Synopses & Reviews
For fans of Sally Rooney's Normal People: A sharply intelligent and intimate debut novel about a secret society of hungry young women who meet after dark and feast to reclaim their appetites — and their physical spaces — that posits the question: If you feed a starving woman, what will she grow into?
Roberta spends her life trying not to take up space. At almost thirty, she is adrift and alienated from life. Stuck in a mindless job and reluctant to pursue her passion for food, she suppresses her appetite and recedes to the corners of rooms. But when she meets Stevie, a spirited and effervescent artist, their intense friendship sparks a change in Roberta, a shift in her desire for more. Together, they invent the Supper Club, a transgressive and joyous collective of women who gather to celebrate, rather than admonish, their hungers. They gather after dark and feast until they are sick; they break into private buildings and leave carnage in their wake; they embrace their changing bodies; they stop apologizing. For these women, each extraordinary yet unfulfilled, the club is a way to explore, discover, and push the boundaries of the space they take up in the world. Yet as the club expands, growing in both size and rebellion, Roberta is forced to reconcile herself to the desire and vulnerabilities of the body — and the past she has worked so hard to repress. Devastatingly perceptive and savagely funny, Supper Club is an essential coming-of-age story for our times.
Review
"[A] delicious first novel...Mixing together insights about food and friendship, hunger and happiness, and the space women allot themselves in the world today, Williams writes with warmth, wit, and wisdom, serving up distinctive characters and a delectably unusual story. [Supper Club] will satisfy your craving for terrific writing and leave you hungry for more from this talented writer." Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)
Review
"[Williams is] a keen chronicler of contemporary women's lives; her sly, perceptive first novel...offers food for thought on the sorts of love (and sorts of women) that society doesn't accommodate....Dive right into the soothing-cooking-show-meets- Fight-Club-concept." Booklist
Review
"Lara Williams's debut...will leave you panting and ravenous....In its unselfconscious splendor, [Supper Club] tackles age-old questions about the female form with a delightfully 21st-century voice." Vulture
Review
"Dissatisfied women reclaim their bodies in an unlikely club that celebrates desire and rebellion." TIME
About the Author
Lara Williams is the author of the short story collection A Selfie as Big as the Ritz, and her writing has been featured in The Guardian, The Independent, Vice, the Times Literary Supplement, McSweeney's, and elsewhere. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and is featured in Best British Short Stories 2017. She writes and teaches creative writing at Manchester Metropolitan University. She lives in Manchester, England.
Lara Williams on PowellsBooks.Blog
Since I have started answering interview questions about my novel
Supper Club, I have been asked the question a few times: “Why did you decide to include recipes in the novel, and what do they represent?” And while I do have a number of sections dedicated to the methodical process of cooking or baking a particular food...
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