I’m so disappointed

So I just finished Tender is the Flesh. I’m just disappointed. I wanted to talk about it because I feel like a lot of people loved it and I was so excited to read it.

The main character has the depth of a kiddy pool

At first I thought the book was supposed to read as sterile and disconnected. It made sense because of how disconnected and desensitized you’d have to be to live in a society like this. Now I feel like it’s just a lack of depth. She author goes on and on about the process of slaughtering people but can’t be bothered to write out dialogue? Idk maybe I missed the point there.

The incredibly short dialogue unless he’s listening to someone else became so boring. The relationships seemed so shallow. He has a complicated relationship with his sister and reminisces about his memories with his dad and of his childhood. Cool. Also, I forget her name now, where did that one lady that was a butcher go? I feel like her role was literally to have sex with him twice and then she was gone. What was that.

I also hear people say how it was such a shock at the end. I guess but the character seems to hardly hold any beliefs so nothing shocked me cuz there was nothing to expect. Yeah he’s a hypocrite but that didn’t surprise me. I know he can’t be completely open about his beliefs but it just didn’t surprise me he was going to kill her.

I feel like it lacks actual story

I think this idea has great potential but just not enough time. Only 200 pages and 150 of them are nothing but world building. Even then, I feel like a lot of the world building wasn’t totally fleshed out. Like “being able to see one another” when talking on the phone. I’m assuming it was the phone surveying them but idk. Or like the government conspiracy theory? That could have been such a good aspect to the plot but it was mentioned seriously like once? I feel like there’s a lot of hinting to things but it’s never strong enough to actually communicate anything concrete so I just kind of shrug my shoulders as the reader.

Especially because it seemed like the government was trying to push people to eat human meat and spreading dietary lies. Why not expand on that? Is there any other crisis/positives related to eating people??

Another example is the scavengers. They’re seemingly more violent than the rest of the population because they eat human meat but the others aren’t as violent? Is it cuz they’re poor so they’re more violent?

Like I said too, hardly any relationship with other characters and you never get to know the main character very well. It makes it feel like I’m just watching a documentary or something.

It’s just not realistic

I understand not everything in fiction is the most realistic but you’re telling me there’s not a single other animal that can be consumed? Really? It affects every animal except humans? Maybe I’m just being critical but it just seemed so silly.

I also hated how that was never confirmed nor denied. The author gave me just enough information for me to kinda shrug and not know where to go when it seemed like such a simple answer to conclude.

It also seemed that the characters had no depth unless they were a “bad guy”. But still then they didn’t. There too many things that were predictable to me. Like ofc Jasmine was only 20, ofc the guy they hunted was getting out within hours, ofc they took Jasmines son, ofc his sister ends up hiring a domestic female. It’s just all bad all the time without any sort of reasonable standard.

I just felt like the hunting grounds seemed a bit ridiculous and underdone too. Ofc we can’t just slaughter them, we have to hunt them for sport and make a big deal about it too. I feel like that was never fully developed either. It was only the gruesome detail that was explained.

Anyway, thanks for listening to my rant. I don’t hate it, it just got boring.