This Vicious Hunger is beautifully written, deeply atmospheric and utter gothic fantasy - but unfortunately not a hit for me. Normally I devour books like this in a day or two, but this one stretched over ten days, I found myself struggling to stay engaged.
The opening is strong, offering a vivid glimpse into Thora's upbringing and setting the stage for a "yes, go get that academic life you dream of!" redemption - but fell flat, losing almost all focus and direction. The dark academia vibes fell off pretty quickly. The romance didn't romance. There are moments of intrigue, some twists and revelations that kept me hopeful, but unfortunately they weren't enough to offset the repetitive conversations and languid pacing.

If you're drawn to poetic, moody prose and atmosphere-heavy stories, then it's worth checking out. But if you're looking for likeable characters, sharp pacing and a sense of closure, this one will leave you hungry for more.

Thank you to Orbit Books and NetGalley for this ARC read.

Thankyou NetGalley for this arc copy, unfuthia book didn’t hit the mark for me. At first I was excited and gripped with the pretence of this book. Unfortunately as it progressed it didn’t grip me the way I wanted it to and it felt quite repetitive.

This was a DNF for me at 33% because it just wasn’t my type of book, The writing is so beautiful, descriptive and atmospheric but it is too slow paced for my liking and a lot of other reviews state the ending is confusing which I also don’t like. I loved the sapphic elements and the dark academia vibes and would definitely consider reading more of the authors work if it is more fast paced!

⭐️ 2.5 stars, rounded up

thank you to Little, Brown Book Group UK, Orbit, and NetGalley for the ARC!

this vicious hunger is a sapphic, gothic fantasy following thora, a student of botany who becomes quickly enraptured with the mysterious girl who tends to the gardens below her room by nightfall. it’s a story of science, obsession, and desire that, although sounding like something i’d thoroughly enjoy, ended up falling completely flat for me.

though May’s prose is absolutely gorgeous, the world building felt limited and the story dull. the characters were unlikeable, thora especially so, and it left you simply not caring what happened to them next. the second half of the story was a rapid fire of twists and turns that, after a slow and languid first half, felt somehow both overwhelming and underwhelming. it was an interesting premise executed weakly, and, although the ending heavily alluded to a future sequel, it’s unfortunately not something i’ll be anticipating anytime soon.

This book had so many twists and turns that I did not expect to come and I just hope this gets another book

Botany, dark academia and some serious gothic vibes. This sounded right up my street, but unfortunately, it was a DNF at 46%. I was so bored. Not even the poisonous plants and the love interest could keep me interested.

A poisonous, sapphic gothic horror.

Thank you to NetGalley and Redhook Publishing for this advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

After the death of her husband, Thora gains a botany scholarship working for the renowned but mysterious professor. But one day she notices a woman in a walled garden gardening by moonlight. Thora becomes transfixed with the woman and as she spends more and more time with her she becomes obsessed with Olea and her poison garden.

The premise of This Vicious Hunger was everything I love in sapphic horror. I adore botanical horror and the potential it has to provide that eerie gothic feeling. There were moments where I felt this eerie-ness and I felt as obsessed with the story like Thora is to the garden. However, the intrigue felt choppy and the pacing was very strange. The "big" moments of the book were written with less detail and no build up whilst the more everyday moments - such as dinner scenes or Thora just in her bedroom - were too detailed, to the extent where I got bored. Hopefully, this pacing was fixed in the final editing stage.

I would recommend this book to anyone who loved "Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil" by V.E. Schwab or "Bloom" by Delilah S. Dawson as they both have similar sapphic obsession and longing and hints of the botanical gothic. Overall, with some pacing tweaks this book had the potential to be a compulsive read.

Lush, gothic, and totally intoxicating. Thora’s descent into obsession and Olea’s eerie garden had me hooked from page one. It’s queer, botanical, and brimming with dark academia vibes.

A beautifully written book that is sadly let down by a story that can't hold the weight.

I wanted to like this. No, I wanted to love this. On the surface it has all the things I adore about this sort of book, gothic vibes, supernatural undertones, forbidden romance, science twisted...

The love story isn't believable, it's more lust at first sight with Thora. Olea has met literally four people in her life before Thora and for her it comes across more as she would have fallen in love with anyone. Maybe her feelings are real, but we never really see inside her head to be sure. Thora is an unpredictable main character, her behaviour inconsistent and despite the whole book being told from her PoV, I never believed she truly loved Olea.

There is still a lot to like. The whole funeral rites, the Silence that this culture employs are fascinating, a wonderful twist and enough to make me hungry to learn what else there is. The writing is lyrical, gothic and wonderful, the description of places and plants just unsettling enough to make you uneasy.

A dramatic point happens at about 75% of the way through the book, a thing, that in theory is prime 'just one more chapter' to find out what happens next. I put the book down and went to bed. I just didn't connect to these characters, I didn't care what was happening and they just got stuck in a loop, over and over. Never progressing.

Then of course, there is the ending. Which is an ending only in that there are no more pages to read, not in any story sense of the word. Is there meant to be a second book? Is this a duology? Because so much is left unexplained, unexplored and unanswered that to think this is the end is a smack in the face. For the last half of the book the only reason I kept reading was for the hope that a certain character would get their dues. Instead the book just stops, as if the writer has given up.

A shame because this world, this garden is great. I would have loved more about the university too, the second library that is mentioned. There are so many little hints of the world, so much promised and if the author returns to this world I hope she spreads her wings further.

I'm such a sucker for a gothic novel and this book totally scratched that itch! We follow Thora Grieve who is given the sudden and unexpected chance to study botany after her husband dies. She meets Olea and from that point on the story takes on a really haunting, claustrophobic air.

One of my biggest compliments for May is she does write absolutely beautifully. There's something cinematic about her prose that is so easy to digest that I read about 300 pages in a single day of this book. Once we reach the university May really takes the reigns and especially the descriptions of botany and the religious setting she has going really, really shone here. What could easily have become bogged down and repetitive remained fresh [not a flower-based pun but you know what if it works it works]

This gained an extra star for me, because I spent the entire book going "May wont lean into it, she won't lean into it, she's not going to lean into it" and then she leant into it and you know what IT WAS SO MUCH FUN. It could have been so easy to go the slightly YA blackout route for the ending, but she really leaned into the madness and gore you'd expect from a story like this. and that alone made what was a quite slow book to get through, really, really enjoyable.

I loved Thora and Olea. They were just cute and I'm a massive sucker for cute. When May gives them the chance to really breathe, their relationship absolutely shines and when she lets herself stretch those quite, meaningful moments you can't help but fall in love with her characters. Which by itself is fortunate because though this book's cast is quite broad beyond the two love interests, there's no doubt to be had they are the core of this novel. I found the rest of the cast tended to be pawns rather than fully fleshed out characters. For the premise, however, I didn't find this detracted from my enjoyment of the book but I could see it might irk others.

However, their dialogue read as either incredibly authentic [if a little bit gen Z] or a bit edgy teenager wanting to impress a tumblr following. Some might leap for that, it made me cringe a little bit I'll be honest. But the broader moments of the relationship, especially toward the end as Thora is tending Olea, is really, really well done.

This had the airs of a slowburn and the timeline of a OMG JUST KISS ALREADY and the prose probably did little favours for it. Personally I'd have enjoyed this more if it had felt a bit less instant, or maybe we paced the relationship building better with Thora's time at university. We don't see as much of her time in class as I'd have expected from the premise and I think basing more of this novel there would have eeked out those pacing issues a bit more.

It’s sad but this was not it for me, ad after reading other reviews I am comforted that at least it was not only a me problem.
The second half of this book was even more boring that the first, and I did not even like the first part.
Thora is such a one dimensional character for me, and every time her personality was challenged it felt not real and a plot device.
I was there for the sapphic element and the academia element. The academia is ok but not actually the point, which is not the problem here (just don’t expect a dark Academia). The romance for me was meh at best.
The writing felt TOO MUCH. Too many words sometimes to describe things that needed fewer sentences. I don’t like when you tell me everything about a room, how does it smell and feel and even taste, because I can imagine it. sometimes it read like the author was describing it like we needed all that details. I don’t, it push me out of the story.
And god, if I read ever again the world terracotta I am going to cry.
Also a lot of italian names that felt out of place in the setting that has nothing of Italy - it’s also not plausible that every italian person goes there at univeristy. Just strange, as an italian girl it felt like it was more a device to convey a gothic atmosphere, not actually relevant for the characters.

The plants were interesting tho

Unfortunately this wasn’t for me, I just felt like something was missing. I also felt like it just ended, either way no conclusion.

However, I do feel like others will enjoy this.

Opinion aside, the writing is amazing just the story wasn’t for me.

Thank you for arc in exchange for a review

Thora was sheltered in a world where women were not given opportunity, but she loved to learn and read. Her father gives her more allowances than many would but on his deathbed insures she will marry a man of his choice who is far less permissive. She unexpectedly gets an opportunity to study botany, something she never dreamed she would be able to do, so she moves and excitedly starts the next stage in her life. She finds that her professor is a little strange and has some 'unusual' experiments, and discovers a mysterious garden with an unknown woman who she feels an instant connection to. Both of these things will change Thora's life irrevocably.

The inclusion of dangerous plants was really interesting, and taught me as I read, which i really like. At the start I felt a bit unsure if this book would be for me, but the more I read the more intriguing it became as we followed Thora down a rabbithole where she finds Petaccia and Olea who both fascinate Thora but in totally different ways.

The concept of being confined or kept prisoner, either mentally or physically, was a really interesting theme, as was the development of Thora from a meek wife to a strong and determined botany student. She refuses to accept the world which seeks to break her and instead makes her own path, which leads her to Olea. The longing was at time lovely to read and at others alarming, as you see the influence over Thora switch between the external longing and her own longing for Olea. It was a really lovely descriptive book, with some beautiful turns of phrase - an original and well written story.

For a female in the past, university may have been a dream, not often achieved. Thora Grueve’s dreams may be about to become a nightmare. I enjoyed this story which flowed from University want-to-be, through a poisoned fairy tale with romance and betrayal. I decided that I didn’t like any of main female characters. But that’s a part of the reason that the story works. They really aren’t nice. All have their secrets, all are extremely fickle and constantly change their minds. Ultimately, and most importantly they are extremely self-centred. So run, and don’t stop to pick flowers on your way! Thank you to Little, Brown Book Group UK and NetGalley for the ARC. The views expressed are all mine freely given.

This book is dark, violent, and dripping with gothic atmosphere — a botanical horror steeped in feminine rage, and I devoured every second of it.

At its heart, this is Thora’s story: a woman raised in a world where her worth was determined by the men around her, her father, her husband, society itself. Yet beneath all that restraint is a desperate hunger for knowledge, for freedom, for something more. That hunger pulls her into the halls of St. Elianto’s University after the death of her husband, into the realm of forbidden research, and into the orbit of two women who ignite something dangerous and uncontainable within her.

The writing is lush and unsettling, painting every poisonous bloom and toxic tree with almost decadent detail. The garden setting becomes both a sanctuary and a nightmare, dripping with beauty and venom in equal measure. What begins as academic pursuit quickly spirals into obsession, desire, and violence, a descent that feels inevitable and impossible to look away from.

Thora herself is a fascinating protagonist, fragile and furious, yearning and reckless. Watching her claim agency in a world that seeks to silence her is as exhilarating as it is terrifying, and the choices she makes leave scars that feel permanent.

This isn’t a gentle gothic tale; it’s thorny, furious, and unapologetically feminine. If you like your horror dripping in atmosphere, tangled with desire, and edged with tragedy, this book will sink its claws into you and not let go.

This is a beautifully told gothic fantasy horror with dark academia vibes & a sapphic love story.

When Thora’s husband dies, it is arranged for her to take up a place to study Botany at her father’s university under a famed professor. Whilst there, she encounters a ghost like woman living in an extraordinary garden full of poisonous plants & they instantly become intoxicated with each other. Mystery upon mystery unfolds as Thora and Olea become obsessed with each other. What is the mysterious professor really researching? Why can’t Olea leave the garden? Why are people disappearing near the garden?

Insatiable hunger is a real theme throughout the book and the author explores the sustainability of this well alongside the ethics of science and the freedoms of women. I really liked that the fantasy world was only just slightly different to ours & enjoyed the dark academia atmosphere. The prose was deliciously gothic and the tension was slow and creeping.

Really felt for both female characters who were trapped in different ways by their gender & circumstances.

Ended a little abruptly for me but can see why the author chose that.

Thanks to NetGalley & Little Brown book group for the ARC.

Time in This Vicious Hunger has no fixed direction—it drips like treacle, heavy and slow, spilling forward and backward all at once. The world-building feels the same: syrupy, one distilled drop at a time, always tantalising but never quite enough to quench your curiosity.

Thora Grieve finds herself destitute and an outcast after the sudden death of her husband, but a glimmer of hope arrives when a family friend offers her the chance to study botany under the tutelage of a famed professor. Once at the university, Thora becomes entranced by a mysterious young woman, Olea, who emerges each night to tend to the plants in the private garden below Thora's window.
Hungry for connection, Thora befriends Olea through the garden gate and their relationship quickly and intensely blossoms. Thora throws herself into finding a cure for the ailment confining Olea to the garden and sinks deeper into a world of beauty, poison, and obsession. Thora has finally found the freedom to pursue her darkest desires, but will it be worth the price?

Characters here are like nesting dolls: they peel away one set of shackles only to discover another beneath. Societal expectations, a lack of choices, or simply the suffocating intensity of their own passions keep them bound.

If you’re expecting an academic dark academia novel, this may not be the one—it flirts with academia but doesn’t linger there. Instead, May leans fully into the gothic: poisoned friendships, twisted love, and the terrifying ways people trample one another in their desperate climb to power.

For readers drawn to the murky depths of obsession, betrayal, and feminine rage, this novel is a feast of shadows.

3.5 rounded up. I love Francesca writing it’s so descriptive and beautiful, a vicious hunger is a complex story of sapphic awakening and gothic horror. The imagery really drew me into the world. I did find the pacing a little slow in the first half but after that it gained momentum and I found the plant horror side of the story fascinating whilst also disturbing at times.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC.

Francesca May knows how to write beautiful prose but I couldn’t for the life of me connect with the plot, the characters or the fantasy world the plot was set in. Thora’s internal monologues were just too boring and “cliched” for me.

I was excited for this; but we can’t always get what you want.