In a culture that fetishizes male power, the heroine of A Certain Hunger is a rapacious, bloodthirsty monster—a perversion of every male fear.

Dorothy is a food critic. She has exquisite taste and she hungers for new sensations. So she transgresses on behalf of those governed by social contracts—and for women in particular. She becomes a ball of sensate wickedness and a delightful anti-heroine who, driven by her appetites, is a sexual terror, a gustatory snob, and an irrepressible misandrist.

Dorothy revels in her power, which derives from her resistance to male dominance and her willingness to assume the same role. She lives in a state of erotic suspension, trailing from lover to lover, and restaurant to restaurant, in Manhattan and Italy. No man is left unscathed: Dorothy eats her boyfriends' organs, and soon she is addicted to the thrill of cannibalism and on the run from its consequences.

Leaning on the overwrought, hyperluxurious language of professional gourmands to describe dishes like duck liver toast—"unctuous as a Vegas emcee, salty as a vaudeville comedian"—and steak and kidney pie—"tender as a love song, rich as Warren G. Harding"—the book is sometimes overwhelming. Its layered descriptions distract from its plot: with so many images on the table, characters are lost. Throughout, Dorothy asserts her superiority to the men whom she murders, but her psychopathy is terminal. In proving that she is better than her prey, she becomes what she hates, but she's not self-aware enough to dispatch her ego along with her dinner.

A Certain Hunger is a hearty novel that, despite its graphic themes of murder, flesh eating, sex, and the dessert menu, is also quite funny. With direct jabs at toxic masculinity and razor-sharp awareness of feminist tropes, Chelsea G. Summers's novel is a slasher-sexy, rich satire.

DEBUT Presented as a prison memoir, this tale is narrated by the funny and astute Dorothy Daniels, a food critic who just happens to be an unrepentant cannibalistic serial killer. (Please don't call her a mass murderer, as "mass murder is to serial killing as McDonald's is to Peter Luger's.") A slave to her appetites, Dorothy recalls Hannibal Lecter in her sophistication and refinement. A sensual being, she is descriptive and exacting in her depictions of both sex and food. Ever clear-eyed, she sees the large-scale butcher operation of her Italian boyfriend for what it is, "a carefully planned organization bent on the extermination of animals for our gastronomical pleasure"; understanding that others choose to look away, she obfuscates the uncomfortable truths into an award-winning magazine profile (before killing and eating him). The psychopathic, darkly feminist antihero can be viewed as a big middle finger to the common practice of judging a female protagonist on her "likability" or "relatability." VERDICT You won't soon forget Dorothy or her delicious insights, but fair warning: This book might turn you into a vegetarian, if you aren't already. (Though as Dorothy herself acknowledges, "It's surprisingly easy to overcome moral qualms, if you give in to the appetite.")—Lauren Gilbert, Ctr. for Jewish History, NY

Summers debuts with the fiendishly entertaining account of the rise and fall of Dorothy Daniels, a successful food writer and convicted murderer. Narrator Daniels chronicles her love of food, men, and the development of a cannibalistic urge that earns her the names "MILF Killer" and "Butcher Food Critic" in the tabloids. Written from prison, Daniels's story gradually unfolds in flashbacks as she acknowledges she has both "intimidating intelligence" and "a dearth of conscience," and that her "fondness for gratification" brought on her downfall. Watching the hypocrisy of her parents' supposedly perfect Connecticut domestic bliss, Daniels learns early on that "femininity was junk" and traditional roles of wife and mother are not for her. After college in the 1980s, she moves to Boston and writes for the Boston Phoenix. She soon leaves for New York City, where she launches a successful career writing for lifestyle magazines. Her work brings her to Italy, where she takes on a series of lovers and, after accidentally killing one with her Fiat, decides to cook his liver. The result: "delectable." Daniels proudly bears her traits as a diagnosed psychopath in the first chapter, a review of a Corpse Reviver #2 cocktail that segues into rhapsody for an ill-fated lover. Despite Daniels's crimes, she is a consistently appealing companion. With graphic sex and violence, Summers's shocking and darkly funny novel reads like a feminist-horror version of American Psycho. (Dec.)