I only finished this book as a courtesy to NetGalley and the publishers who offered this ARC. All I can say is there are so many good and even not so good books out there, don’t waste your time with this one,
I found it badly written, often confusing. In fact it occurred to me more than once that I might have been missing pages it jumped so much. Poorly researched, human beings cannot donate 500mls of blood a day, and downright revolting at times.
A great big no from me.

A dark, unflinching spin on kindergarten drama.

Thanks NetGalley & Random House UK, Vintage for the ARC!

Synopsis -

4 year old kids of Little Academy have a unique demand – blood. When this strange epidemic like medical condition begins to go around at school, another disaster awaits – the young class teacher is found dead, with the only witnesses being these 4 year olds. What are these little kids capable of? Are they kids really or monsters?

Review -

Cutting Teeth can be thought of as a thriller with a real ‘bite’. Baker has come up with a distinctive plot involving a certain ‘syndrome’ that seems to have been caught by the children. This is not just any another novel/thriller about motherhood and child rearing. At its core, it is so much more.

The POVs alternate between the mothers - Darby, Rhea and Mary Beth – exploring their deepest, darkest thoughts, friendships, loyalties, struggles to adhere to societal motherly expectations, frustrations, spousal dynamics, the bonding they share with their kids and most importantly their secrets and insecurities.

Baker attempts to weigh the benign and malign attributes of motherhood with a hint of satire and cynicism. She showcases the mental and physical toll it takes, the unimaginable pressure it exerts and the universal truth of what it takes to be a parent - feeling love, joy and fulfilment at one moment and anger, guilt, agony and annoyance at the very next.

Following the teacher’s death, the momentum picks and the blame game commences, arousing suspicion and curiosity. Nobody is trustworthy. The children’s innocence also seems questionable, what with their ‘blood sucking’ tendencies, tantrums and bizarre behaviors.

The ending literally feels like razor sharp teeth tearing away from all sides – with hidden agendas and ugly dark secrets coming to light.

With vampiric children and imperfect, flawed mothers, Cutting Teeth will surely leave you with a rictus grin and wicked satisfaction.

Really clever! I enjoyed this portrayal of motherhood, the sacrifices, debates had and the fact that young children do often feel that they are sucking the life out of you - in this book literally! A satirical take on an age old issue that is worth reading by parents everywhere.

Cutting Teeth, Chandler Baker

Mary Beth, Rhea and Darby feel adrift as mothers. Who are they outside of their children? Before they can answer a dark phenomenon sweeps the class, the children start biting and worse, drinking the blood from the wounds they inflict. When their teacher is found dead the mothers start to question how far the bloodlust has gone.

This is a book of two halves. A dark murder mystery with all the twists and turns you’d expect AND a statement of motherhood, you give them all but essentially they’ll crave more.

I LOVED The Whisper Network and enjoyed The Husbands. Baker has a knack of subverting the expectations and slapping you in the face with her honest and fair points. You can’t miss the subtext in any of her work, this is no exception. It would make a fascinating adaption.

Short and sweet from me today! Thank you Netgalley and Random House UK, Vintage for an advanced copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

The book is essentially a who-dunnit along side a story about motherhood and their children biting people!

I know my description doesn’t sound appealing at all but I promise you, it is a good book! Disgusting, but good 😂 And hey, that is what myself and fellow crime lovers tend to look for in a story. It has a twisty plot and it’s safe to say I’ve read nothing like it!

Vampires are born, not made; Murderers are made, not born. Four-year-old children can be in the first group but can they also be in the second? At The Little Academy for preschool children some of the children are developing a habit of biting their mothers, evolving rapidly into lapping up the blood they draw. This is diagnosed as pediatric (the events happen in the USA, where else?) Renfield Syndrome. To minimise the pain, mothers of affected children start to supply it as a ‘snack’ in the lunch boxes. The class teacher is the vastly over qualified Erin Ollie, but that isn’t her real name. Rhea, one of the mothers, is investigating this. Mary Beth, another mother, is becoming infatuated with Pastor Ben, the new, hot, cleric at the linked church. Darby, the third main character mother, is worried that her intellect and fitness is being eroded by the leaching effect of motherhood. Then Erin is found murdered at a time when she was scheduled to meet with the trio. However, the meeting didn’t take place because all three, for apparently sensible, but separate, reasons didn’t attend. When the police arrive the main clue that they find is bloody footprints, the size of a typical four-year-old child’s! Have the vampire children gone too far?
This is mainly a domestic drama, because it mainly consists of observations on motherhood and the relationships, family and social, of the mothers (fathers are peripheral). In that context the story is a satire, the bloodthirsty children a metaphor for the draining effect of young children, the murder incidental except that it highlights some aspects of the other characters behaviours. This is quite an amusing book, with a novel sort of idiom. It is a bit slow in places although it does ramp up a bit towards the end. However, it isn’t really a murder mystery, and the solution to the investigation is not surprising. Incidentally, Renfield’s Syndrome is not a real illness (i.e. it is not an accepted diagnosis according to the medical profession) but there are a few cases where consuming blood is a feature of a broader psychosis. For novelty value it reaches towards a 4, as a crime story it’s a 2.
I would like to thank NetGalley, the publishers and the author for providing me with a draft proof copy for the purpose of this review.

That was different! It’s such a compelling story that will keep you awake until you finish it! There’s plenty of emotion, lots of pace and great characters!

This was a wild read. I knew what I was getting into from the synopsis but this was more bizarre than I anticipated but I went with and this was a sharp and entertaining read if a little uneven in parts. I did find my attention drifting at parts but glad I continued with this one. Original, weird but in the main, entertaining. I am not sure if I would recommend only to certain people, perhaps. I know some will love this and some will not, Im on the fence and in the middle.

3 stars.

Cutting Teeth

Something’s happening at Little Academy. Its happy little band of pre schoolers have acquired a new extra curricular amusement as single mom Rhea discovers.
She has been summoned there by Miss Ollie, a new teacher, to discuss Rhea’s 4 year old son Bodhi and Rhea’s unconventional vegetarian choices for his lunchbox. While she is unwillingly there, Rhea witnesses the children biting each other including Bodhi. And he says that its’s not the first time. Soon the children begin biting their parents after one actually says to her mom, ‘I wish I could bite you.’ It’s a prelude to her actually doing it.
The moms begin to be caught up in it and start sending their children to Little Academy with a cup of Mommy’s blood for them to drink as needed. Mary Beth and Darby are full of pride about how much of themselves they are giving their child. However Rhea declines. She has a blossoming mall order business and is avidly watching a motivational speaker’s audio book called ‘Bitch, please.’ She doesn’t have time to be cutting herself to draw enough blood for Bodhi’s break time snack and he is the only one who doesn’t want to bite. According to Miss Ollie, it’s a case of Renfield’s syndrome and there are several historical cases. Rhea comes across an abandoned Reddit thread on which the final disturbing entry says ‘They will get blood, one way or another. Let this be a warning.’
Then Miss Ollie is found murdered in one of the classrooms and small footprints are found at the scene. Did some little person want more than their fair share of Miss Ollie (there was a lot of blood at the scene). Now the police are investigating and everyone is under suspicion even the children.
I was intrigued by the book’s premise. Vampiric children! And there were several sly references in the book to vampires. For example, Miss Ollie’s red eyes in the photo at her funeral, the name of the syndrome and I began to see Miss Ollie as the villain.
However the book then became a very dark satire on motherhood and how society sees mothers as sacrificing themselves for the good of their children. Hence the willingness to donate their own blood. Mary Beth would do anything for her children whereas Darby is more detached. The children are literally consuming their mothers. Rhea is the outsider of the group and feels that it’s because she is a single mom.
There several chapters devoted to Darby and Mary Beth ruminating on their lives pre and post children. Even Rhea misses being able to shout out ‘the politically incorrect words to rap songs’ with Bohi in the car. There is one very telling paragraph in which ‘Griff and Darby hear their house alarm and when they awoke they both sat in bed for about 30 seconds, waiting for their own respective parents to swoop in and take care of the problem. What a rude awakening it was to discover it was to discover that the parents were them.’ The phones stuffed with photos of the children for grandparents and friends and Pastor Ben encouraging married couples to have sex. And also The Bowel Movement Bandit.
The plotline with Miss Ollie took a more conventional twist and the book became more of a murder mystery but with a very disturbing twist at the end. I would have liked Miss Ollie to be the villain as the narrative seemed to be going in that direction until it changed.
A sharp dark satire about motherhood and child rearing which I really enjoyed. Although I did wonder what might happen to the biting children in later life….
My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for an ARC.

Little Academy preschool sounds idyllic and if you're one of the mothers in this novel, it is. Until 10 four-year-olds are the only witnesses to a cruel murder. The children, however, swiftly move from witnesses to suspects, as are their mums. It's a clever, clever read but one that will have the hairs on your arm stand up.

A really bizarre story leaving so many questions from it.

It was weird enough that you could imagine some of it being a thing however still very enjoyable to read

★★★★☆

It turns out that children drinking blood is a very quick way to get me to pay attention.

This was a really fun take on the difficulties and issues of motherhood - told through the switching perspectives of Rhea, Mary Beth and Darby, all mothers to adorable little 4 year olds in an expensive private school, they struggle with romantic issues, trying to find time for themselves, and what to do when their kid starts biting them in order to drink their blood. Especially when someone turns up dead.

I think the first 50% of this book was really strong - it was quick-witted, weird and full of mystery. As it went on, things started getting a little loose in terms of pace and plot for me. It also says "ass" more times than 50 shades. Now I've said it you can't not see it.

BUT I had NO idea where the plot was going, which for me is really fun. Eventually it became a bit predictable, with some twists that were shocking in the moment (but then the more I thought about it the more I was a bit like oh.) But still - I wasn't anticipating a lot of them, so they were nice surprises. It also lets you figure things out for yourself first which is great, rather than being incredibly obvious about things.

Ultimately, this is a true tale in how far mothers will go for their kids, and I think it's a really interesting take on something that's been written about forever. But definitely not one for the squeamish kind.

Cutting Teeth is a strange tale of pre school children buying and the murder of their teacher. I found it a difficult read as I had enjoyed the authors previous novels and I struggled with the narrative.

I am not sure really what I feel about this book and whether I really enjoyed it or not. A very unexpected storyline which I struggled with until the last section, which brought the story together.

The story of some young kindergarten children who start to crave human blood. The unexpected death of their teacher and the parent and sibling rivalry that brings it all to a melting point.

Thanks to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

This is an original story and although a bit weird it shows some good detailed observation by the author. Loved the classroom descriptions and the parents interactions but it wasn't what I was expecting and so I found it difficult to get into, maybe if I had been better prepared ?.
I'm sure others will enjoy it as it has many good elements.

Well this is certainly different from books I’ve read before but having said that I did find it intriguing. The premise of children being the murderer was very different but the storyline kept me turning the pages.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in return for an honest review.

This is the first book I had read by Chandler and I liked the premise of the book. We being by meeting the children and parents of Little Academy an American pre school where there is a new issue of children biting in the class. When there is a body found in the school of a teacher we being to find out who may have had it in for Miss Erin. The book covers topics such as parenting and how far you would go to protect your child. The chapters flick between characters of the moms Darcy, Mary Beth and Rhea. This book had a very different and interesting plot and kept me turning the pages. 3.5 rounded up to 4

A very clever take on parenthood (mostly mothers but the dads get a look in too) where the blood lust could just as easily be any of a myriad of other parenting concerns from vaccination status to nits- where there will always be one mother who hides it, one who styles it out loud and proud and everyone else trying to decide whether to follow one of them or do what their common sense dictates!

The characters are all excellent and hugely relatable- from the very differing teaching staff to the creepy pastor and the full school-gate-range of mums with their many, many neuroses!

The mystery of whodunnit is well contained to the reveal with hints dropped and evidence revealed but confirmation of suspicions kept to the end.

I really enjoyed this book. It was weird but like nothing I have ever read before. I definitely felt like the parents were realistically represented!

The rate at which I devoured (pun intended) this book is scary!

I LOVE a book that touches on the real side of motherhood. The loneliness, the constant pressures, the sense of competition with every other mum and even yourself, the having to cope with your new baby, new body and new way of thinking. Having a child rewrites your brain chemistry and as a parent we’re expected to just bounce back to what we were before. Cutting Teeth isn’t afraid to have these topics at the front and centre of its story. A lot of people may find it too full of allegories of the woman’s workload but honestly I don’t think this can ever be spoken about enough!

The story revolves around a preschool group, the teacher and the parents. From the start you can feel the tension, not from the morbid mystery that is soon to follow but from the high strung stress of parenthood when you put too much pressure on yourself and your child. We’re introduced to Rhea, Darby and Mary Beth, three mums that would do anything for their little angels.

The kids develop this need to bite and draw blood, the mums try to find a reason for this new behaviour that doesn’t feed off of the mum guilt ingrained in them. They’re met with gaslighting by their husbands, their doctors and even themselves. The biting soon turns into more than just that when the mums notice the way their kids are drinking the blood when they bite.

The story soon turns into a murder mystery with a horror twist when the teacher ends up dead in a huge puddle of blood whilst the kids are in the next room and a toddler sided footprint is found next to her. Was it one of the children whose parents believe are innocent little things who would never hurt a fly or did someone else enter the classroom that day?

The multiple omniscient pov worked so well to put us in the heads of all three mums, we can see their distinct personalities and the way this influences their parenting dynamic and home lives. It also keeps the story being fast paced as plenty of chapters end with cliff hangers that make you keep reading because you just have to know what happens next. You’ll be saying just one more chapter until you realise you’ve been reading into the early hours of the morning.

The twists just keep coming and the reveal of the who-done-it is written expertly. I was pleasantly surprised to find all of my questions answered by the end which is usually hard to find in a murder mystery where there’s usually a plot hole or two left unfilled. This is my first book by this author and I’m definitely going to be reading more!