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Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body Hardcover – June 13, 2017

by Roxane Gay (Author)

535 customer reviews

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New York Times bestseller

National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist

Lambda Literary Award winner

A best book of 2017: Time NPR People Elle The Washington Post The Los Angeles Times The Chicago Tribune Newsday St. Louis Post-Dispatch PopSugar BookRiot Library Journal Booklist Kirkus Reviews Shelf Awareness

New York Times bestselling author Roxane Gay has written with intimacy and sensitivity about food and bodies, using her own emotional and psychological struggles as a means of exploring our shared anxieties over pleasure, consumption, appearance, and health. As a woman who describes her own body as “wildly undisciplined,” Roxane understands the tension between desire and denial, between self-comfort and self-care. In Hunger, she casts an insightful and critical eye on her childhood, teens, and twenties—including the devastating act of violence that acted as a turning point in her young life—and brings readers into the present and the realities, pains, and joys of her daily life.

With the bracing candor, vulnerability, and authority that have made her one of the most admired voices of her generation, Roxane explores what it means to be overweight in a time when the bigger you are, the less you are seen. Hunger is a deeply personal memoir from one of our finest writers, and tells a story that hasn’t yet been told but needs to be.

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

An Amazon Best Book of June 2017: If you’re a woman in America, chances are, no matter your size, you probably have a somewhat fetishistic relationship with food. We obsess over having too much, too little (to a lesser degree); we use terms like stealing a bite and guilty pleasure--things that evoke shame, and are meant to keep our bodies in line. For those that fit that (ever narrowing) bill, congratulations! Clothes are designed to fit you, kale growers love you, and so does society. You bask in its glow. The rest risk being in shadow, which is exactly where Roxane Gay wanted to be. In her brutally honest and brave memoir Hunger, Gay recounts a childhood sexual assault that led her to purposely gain weight in order to be unseen and therefore “safe.” Gay warns at the beginning of the book that if you’re looking for a triumphant weight loss memoir, this is not it. But Hunger is a triumph nonetheless. It’s a story not easily told, but the telling set her free. And through Gay’s experience we learn one of lessons she eventually did, that “all of us have to be more considerate of the realities of the bodies of others,” and more accepting of our own. --Erin Kodicek, The Amazon Book Review

Review

“A work of staggering honesty . . . . Poignantly told.” (New Republic)

“The book’s short, sharp chapters come alive in vivid personal anecdotes. . . . And on nearly every page, Gay’s raw, powerful prose plants a flag, facing down decades of shame and self-loathing by reclaiming the body she never should have had to lose.” (Entertainment Weekly)

“Bracingly vivid. . . . Remarkable. . . . Undestroyed, unruly, unfettered, Ms. Gay, live your life. We are all better for having you do so in the same ferociously honest fashion that you have written this book.” (Los Angeles Times)

“Searing, smart, readable. . . . “Hunger,” like Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “Between the World and Me,” interrogates the fortunes of black bodies in public spaces. . . . Nothing seems gratuitous; a lot seems brave. There is an incantatory element of repetition to “Hunger”: The very short chapters scallop over the reader like waves.” (Newsday)

“Luminous. . . . intellectually rigorous and deeply moving.” (The New York Times Book Review)

“Her spare prose, written with a raw grace, heightens the emotional resonance of her story, making each observation sharper, each revelation more riveting. . . . It is a thing of raw beauty.” (USA Today)

“Powerful. . . . fierce. . . . Gay has a vivid, telegraphic writing style, which serves her well. Repetitive and recursive, it propels the reader forward with unstoppable force.” (Associated Press)

“This is the book to read this summer . . . she’s such a compelling mind . . . . Anyone who has a body should read this book.” (Isaac Fitzgerald on the Today show)

“Hunger is Gay at her most lacerating and probing. . . . Anyone familiar with
Gay’s books or tweets knows she also wields a dagger-sharp wit.”
(Boston Globe)

“Wrenching, deeply moving. . . a memoir that’s so brave, so raw, it feels as if [Gay]’s entrusting you with her soul.” (Seattle Times)

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Product details

Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Harper; 1st Edition edition (June 13, 2017)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0062362593
ISBN-13: 978-0062362599
Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 535 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,690 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #34 in Books > Parenting & Relationships > Family Relationships > Abuse
- #39 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Professionals & Academics > Culinary
- #97 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Cooking Education & Reference

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Meg Tuite

Unforgettable, fierce, unparalleled!!! GET A COPY! LOVE!!!

June 14, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

I read this book in one sitting. No possible way that anything could stand in the way of Roxane Gay's collection, "Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body"! I sobbed through each essay as Gay revealed her depth and each secret was stripped and empowered on the page! This is by far the fiercest and most unforgettable memoir I have read to date! Some quotes:
"My warmth was hidden far from anything that could bring hurt because I knew I didn't have the inner scaffolding to endure anymore hurt in those protected places."
"Do my boundaries exist if I don't voice them?"
"The thing about shame is that there are no depths. I have no idea where the bottom of my shame resides."
"There is a price to be paid for visibility and there is even more of a price to be paid when you are hypervisible."

Make sure when you get a copy that you have time to read it through because you will not want to do anything else! LOVE LOVE Roxane Gay! This is her most powerful work to date!

111 people found this helpful

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Joan C. Curtis

A Book You Won't Forget

February 15, 2018

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

The title of this book is perfect. Anyone, who knows who Roxane Gay is, will assume the book has to do with eating. Hunger connotes a desire for food, right? But, this book is much more than a book about food. It's a book about yearning, about hungering for many things. Food is, of course, one of those things. But, Ms. Gay hungers for companionship, for love, for acceptance, for simple courtesy. She hungers for recognition of who she is versus what she looks like. In fact, there is little in the book that indicates that she hungers for food.

This is a troubling book to read. It's full of angst. The short chapters feel as if each could be a confessional on a shrink's couch. The author shares her innermost wants, needs, feelings. It is so revealing that the reader feels as if they are intruding. The courage it took to write the book is evident. But, what's not so evident but clear is how much the author had to go deep within herself to really understand who she was. I'm assuming she did that alone and not in therapy. She doesn't mention being in therapy (except some counseling when she was in high school).

Given all the revelations in the book, the reader begins to search his or her own soul. In doing that, we might ask ourselves, do we really see others? Do we assume by what we see in other people's appearance (bodies), they are a certain way without knowing that person. Are we subconsciously critical of people who are fat (anorexic, old, handicapped--my additions)?

Ms. Gay helps the reader understand the difficulty she has doing very normal things, like going out to dinner with friends, going to the doctor, using a public restroom, flying in an airplane, sitting behind the steering wheel of a car, going to a movie or the theatre. The list is endless. I can add others: Serving on jury duty, walking on a sidewalk, sitting on a park bench. Those of us in normal-sized bodies take all these things for granted. After having read Hunger, I will never take these things for granted again.

Hunger is a tough read. My hope is the process of writing it helped Ms. Gay deal with her own deep-seated, long-standing traumas. In the meantime, I will never look at an overweight person in the same way. That much I gained from this book.

The book is not a slow read. The chapters are quickly devoured. The sentences short with much repetition. The emotion high.

16 people found this helpful

Comment

August 22, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This was not an easy book to read, especially if you are struggling with weight issues. The author writes beautifully of her struggle with her body after being raped at the age of 12. Her way of keeping men away was go gain weight. At one point in this book she weighed 511 pounds. She has struggled since the age of 12 and she details the diets, the comments, the bullying. Her story is beautifully told but it offers no real answers, no solutions to the problems of weight. The chapters are very short and many will identify with the author. At the end of the book she seems to accept the fact (as many of us do) the loosing weight is a struggle with no real end it sight. The author has accomplished a lot in spite of the trauma and her story is compelling.

12 people found this helpful

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C. Honey

Like reading a personal journal written for public consumption

June 21, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

I found the first half of the book better than it's second half. Overall, I found it read like a personal journal written for public consumption, meaning it's light on details and heavy on reasons explaining behavior.

At a pivotal age, the author suffers a trauma that by every measure is horrific and live changing. Her rage is more than warranted and what follows 30 years on is rage expressed in many forms. She explains this well and throughout the book but misses the opportunity to question her motives as an adult, which makes her story relatable but falls short of providing insight.

33 people found this helpful

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Sophfronia Scott

A Book of Clear-eyed, Difficult Truthfulness

June 24, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

“I don’t know how I let things get so out of control, but I do.” These words, repeated a few times in Roxane Gay’s memoir, hold the tension of this important work. The tension is the push and pull between strength and vulnerability, courage and fear, reality and illusion, knowledge and confusion. This tension is where the author lives. “…here is my heart, what’s left of it. Here I am showing you the ferocity of my hunger.” I admire this stance. I like how Gay, in a world that adores happy endings and experiences neatly dissected for meaning, “went there,” showing the pain and frustrations she continues to endure. She isn’t afraid to admit the story is ongoing. But hope is present in her life, in tiny glowing balls that remind her she is not totally in darkness: she is loved, her work is affecting lives, she is seeking the geographic place her heart most wants to call “home.” For this reason, the fact of its clear-eyed and difficult truthfulness, I believe this book will do more for more people than a truckload of all those happy ending books could ever do. Gay says this was a hard book to write. I am glad she managed to do it.

20 people found this helpful

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Most recent customer reviews

Peggy Hayes

A compelling read

Well written book on a provocative topic.

Published 5 hours ago

Laura Sokol

Saddening reality

Roxane tells the story of her life in way that makes aware the harsh realities of society in how we view women in their appearance.Read more

Published 17 hours ago

Tanya K

True Authenticity!!

I had wanted to read this since hearing an interview with the author on NPR about a year ago. What a thoughtful, difficult, and important book!Read more

Published 1 day ago

Linda J. Schiller-Hanna

The bravest book on food and hunger and power I've ever encountered. Honest and profound. Moving.

Even though this is well reviewed, I HUNGER to add my two cents. Possibly the most profound book about food, femininity and power I've ever come across.Read more

Published 1 day ago

Irishfaith

Inspiring Book!

What an amazing book!!! Roxane talks openly about her struggles with weight, acceptance, confidence, worthiness and so many other important topics.Read more

Published 1 day ago

marissa dawson

Sad and beautifully written. It will either strenthen your capacity for empathy or help you to feel less alone.

Sad and beautifully written. It will either strenthen your capacity for empathy or help you to feel less alone. done

Published 2 days ago

Cariola

Devastating, Both as Memoir and as Social Critique

'Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body' is devastating, both as a personal memoir and as a critique of social attitudes towards overweight women.Read more

Published 3 days ago

Nic R. Coers

Raw and self-indulgent

This is a very transparent look at life inside an “unruly body.” Roxane describes a life defining moment and traces its consequences through the next thirty years.Read more

Published 8 days ago

wcmom

Bcthjgv. Fun.

Fyvhvihvuyvkhvgyfgvh. Nguy nggu. Hghj. Neighbor. Hugh job. Hjkkfgb jkghkon. Gun. Gjkutghn. B.B. kJ nfhk. B. Gym. Btdryhfyjnyf. Be; H bunk.

Published 10 days ago

Herman Hesse Fan

This work oozes power because of its honesty. Thank you!

Wow! I am still overwhelmed by the power of this book. All I can muster at the moment in the form of a review is THANK YOU, ROXANA GAY!

Published 10 days ago

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