Jackie Kessler

This was a disappointing read. The characters were one-dimensional, so poorly fleshed out that it was impossible to relate to them or care about them. The main character, Lisa, had no personality outside of anorexia, and while I understand that eating disorders tend to take over the lives and identities of sufferers, there is still a person underneath the illness. And I think this is a point that all writers of eating disorder fiction and non-fiction need to drive home, so that people can see beyond the illness and reach the real human beings suffering from them. I did appreciate how the author tried to show the ugly side of eating disorders with the detailed descriptions of constipation, bowel movements, and vomiting, but because the characters were so flat, I can only read those scenes from a detached point of view and I feel like they would have been more powerful if I could better feel the characters' pain.

Because the book was so short, the plot moved fairly quickly from scene to scene that the story sometimes felt disjointed and many things were unexplained. The mythology of the four Horsemen was completely lacking. I would have like to know more about where they came from/how they do their jobs/how do they choose who to become a Horseman and why did they choose Lisa? The story was resolved too quickly and easily.

The writing was very uneven. I feel like there is way more telling than showing in the book. Kessler often tells us how a character feels, rather than showing us through the character's actions and behaviour. Occasionally though, Kessler shows that she has a knack for writing description. There are some really wonderful turns of phrase and beautifully-written paragraphs describing the famine-ravaged places that Lisabeth travels to, Lisa's kitchen and her mother. But then Kessler will randomly insert a joke or an awkward description ("..she'd just moved like some sort of ninja superhero. How freaking awesome was that?") which, for an overall very serious book, feels incredibly jarring and out-of-place in the narrative.

Overall I was rather bored with this book. I felt like I was reading a description of a story rather than an actual story. I felt no real emotion while reading this because none of the characters and their situations were really developed, and because of that, I couldn't enjoy it. It was an interesting concept but totally wasted, however I do think Kessler's writing has potential.… (more)

This is one of those books I wish had been longer; it had definite potential, but its small size made development rushed and stopped me from really caring about the main character.

It's a very interesting premise; a modernization of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse, with the person chosen for each Rider having intimate knowledge of the human folly they represent. Lisabeth Lewis is chosen as Famine, and that's because she's anorexic, thoroughly convinced she's fat and too scared to eat normally. But she's also horribly in denial of her disorder, and terrified of her new post.

During her travels as Famine, Lisa learns not only about the true Famine that plagues the world, but how her own problem is related to it, and maybe how she can do something to help both humanity and herself. She also meets the other Riders: gloomy Pestilence, vicious and cruel War, and the amusingly modern and droll Death, who enjoys the disguise of a dead rockstar and acts as Lisa's (sort-of) guide.

The author writes with good style sometimes, but it's a little spare in other parts. Lisa's disorder is represented truthfully because of the author's personal experience with anorexia and bulimia, but her character can be extremely whiny and annoying on occasion because of how insecure and in-denial she is. Like I said earlier, I think a longer book would have made her character quite likeable eventually, but she's just starting to change by the novel's end.

Parts I really enjoyed were the concept, which I already said was great and original, the fact that Famine's horse (to which Lisa gives the irritatingly unoriginal name 'Midnight') had a personality and even a few paragraphs of POV, and Death the Pale Rider, who was yet another utterly unique imagining of the enigmatic and interesting "character" and easily my favorite person in the book. It's so very easy to like a scruffy Death who dresses in a baggy sweater and jeans, sings Nirvana while waiting for Lisabeth to return from riding the world, and switches between gloomy old English and old school slang in the same sentence. "Thou art Famine, yo," indeed.

Despite a couple shortcomings, I am still interested to see how a different Horseman is handled in the sequel, and if the concept is expanded at all.… (more)