The brief stints that allow you to smile, getting little glimpses into the time before, are sweet. There is a darling story about her Haitian American family having meals around the table, and the loving relationship she had with her mother, at least for a brief time. “Food was not only comfort food also became my friend because it was constant and I didn’t need to be anything but myself when I ate.” You can have knowledge that prepares you for reading such an experience, but we can never be truly prepared for Gay’s words before they come out in her deliberate, heartbreaking way. While the description of the event that changed her life is terrible, her recounting of the aftermath is devastating. But the visceral reaction to her blatant, open words, could not be escaped.
Having read Bad Feminist a couple years ago, I was not taken unawares by the story of Gay’s rape, or of her reaction to it. Some boys had destroyed me, and I barely survived it.” This isn’t to say that there are not heartbreaking moments in the last third of the book merely that they are eclipsed by the things that have made her the stronger person she finds herself to be today. More about moving forward, even if it is impossible to truly move on. More of Roxane seeing the better things about life and herself. Then, I found myself reading more there was less terror, less of the terrible, and more hope. There are some things that need time to process before you can move on. At first I would read chapters five or ten at a time, unable to go further, or just unwilling.
I spent several weeks taking in Hunger’s words. And already I was aware that I would be listening for quite some time. I knew then that this was going to be something. The first thing I noticed about Hunger was the chapter count: 88 chapters. “I know that to be frank about my body makes some people uncomfortable. But what you don’t know until you’re enmeshed in her life is how much the idea of obesity and other people makes an impact on her life. Going into Hunger, and knowing what Gay looks like, you know that there will be references to food, weight, and hunger. Statistics say that 34.9 percent of Americans are obese and 68.6 percent of Americans are obese or overweight.