughter whose lives are changed when a stray arrives at their door who Ruth decides to keep because, as it turns out, she (Eden) is one of them. And Eden fundamentally changes the dynamic in the household which leaves Margot on the outside looking in.

Margot is used to making herself small so as not to draw attention. But she makes a friend at school, Abbie, and her bus driver, Steve, also seems to sense something is not quite right. The danger doesn’t come from the outside world, though. Her mother tells her

“I didn’t want to carry a child!” […] I never wanted to be a mama. I just wanted to be a person. None of this was supposed to happen. […] You make me hate myself.”

The Rose is a fairy tale and a story about female rage and motherhood. Do women cannibalize themselves in order to do what is expected of them? Does the hunger for more ever go away? What sacrifices must be made in order to live a fulfilling life?

If you have a strong stomach, The Lamb is a terrific read.