Hunger

Hunger
by Jackie Morse Kessler

Full disclosure: ARC received at BEA 2010 from Publisher
Publication date: October 18, 2010

"Thou art the Black Rider. Go thee out unto the world."

Lisabeth Lewis has a black steed, a set of scales, and a new job: she’s been appointed Famine. How will an anorexic seventeen-year-old girl from the suburbs fare as one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?

Traveling the world on her steed gives Lisa freedom from her troubles at home—her constant battle with hunger, and her struggle to hide it from the people who care about her. But being Famine forces her to go places where hunger is a painful part of everyday life, and to face the horrifying effects of her phenomenal power. Can Lisa find a way to harness that power—and the courage to fight her own inner demons? (description taken from Amazon.com)

Lisabeth, or Lisa, battles herself every day. She hears the Thin Voice that tells her she will never be thin enough, never pretty enough. Lisa is anorexic. She has become so sick that she might die...unless she becomes Famine instead.

When Lisa accepts she never imagines what she will be required to face as one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. She never expected to meet Death (pretty cool), Pestilence (nicer than she would have thought, but icky) and War (a total B-word that wants to kill her). She never thought she would learn to master her own actions...

I don't want to spoil this for anyone so I won't give away any more of the plot. This was an excellent book. It does deal with an eating disorder, which always grosses me out and I generally avoid books like this, but it's only part of the focus of the book so the icky parts are fairly minimal. It's handled VERY well.

The idea of a teen girl becoming one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse...awesome!! The plot works out really well and Lisa is an emotionally complex character that I wanted to shake and hug at the same time.

Keep an eye out for this one!