The Art of Fulfilling Insatiable Appetites: Lucy Rose’s “The Lamb” https://ift.tt/6huWlsE
One unassuming winter night in 2023, I found myself doomscrolling on Twitter. The blur of posts moved at a speed no human eye can register, almost putting me to sleep. But one tweet kicked me awake. A logline for a novel: cannibal mother-daughter duo living in a tiny cabin in the forest, waiting for strangers to knock on their door. Disappointed it wasn’t published yet, I commented: “This is my most anticipated novel ever!” Lucy Rose, author of the post, wrote back, and we ended up messaging each other briefly. Jump ahead to a little over a year, and The Lamb is one of the most critically and commercially acclaimed novels of the year, an instant #2 Sunday Times Bestseller and a Dakota Johnson Teatime Book Club Pick.
Originally written as a series of interconnected flash fiction pieces, The Lamb is a folk horror novel at its sinister heart, much of it taking place in a small, dingy, grimy cottage in a forest in Cumbria, England. For all the darkness oozing from the pages, the prose glistens gloriously — “When the sun hit the pool and the trees sprinkled new leaves onto its surface, the water looked like copper.” In doing so, the novel establishes a duality between horror and beauty that flows through every crevice and crack of the narrative, leaving the reader repulsed and raptured in equal measure.
Underneath the blood and human feasting that floods the surface, The Lamb is many things — a cultural commentary on motherhood and womanhood, a twisted queer love triangle, a coming-of-age story that rots and blossoms. The story is told from the perspective of Margot, an otherwise normal tween growing into a teenager, if not for her mother Ruth (mostly referred to as Mama), who has created a strange life for Margot, tied singularly to her and far removed from everyone else. No friends, no family, no doctors when you fall sick. The world outside is inhumane and barbarous, there is no one you can trust, and you don’t bring attention to yourself — this is what Margot has known her entire life. Until the enchanting Eden shows up at the door. Initially considered a ‘stray,’ the word Mama uses for lost strangers that enter their house and soon, their bellies, Eden slowly disrupts the tight-knit mother-daughter relationship, making Mama fall in love and Margot in awe.
Food and consumption are the binders of the story. The novel is bursting with lip-smacking preparations: buttery pastry baked into a pie, breadcrumbed fried fingers basted with rosemary, roasted potatoes and carrots. When asked about the book’s origins in an interview with Forbidden Planet TV, Lucy Rose calls herself a foodie, adding that food “unlocks something primal in us,” and this very primal need drives The Lamb. Rose forces readers to reckon with complex questions as she draws on primality that is usually locked up. What is right and wrong when it comes to satiating your appetite? How far do you go to feed your family? How far until temptation drives you to your grave? How long do you suppress deep-seated desires? Until they eat you alive?
As Mama and Eden’s fiery and frenzied romance takes over, Margot’s coming-of-age story weaves into the narrative. When she lures her “first real stray” to the cottage, it’s a true rite of passage. “There was a person here, but all I saw was meat,” Margot muses, and with Mama and Eden dizzy in delight, their little family seems complete, locked in perfect harmony. But as the two lovers spend their days glued together and Margot slowly fades to the background, she finds herself questioning the nature of their appetites for the first time.
The Lamb flips the gender switch — women are in control, and men exist solely to fulfil the needs of women. Be it the gamekeeper’s illicit affair with Mama or the mysterious disappearance of Margot’s father, their brief presence and overwhelming absence create space for poignant commentaries on toxic masculinity and domestic abuse without ever being preachy. Mama married young, and although she loved Margot’s father, she was reduced to a powerless wife and, with Margot’s birth, a mother with dying dreams. Now, she’s reclaiming herself, and in the process, much more. When the gamekeeper meets his unavoidable, violent end and the family of three feast on him for days, little does Margot know that it’s going to change her life forever.
For the first time, Margot looks for solace in the outside world. She finds tenderness in Abbie, the gamekeeper’s daughter, spending most of her schooltime fawning over Abbie, watching her mourn the man that disappeared inside her in bite-sized pieces. As she learns that Mama’s first victim was Margot’s Papa, and she strikes up a friendship with the school bus driver, new emotions take hold — guilt and shame and love. Margot finds herself questioning morality and immorality, desire and temptation, yearning and madness — and where the line between them exists.
Mama’s appetite increases recklessly throughout the 300-odd pages, until strangers no longer suffice. So, she turns to the only person who can fulfil her insatiable hunger — her daughter. Margot finds herself locking eyes with the very person who brought her into this world, the person who wants to take her away from it now. Will she run? Will she escape? Will she fight back? Or will she sacrifice herself to the woman, despite everything, she loves the most in the world?
Cannibal-horror as a trope has gained significant momentum in contemporary fiction over the last few years, spearheaded by uncompromising and audacious female voices. Chelsea G. Summers’ A Certain Hunger, Agustina Bazterrica’s Tender is the Flesh, Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch, and Otessa Moshfegh’s Lapvona are at the forefront of this movement, some of them even drawing parallels between cannibalism and motherhood. The Lamb stands proudly amongst them and holds its own, although it chooses formula over reinvention and metaphors over movement. But maybe that’s enough for a debut novel and the birth of a fearless new voice in horror.
FICTION The Lamb
By Lucy Rose
Harper
Published February 4, 2025
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