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Lately, my book A Carnivore's Inquiry has been giving my friends nightmares. Mira, who has an active imagination, tells me that she dreamed I was worried about an upcoming student party I am hosting. She says, "I offered to give you a hand, and you said, 'Good. I was worried that there wouldn't be enough fresh meat.'" This illustrates two things about A Carnivore's Inquiry: firstly, it scares people, and secondly, I am constantly conflated with my narrator, who happens to be a cannibal.
At a reading last month, a man asked me if I ate sushi. My narrator does not eat sushi, but raw food is often considered taboo and I think this man was testing my digestive parameters. To this I responded that not only did I eat sushi, but also ate steak tartare, and recently, while visiting Norway, ate a seasoned lump of raw elk meat. I added that a Norwegian elk is actually a small moose, and that I finished off whatever was left for breakfast the following morning. I should note here that the man was most satisfied with my response, but, rather shamelessly, declined to buy my novel.
I didn't imagine that people would respond to me this way when I conceived of A Carnivore's Inquiry. I wanted to write something scary and since I'd already written about war in my last book, The Caprices, I found myself faced with limited prospects. I also didn't want to write a grim book exhausted by my last effort – which does have funny moments, a few uncomfortable laughs in the general carnage – but rather something darkly humorous. Dating books have done well and although my work seems to land solidly in the realm of literary, I thought I might be able to put a bit of that into what I was doing. I thought the mix would be interesting – woman picks up men who disappear – and I learned a good deal in the process of researching. The life of a cannibal is undeniably lonely. No surprise there. What I've learned upon publication – the shocker – is that the writer of cannibalism is undeniably suspicious.
Read more about A Carnivore's Inquiry
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