The Starving Saints

by Caitlin Starling

From the nationally bestselling author of The Luminous Dead and The Death of Jane Lawrence, a transfixing fever dream of medieval horror following three women in a besieged castle that descends ravenously into madness under the spell of mysterious, godlike visitors.

Aymar Castle has been under siege for six months. Food is running low and there has been no sign of rescue. But just as the survivors consider deliberately thinning their number, the castle stores are replenished. The sick are healed. And the divine figures of the Constant Lady and her Saints have arrived, despite the barricaded gates, offering succor in return for adoration.

Soon, the entire castle is under the sway of their saviors, partaking in intoxicating feasts of terrible origin. The war hero Ser Voyne gives her allegiance to the Constant Lady. Phosyne, a disorganized, paranoid nun-turned-sorceress, races to unravel the mystery of these new visitors and exonerate her experiments as their source. And in the bowels of the castle, a serving girl, Treila, is torn between her thirst for a secret vengeance against Voyne and the desperate need to escape from the horrors that are unfolding within Aymar's walls.

As the castle descends into bacchanalian madness—forgetting the massed army beyond its walls in favor of hedonistic ecstasy—these three women are the only ones to still see their situation for what it is. But they are not immune from the temptations of the castle's new masters… or each other; and their shifting alliances and entangled pasts bring violence to the surface. To save the castle, and themselves, will take a reimagining of who they are, and a reorganization of the very world itself.

Genres: Horror, Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Historical

352 pages, Hardcover

First published May 20, 2025

About the author

Caitlin Starling is the nationally bestselling author of The Death of Jane Lawrence, the Bram Stoker-nominated The Luminous Dead, and Last To Leave The Room. Her upcoming novels The Starving Saints and The Graceview Patient epitomize her love of genre-hopping horror; her bibliography spans besieged castles, alien caves, and haunted hospitals. Her short fiction has been published by GrimDark Magazine and Neon Hemlock, and her nonfiction has appeared in Nightmare, Uncanny, and Nightfire. Caitlin also works in narrative design, and has been paid to invent body parts. She’s always on the lookout for new ways to inflict insomnia.

Reviews

[ellen · Rating 2 out of 5]

not gory enough and not gay enough

[bri]

Give me medieval queer cannibalistic fever dreams forever. Caitlin Starling truly understands the power of slow, eerie, mindfuckery as a horror genre, and though it may not be for everyone, her approach is definitely for me.

All types of horror have their value, but the thing I love about Starling’s books is that they function in individual and particular narrative pockets. Though there is plenty of moral discussion to be had about meaning or metaphor, they’re almost less profound and reflective and more somewhat escapist in their contained scope and vibe. They feel truly like dreams, not only in their confused what-the-fuck logic but in the way they feel like leaving the world behind to go exist in some super specific crafted reality. They aren’t neat or tidy and they aren’t especially linear or purposeful in terms of impact. But they are an absolute weird ass vibe and I love them for it.

And I loved getting to dream away the time in this world of bacchanalian madness in a claustrophobic castle with bees, trickster beings, nuns, cannibalism, and fucked up complicated lesbian yearning. I had been craving this exact concoction of honey and wine and blood.

Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

CW: cannibalism, blood & gore, violence, dismemberment, mutilation, dead bodies, murder, death, character death, claustrophobia, alcohol, death of father (past), grief, drowning, emesis

[Brandon Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why is this kinda like a medieval Gideon The Ninth?? It’s not but like also it kinda is??

SO GOOD!!! I loved the medieval setting, the cosmic vibes, the overall feeling of not knowing what’s happening and who to trust and all 3 of the MC’s Povs- this was crazy. I’ve seen other reviews say it’s slow and idk if I agree bc I was hooked- PHENOMENAL

[Siavahda · Rating 2 out of 5]

*I received this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.*

Highlights
~bees > holy communion
~fealty
~a failed Lionheart
~a voice (and mouth) in the dark
~is it cannibalism if it started as a fingernail

This sounded like everything my weird little heart could desire, but unfortunately it ended up pretty underwhelming.

The first third or so is great: Starling leans into Medieval Weird, replacing the Catholic church with a Lady and bees, and each of our three protagonists – Phosyne, Ser Voyne, and Treila – are deeply imperfect, all sharp, broken edges and contrasting flavours of unlikeable. Tensions are high, no one in charge really ought to be, and the situation is desperate. All of this came through to me beautifully.

Then the supernatural arrives.

Horror, I think, must be one of the hardest genres to write, and I suspect supernatural horror is even more difficult than other kinds. On the one hand, keeping the reader ignorant of what your monster/magic can do can up the fear factor – but if you don’t convince your reader that you know what it can do, the fear factor dissolves completely. You can’t dread something when you don’t know what to fear, and it’s easy for abrupt reveals to come across as random and disjointed rather than shocking.

Which is basically what happened with Saints. Starling makes up her own kind of demony creatures, and because I never knew what they were or what they could do, I stopped being scared of them pretty quickly, and was just left confused instead. I didn’t know what to dread, and I guess in theory that could have turned into dread that they might do anything at all…but it didn’t. Every new reveal of their capabilities just struck me as freaking random, irritatingly so, because none of their powers or goals seemed to fit together, none of the rules that bound them could be inferred from previous ones. It made for a lot of telling-not-showing as the characters ‘deduced’ each new thing and informed the reader of it. Borderline info-dumpy, at times.

The longer the story went on, the more annoying this got, the less impactful each subsequent reveal was – not just about the not-demons but also about the characters and their capabilities. Phosyne in particular becomes a kind of rival to the Lady, and I never understood how that was happening. The alchemy/magic Phosyne has been experimenting with at the beginning of the book, and which she grows more proficient in as we go along…it’s maddeningly vague, and seems to be, and be capable of, whatever the plot requires in the moment. The vagueness would be less maddening if Phosyne’s main arc wasn’t studying the magic, trying to make it make sense. Hand-waving it as ‘not human logic’ isn’t bloody good enough; I was never convinced that Starling knew how it worked or what-all it could do, and the magic ended up playing deus ex machina far too often.

(I had the vague impression Phosyne was meant to be neurodiverse, and that might be why she can grasp the magic at all, but that wasn’t very clear to me so don’t quote me on it.)

The pattern of abrupt reveals ruined pretty much every aspect of the book. Treila especially does a couple of 180s that weren’t the slightest bit convincing, and the magical reveal about her in the final showdown made no sense; I wanted to throw the book across the room and SHRIEK. At another point, a character is brought back from the dead WITH NO EXPLANATION WHATSOEVER; no one even expresses confusion about it! By the time bits of reality were dissolving up into the sky I had long since stopped caring.

All our protagonists were set up to be extremely interesting, but in the end they were each defined by just one or two traits that never deepened or developped – just flip-flopped like a dying fish. Phosyne went from feral mess to queenly with no transition. Treila discarded everything that made her great (vicious, out for herself, a survivor) for no apparent reason. Voyne…I don’t even know.

The cannibalism, especially the hypnotic feast sequences, was amazing: horrifying on every level, full marks, excuse me while I go throw up. The feverish quality to many scenes: superb. But the moment the book stepped away from that – in its attempt to paint some kind of Big Picture horror – it all fell apart, and kept falling.

(For all that this was trying very hard to be a queer book, none of the queer configurations had any real chemisty, by the way (even if Ser Voyne’s need to serve was delicious) and I remain very confused by a) the Relationship Status of the ending and b) how the m/f dynamic was so much sexier and more interesting than any other set-up. Seriously, what was going on here?)

This is the first Starling book that hasn’t worked for me. I’m disappointed, but it won’t be the last book of hers I try. I’ll cross my fingers for better luck next time – but I really can’t recommend Starving Saints at all.

[megs_bookrack · Rating 4 out of 5]

**4.5-stars**

The Starving Saints is a Historical Horror novel, replete with a strong religious focus. The story is set at Aymar Castle, which has been under siege for months.

With food stores running low, and no signs of rescue in sight, it seems the residents will soon need to resort to extreme measures in order to survive.



As they teeter on the brink of total destruction through starvation, salvation arrives in the form of the divine figures of the Constant Lady and her Saints. Just like that, the castle stores are replenished and the weak are strengthened.

But how did they get in? And what are they really?

The castle gates are fully barricaded, protecting against their enemies. Soon the entire castle is under the sway of these mysterious saviors, partaking in epic feasts of horrifying origin. As the castle seems to fold under the Saints will, our three MCs are the only ones who seem to see the situation for what it really is.



This story is told through three main perspectives: Ser Voyne, a war hero, Phosyne, a nun-turned-sorceress, and Treila, a serving girl. All three women are working in service to the King, though in different capacities.

Initially, I was wondering how Starling was going to more heavily connect the three perspectives, and I ultimately loved how that was done. I also loved how fully fleshed out all three characters ended up being.

Ser Voyne was def my fave. She was delivering HEAVY Brienne of Tarth vibes, and I was absolutely eating it up.

((Punny!!))



I was also pulled in by the tone of the novel. I was intrigued by the the historical setting, the religious and political characters, as well as their superstitions and belief in miracles.

After the Saints arrived, when the feasts begin and various other odd interactions, it starts to get very trippy. It's scary and unsettling in an indescribable way. At least to me. It got under my skin what was happening, as I had no explanation and no one was seeing it but me.

I'm sure that sounds silly, but I think I was just so invested, I was able to put myself in these characters shoes and thinking about being in this castle, and experiencing these things truly got under my skin.



Granted, I'm not generally a fan when things get too fever dream, which this toes that line. I still like to be able to track events clearly, even when the characters don't know what's going on, and a lot of the time fever dream writing only gives you the same insight as the characters.

This though, I feel was done really well. I think it's because not all of the characters succumb to what's going on in the castle regarding the Saints to the same degree, so you still have a bit of a more coherent view of the happenings. I feel like that's why it worked for me.

This does end up getting really wild, and it is my favorite that I have read from this author thus far. By a long shot, actually. I'm hoping for more like this.



Overall, I really, really, really enjoyed this. It is so strange, but in such an enchanting, dark and unsettling way. The atmosphere and characters exceeded my expectations, and I'm thrilled with that.

I have no idea if I truly understood what the author was trying to get across with this, but I've developed my own, quite intricate, theory involving the holy trinity, and I'm choosing to look at it that way for now. It just feels right.

With Saints like these, who needs Devils. This novel absolutely offers up a lot of FOOD for thought.



I highly recommend it to fans of Historical, or Religious, Horror, as well as anyone looking for a wild, unsettling story set in a medieval castle.

[Rosemary Nagy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one was… Not my favorite.

I’m a sucker for anything involving cannibalism, saints, or bees as a harbinger of doom. So I really genuinely expected to love this book. But unfortunately it fell flat for me.

The plot was confusing and barely there. There was a siege, and everyone was starving, and then there was magic, and saints, but the saints were monsters, but the main characters were monsters too, and they all hated each other, but they also were all sexually attracted to each other, but they were starving to death and were fainting from hunger, but they still had energy to have sex, and then they ate the bad guys? That’s about the entire plot in my experience. We alternated from watching the characters trying to kill each other to deciding that killing each other was kinky WAY more often than made sense. One of the main characters died and then just straight up came back to life, no explanation of how or why? And then immediately started kissing the other main character who had killed her in the first place??

The magic system made absolutely no sense. There’s these evil people from another realm who can take any form so they take the form of the saints, and they feed on lust? So they kill a bunch of people and then bewitch other people and made them eat their dead friends. And somehow that means they’re air? So they can only be killed by fire, or by iron, or by drowning, or by ripping their throat out with your teeth after you seduce them and eating them, but no really they’re immortal unless you do any of those things. Oh and also they’re the gods of the bees. But the bees don’t serve them anymore, the bees only served them until the bees decided to serve the bee priestess instead. And there’s also this whole other monster that is the soul of stone, but also has a tongue and teeth, and will bite off parts of your body in exchange for passage out of the castle and also through time. And also the main character is a monster, and then the other main character has a heart made of diamond, and there’s no explanation for why or how or what any of it means.

The first half of this book is all the characters talking about how hungry and starved they are since they haven’t eaten in months and the people are resorting to cannibalism because they’re so hungry, and then the second half of the book they all forget how hungry they are because they’re so horny. I still don’t understand if they somehow magically overcame starvation or what happened, because they went from literally dying of starvation, like, blacking out from hunger, “the end is near I won’t make it through the night” level of dying from starvation, to making out like that’ll fill their stomachs and not mentioning food at all. It was so much build up around food and hunger and starvation that just fizzled out and disappeared with no explanation.

If this review makes no sense it’s because this whole damn book made no sense. If you’re confused reading my review it’s because I spent the entire time I was reading the book confused, and I kept thinking I would get answers if I finished it, and I did not. I’m sorry.

Bottom line: I’m all for a good lesbian romance, but you can’t just go “she seduced me for the sole purpose of murdering me but she’s blonde so I’m still in love with her, no hard feelings” and call it a day.

[Gyalten Lekden · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intensely atmospheric and slightly unhinged, this novel wrestles with important themes while being both visceral and ethereal, somehow very grounded in the body and yet dreamlike and refusing to settle in any one place. Tortured characters doubt themselves and each other as they fight to decide who and what is worth saving, and that struggle, set against the atmospheric and emotional landscapes the story crafts, worked well for me. However, there were a few things that held me back from really loving this story, and I will discuss those before returning to what I thought of as its strengths.

While the atmosphere and vibes are really compelling, the world-building isn’t nearly as strong. This is marketed as “medieval horror,” but that is slightly off. It is a second-world fantasy, which means it takes place in an entirely invented world that is similar to but not the one we live in. That’s fine, it allowed for an interesting religious element and no need to reconcile that with known religions, countries, or histories. But we know nothing at all about this world, or even about the conflict that has caused them to be under siege in this castle. We hear of a single battle that happened, but other than we know nothing, nothing about how average people exist, what the roles of women are in society (important, given our main characters), what the impression or reputation of this particular king and kingdom are to the larger world, what role religion and faith play in other societies, and so on. These are all things that would ground our story, make it feel real and lived-in, but instead we know nothing besides we are in a castle under siege that has the vibes of a medieval fiefdom. Without that deeper world-building the story felt unanchored, and so I would hope to find that anchor in the characters, but they, unfortunately, are equally history-less. The three main characters have histories, sure, which they explain to us, but nothing that makes them feel genuine, nothing that really makes their motivations and lived experiences meaningful. Each of them has one particular event in their history that they ruminate on, basically, but most of their actions in this story seem to regard that as an afterthought. The characters are distinct and interesting, they clearly have conflicted motivations and broil with internal tensions, so they are fun to read and spend time with in that way. But their lack of grounding compounds the lack of world-building to make it hard to be invested in the story. Further exacerbating the disconnect, there is no real good explanation of or for the antagonists, the titular starving saints. We learn, near the end, ostensibly why they arrived when they did, but it just beggars more questions than offers anything satisfying. Why they have chosen this besieged castle, where they come from, how they relate to the larger world, and more, there are just questions, and any answers given are more vibes-based than narrative. Finally, our three main characters are special, in some ways, but there is on real exploration of why. How they learn about that, what they do with it, those are explored, but what is singling them out in the first place, whether it be something in their personal history that reforged them or some inborn quality or what it may be, these are never addressed in any satisfying way. The main-main character, especially, blossoms in unknowable ways, and while that journey is an interesting one to take with her there isn’t any narrative justification that feels intentional.

I don’t need or expect my stories to have everything tied up with a neat bow, I like ambiguity, and I like when stories imply there are bigger worlds (both epistemologically and narratively) than we see in the immediate text. I think that any one or two of my frustrations above would have added to the story, but when it was “convenient situation without useful narrative grounding” again and again it didn’t feel like ambiguity, it felt like a story that was missing fundamental grounding.

That may not matter to you. There is a lot to enjoy in this story. It is very dreamlike, and it could be argued that all that lack of world-building or narrative specificity is intentional, to really heighten the atmosphere and imperceptibility of this world. As I mentioned the three main characters are all interesting and feel distinct, seeing their different reactions to the ongoing situation was an interesting experience. While I wanted more from the characters in terms of lived history I still felt they were engaging and complicated, more than any simple stereotype of a knight, witch, or peasant orphan would offer. They all kept me on my toes, and I didn’t feel comfortable with any of them, which worked well in this story. The writing itself, on prose and dialogue levels, was really strong. It pulled you in and yet kept you guessing, in good ways. It was wonderfully descriptive when it needed to be, with the decadence of feast and worship and with the gore of violence and destruction. The imagery is really striking and effective, in that way. The chapters are short, switching perspectives across the three main characters, which leaves the reader always feeling a little unprepared. As soon as it feels like any semblance of firm ground it gets taken away, and this adds to the dreamlike atmosphere and makes it really compelling to keep turning the page, to try and get a grasp on something. Lastly there are a lot of really interesting ideas here. This story is one about power, power over yourself and power over others, and more importantly what you do with that power, whether you use it to confine or liberate, to subjugate or support. It is about how relationships with others are always mediated by power, but it is a human-made power, not one innate, and so what we sacrifice for power and where and how we yield to power are really fecund topics.

I enjoyed the story, overall. It has a very strong sense of atmosphere, one disorienting and graphic. It has three dynamic and interesting main characters that the story revolves around. And it explores ideas of selfhood and power through a cannabilistic dark fantasy, where magic, miracles, and spirits are neither unexpected nor to be relied upon. As I mention (exhaustively) above there is a lack of narrative grounding that did contribute to the dream/nightmare-like qualities of the story but overall left me feeling disconnected and not particularly invested, and that certainly sapped at my experience and turned what has the ideas and imagery of a really great book into one that was just good. For me, at least. Your experience will differ depending on what draws you into a story, and there are certainly a number of enticing elements to this novel.

I want to thank the author, the publisher Harper Voyager, and NetGalley, who provided a complimentary eARC for review. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

[Nat · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're looking for a book that's drenched in debauchery and brimming with bacchanalian madness, let me introduce you to my latest obsession.

The Starving Saints has it all:
- A lady knight (who has managed to steal my heart, thanks).
- Mind control food.
- Scary bees.
- Cannibalism as a metaphor for... cannibalism.
- Three toxic women who are, you guessed it, toxically dependent on one another.
- Delicious yearning.
- Not so delicious (and I say this positively) depictions of meat.
- A weird, cult-like religion.

When I say that this novel is an exploration of the depths of human depravity, I mean it. It's incredibly visceral--the type of story that doesn't shy away from appealing to your five senses in the worst (best) possible way--and god, the execution of it was just fantastic.

Our three leads are compelling and awful in their own compelling and awful ways, too. I always worry that there might be a character that I hate when there are multiple perspectives in a story, but Ser Voyne, Phosyne, and Treila were all PERFECT. The web spreading between them was also a delight, and I would give anything to read more about their messed up lives and histories if given the opportunity to.

Overall, this was my perfect book and I'm patiently counting down the days until next May when I can get my hands on a physical copy of it. It's easily a must-read for anyone even remotely fascinated by the medieval horror genre, or for anyone who wants to see messy sapphics try to save a starving castle from itself (and possibly each other).

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an early copy in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own :)

[Ricarda · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a medieval fever dream (affectionate).

[Book Riot Community]

May also brings us the latest from Caitlin Starling, author of The Luminous Dead and The Death of Jane Lawrence. In this sapphic medieval horror novel, Aymar Castle descends into hedonistic chaos following the arrival of divine figures who have come to "save" them, all while the castle is surrounded by a massive army. Only three women—a war hero, a nun-turned-sorceress, and a serving girl—can see what's really going on all around them. But that doesn't mean they are immune to temptation.

—Emily Martin, New Horror Books to Keep You Up At Night

[sassafrass · Rating 1 out of 5]

i will start off by saying that i think some of the horror aspects of this book were genuinely very good at times. anyway, onto the main show

i did not finish this. i gave it a really good effort!!! but this book was designed in a lab to irritate me, and anyone else who knows anything about siege warfare, or anyone who frankly cares about world building in fantasy.

i made it 175 pages, thats pretty much bang on the half way mark. at no point did anyone, even in passing, mention why the hell this castle was under siege. you might be thinking 'oh surely thats just a minor point' but no. if you cannot even provide an explanation for the wider conflict, then it is incredibly hard to care about the little ones.

do you know how time crucial a siege is? not for the people inside, thats obvious, but for the people outside? when you invade a kingdom, you cannot leave a castle at your back as thats a stage post for a counter attack. you have to take that castle. you also need to do that as quickly as possible, because the second you start that siege you are on the clock to avoid: the enemy army attacking you and flanking you against the castle, your men all dying of disease, your men running out of food, you running out of funds to pay the soldiers, the weather, your court revolting in your absence.

none of this seems to have even been a twinkle in caitlins eye. the besiegers here are taking a very leisurely jaunt.

its also entirely unclear why the king is there with what appears to be ONE GUARD, and also no one being in a rush to rescue him? caitlin mentions in passing he has three sons (a rare piece of wider world building i savoured!!) so....are they in on it? is this a coup? i doubt it because its clearly meant to be another nation, but wouldn't the betrayal have added a fun layer of extra horror????

furthermore, writing a book about fucked up saints is a fun idea. writing a book about fucked up saints where everyone is basically an atheist, INCLUDING THE PRIORESS, is just...what???? i get that is cringe to be that sincere about anything, but you cant base a book off religion and nOT have anYONE give a sHIT about the religion!!!

(also, side note as this just reminded me, why on earTH was the priory inside the castle???? an abbey, priory or a monastary is an entirely different building! you get chapels in royal palaces, that have devoted priests, but you dont get the ENTIRE ABBEY. i mean, this is also part and parcel of the laziness of the world building, as there is no sense of the castle as a space. lazy!!! LAZY!!!)

i am so tired of absolutely 'head empty, vibes only' style of writing genre fiction. i'm sure the pinterest board for this was lovely.

[Quill&Queer · Rating 2 out of 5]

"As the castle descends into bacchanalian madness—forgetting the massed army beyond its walls in favor of hedonistic ecstasy" promises the description of this novel, but forgive me, I do not know how you can achieve this without a single orgy.

Aside from that, the three characters who have lived in this castle for years frequently forget that anyone else in this castle exists. It's hard for a castle to descend into madness when they seem stationary when the main characters are not in the scene with them.

The story is very repetative and the characters felt surface level. Treila is seeking revenge for her dead father, Voyne is struggling with being knightly and having gay thoughts, Phosyne is mad and has weird pets. Nothing deeper than this is explored, these facts are just repeated.

I did like the reveal of what the Saints were, and that the answer lies in the opening pages. I did work it out fairly early on after they turned up, but I liked being proven right. The Saints themselves however are somehow really boring. They just turn up and say stuff menacingly.

[Matty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Part medieval horror, part dark fantasy. The story revolves around three women connected from past events and their fight for survival behind the walls of Aymar. Phoysyne, the mad woman, Treila once of high nobility, and Voyne a warrior all see their lives drastically change as food runs out and with the arrival of three mysterious Saints and The Constant Lady. The Saints bring gifts but they come at great costs for all.

The story was unique and pacing followed the impending doom of hunger with a few gruesome, explosive scenes. All the characters were interesting and the three main women had connections and back stories made of magic, hate, revenge, and love. Readers of Between Two Fires will enjoy this one. Book will be available in the US, May 20 2025.

[idiomatic · Rating 3 out of 5]

as with so many recent fantasy releases, this is more of a pinboard of a novel instead of the novel itself, which is a pity because the novel it is pinboarding is quite good! what we get is still tense and yucky (compliment) while also being beautiful to rotate in your mind's eye, and very acclimated to Medieval Weirdness, which is a nice change of pace from medieval fantasy generic. but unfortunately the clear presence of the author having done her reading only made it more annoying that no one had gone in and edited out the lazy modernisms in prose that isn't aiming at modernity ('okay', 'crushing on him', things of that nature) and the story lacks grounding in character: our three protagonists are each defined by (1) character trait and are moved from tableau to tableau as the author sees most visually interesting while everyone else in the scene is—in some cases literally—a thinly sketched face in the background. large scale but very much the sense that scenes are full of copy-paste-duplicated extras. it is again a pity because the characters could all have been developed into interesting people, but as it is, they are paper dolled out of having actions that make sense and barely participate in the scenes they are in.

listen, writing Delirium and Madness while trying to ground a scene is hard, especially if you are a journeyman prose writer, which starling is. that said. okay. try harder.

[Flynn Gilmore · Rating 3 out of 5]

The second half lost me a bit, but we do get a hot lady knight with a light choking fetish, so I'm counting this as a win

[Booksblabbering || Cait❣️ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Part medieval horror, part dark fantasy, definitely a fever dream. If you don’t mind feeling cuckooed, lost, like you’re on an acid trip: read this!
Am I mad or is this book mad? Or are we all mad here?

Aymar Castle has been under siege for six months. Food is running low, they are eating the animals, and there is no escape.
Then the impossible happens. A miracle.
The Constant Lady and her Saints appear out of no where, offering food, healing, and hope in return for adoration.

Three weird girlies:
Ser Voyne: loyal war hero.
Phosyne: a chaotic, paranoid experimenting sorceress.
Treila: a serving girl in over her head who wants revenge again Ser Voyne, but also wants to survive.

Expect unravelling hedonistic ecstasy. Queer longing that guises itself in hate and lust combined. A choking kink taken too far.

Phosyne is hungry. But it's not the hunger of an empty stomach. It's the need to taste. To chew. To consume. She wants to indulge.

I did find the prose uncertain at time. This is supposed to be medieval but occasionally uses modern slang.

Perhaps I would have enjoyed this more reading with my eyes rather than via audiobook. The narrator was great, but I found my attention wandering due to the bizarreness of it.

I recommend not eating any meat whilst reading this.

Audiobook arc gifted by Libro.fm.

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[zara · Rating 2 out of 5]

you cannot write polycule lesbians involving a lady knight in a cannibalistic setting and not deliver. that's a punishable crime, and unfortunately, this book is guilty of that. it's 13 and a half hours of audiobook yet it felt like it's going FOREVERRRR like when i get halfway through my only thoughts were "when will this book be overrr" and i knew this book is doomed. i couldn't pinpoint exactly where this book went wrong, but it felt like it didn't know where the story was going, and it felt messy in a bad way. by that point i lost interest and i don't care anymore about the story nor the characters.

originally i didn't plan on giving the book this low of a rating but again! i am thoroughly pissed off by how this book could've had it all.

[DianaRose · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5ish stars? — because while the writing was beautiful and completely chilled me to the bone, i find that i just was not in any way connected to our cast of characters…

——

this has been on my tbr for months, and of course, my libby hold is expiring… but i’m excited for whatever chaos the reviews for this book promises

[Bethany (Beautifully Bookish Bethany) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay this book is weird, and very slow to get started. But it's ultimately a pretty twisted queer horror novel that's doing something clever I've not seen before in quite this way. The Starving Saints is set in a medieval castle under siege. The people are starving and we follow the perspectives of three women including a miracle worker/nun and a knight. The nun has found a way to magically purify the water, but there isn't food. Until a group of beautiful and powerful saints appear and things devolve into a fever dream of the "bacchanalian feasting" mentioned in the description.

Yes, it does involve cannibalism. And yes, it includes sapphic characters, but living in a time where they don't necessarily understand that? I will say, when I figured out what the author was doing with this novel I thought it was really cool. Not going to be to everyone's taste, but I liked it. The audio narration is pretty good, though I wish it was more clear when we had a perspective change. I received an audio review copy via NetGalley, all opinions are my own.

[lexie · Rating 3 out of 5]

for a book about medieval sapphic cannibals, i needed more from every aspect??? for shame 💔

[♡ retrovvitches ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

ok i loved this! this was a medieval cluster fuck of unhinged decision making and some pretty insane cannibalism. just the right amount of horrifying with some fantasy elements that just made for a truly riveting story for me. i really enjoyed the characters, i was really invested in them all. i annotated the crap out of my copy, couldn’t help myself

[Maggie Gordon · Rating 2 out of 5]

tldr: maybe the saints are starving bc this book did not eat

Okay, look. Did this book have a coherent and compelling plot? No. Did it have inventive or well-written prose? Not particularly. Are the character dynamics lifelike and emotionally resonant? Also no. *However* there are some moments of lucidity that keep this from being a total disappointment—there’s some cool imagery in there and, of course, women being freaks. This novel’s conception has the sauce, the execution is just kind of lacking. It’s kind of a shame since I was so excited to read it and it seemed to be totally up my alley. Like, weird gay women! Bee themed nuns! Psychedelia! Horror-ish! And yet it kind of flopped! :(

The writing is pretty unforgivably trite. It’s like if you asked a tumblr user to rewrite Lauren Groff’s Matrix, complete with a halfhearted stab at Catholicism-lite and a prose style that is reminiscent of something that would be reblogged with the caption “this line didn’t need to go so hard!!!” Lots of “leash” metaphors, lots of lines like “the lie was sweet on her tongue,” lots of stuff that’s just kind of cribbed from poetry and doesn’t really make sense or work in its context.

Also, the dynamics between the characters are handled with a sense of melodrama that is totally unearned. The author will painstakingly over explain individual characters’ feelings and emotional states, but the context of their relationships are pretty threadbare for the majority of the book—possibly an attempt to build tension, but the little hints that are dropped aren’t really that interesting. It picked up a bit in the last third, but I can’t really tell if this is because more plot started happening or if the relationships actually became more compelling.

Anyways I was severely disappointed by this. I need to learn my lesson and not just read stuff because it looks weird and is about wlw.

[alex · Rating 2 out of 5]

my disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined

[Matt Milu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a creative and fascinating group of characters! Also, the premise is just as unique! You may think you know what you are getting into, however I promise you won’t! Extremely fast paced and exciting! 4 Stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️!

[witzelsucht · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was meant to be my year of DNFing, of taking the high road and putting down a book when I smell one star coming over the horizon, but I suffered through this in solidarity with my book-club pals. Venting with them and writing this review were the great and only pleasures I got out of this book. I thought it would be impossible to make a toxic lesbian love-triangle set during a siege be boring, but The Starving Saints manages it and then some.

My first of many complaints is that this book is touted as a medieval horror when it isn’t really. It has an entirely generic cardboard backdrop with kings and knights and castles and nuns, but no thought given to the geopolitics, social history, and religion that would come with them. Starling doesn’t interface with the medieval in any way that enriches this as a horror story. It’s a secondary-world fantasy without a world; a paint-by-numbers that hasn’t even been filled in. It’s pure Pinterest vibes containing homeopathic amounts of research and worldbuilding, which is what I should’ve expected from a book endorsed by Ava Reid, author of the most asinine garbage I’ve ever read (Lady Macbeth). Let this be the second and last time I’m suckered in by a trendy new book with a Barbie-pink blackletter title.

This book wants to have all the claustrophobic tension of a siege with none of the details of architecture, warfare, or community; all the grandeur of medieval saints, heresy, and miracles with none of the context or the Christianity. Even as an atheist myself, its incuriosity towards faith and religion feels coy and cheap. The notion of cannibalism as a profane taboo is quickly undermined by the author’s decision to give two of the main characters past experiences of cannibalism. They’re hardly fazed by it, so why should we be? Where are the stakes to their starvation? Where’s the horror when our heroines have already snacked on corpses? As the book’s many underwhelming narrative choices go, it’s as weirdly timid as making most of the characters irreligious. If the author is so unwilling or unable to commit to the premise and challenge her characters’ moral fibre, why write this story at all?

The prose reaches for an esoteric, archaic tone that’s distractingly patchy; you can feel the author aiming for grandeur but landing on ‘Tumblr prose-poem’. She is obviously proud to have found words like “corkindrill” as an obscure substitute for “crocodile”, but then writes them alongside such mind-numbing banalities as “join the club” and “I’m afraid that I’m fresh out of miracles”. Your mileage will vary, because I’m that person who hates seeing multiple uses of “okay” in a book that’s trying to evoke haunting Gothic-medieval gravitas, but I think Starling has a tin ear for the book’s desired tone. The gulf between the narration, which tries way too hard, and the dialogue, which rarely tries at all, is often baffling. There’s not a single line of speech that feels unique or worth remembering. The grammar is awkward and sometimes just wrong. The use of present tense detracts far more than it adds; again, you can off-puttingly sense the author’s lack of ease with it.

The descriptions are both overwrought and empty. I often had to backtrack to clarify how people were positioned and who the author was even referring to. I sometimes got halfway through a chapter before realising I could hardly tell whose POV it was from (and that I hardly cared). The character-writing is repetitious and clichéd: people keep sitting back on their heels, inclining their heads, quirking their eyebrows, curling their lips, baring their teeth, fisting things, and snarling, growling, or purring their words, ad nauseam. The three protagonists are repeatedly forced into close proximity to manufacture sexual tension, and it never feels authentic because who are these people? In her eagerness to get to the manhandling and choking, Starling bypasses all the groundwork of giving her heroines personalities. They barely interact enough to establish their relationships. One of them has more rapport with a minor male villain than any of the female leads do with each other. Most interactions read like fanservice, speciously assuming these characters have fans to service. Character development and believable arcs are eschewed in favour of chasing the next big trope scene or #aesthetic #moment. Scenes that are meant to be profound, revelatory, or powerfully erotic are so flat and unearned that they only elicit mild embarrassment. When they aren’t performing stock phrases and corny tropes, these deeply dull women go for pages and pages without dialogue or interaction, just wandering around navel-gazing. Where’s the urgency? The chemistry? The editor?

Everything’s vague and wishy-washy, from the personal stakes to the villains’ motivations to the incoherent magic. The castle feels empty and the siege hardly matters. The horror and hedonism are both vastly oversold. It’s a great high concept that’s failed by a lack of depth and, honestly, what feels like the author’s lack of basic heartfelt interest in the subject matter and setting. In the acknowledgements, Starling says, “I’d never tried writing a book with three POVs, or in a medieval-inspired setting, and I’d only ever written present tense in fanfiction,” to which I can only say, “No shit.” She then mentions Dragon Age fans and, even as someone who likes those games, I just thought, “Oh, you’re not even writing ‘ser’ because you saw GRRM do it. You’re copying a video game.” Then the book’s unserious Skrillex haircuts and general lack of invention made total sense, and I liked it even less, which I hardly thought possible.

I really wanted a book that engaged seriously and wholeheartedly with all the ideas The Starving Saints plays at having. Publishers Weekly describes it as having “sweeping fantasy worldbuilding” and “complex queer characters [with] wonderfully distinct voices” and I wish I’d read that book, because it cannot be this one. Don’t be seduced by the blurb that promises a fever dream of gruesome orgiastic madness. This is a wasted premise that’s wholly carried by a striking title and cool cover.

[Becky Spratford · Rating 5 out of 5]

STAR review in the April issue of Library Journal.

Also in that issue, an interview with the author here: https://www.libraryjournal.com/story/...

Three Words That Describe This Book: richly detailed, highly unnerving, 3 points of view.

Other words: transfixing, strong sense of place

Draft Review: Aymar Castle is filled with refugees, huddled inside the walls, protected by their King over the course of a six month siege. With mere days to go until the food stores are depleted, four saints appear out of nowhere to save them from starvation. Readers enter this world, closely modelled after Medieval times, through the perspectives of three women: Phosyne, an excommunicated nun who can perform miracles, Ser Voyne, a trusted knight, and Treila, a serving girl with a thirst for revenge. While many immediately bow to the strangers, the protagonists are not willing to trust what is clearly too good to be true. But what can they do to stop the saints? Richly detailed with an engrossing pace and pervasively menacing tone, Straling quickly transports readers inside the castle walls as they watch the horrors unfold. From cannibalism, increasingly dangerous magic, and betrayals to monsters, hidden tunnels, and swarms of bees, this fantastical story is transfixing on its own, but it also serves to underscore a very unsettling truth– no matter the time or place, humanity’s obsession with power may be the biggest horror of all, a horror that may be too much for these three deeply flawed women to overcome, a horror that may doom their people, unless the can find the strength to embrace their true selves.

Verdict: A brilliantly constructed and thoroughly unnerving fever dream, Starling’s fans will ravenously gulp this novel down,* but it will also appeal to readers nestled in the space where Slewfoot by Brom, The Unworthy by Bazterrica, and The Queen by Cutter overlap.


This book brilliantly transport readers away from their current world while reading but then forces them to look even closer at their real world when they close the covers. It is both an escape but also a call to arms-- in many ways this is a story that demands the reader refuse to me led by those in power because everyone with power has an agenda. Even our protagonists.

3 points of view and they alternate and they depend on each other to tell the story. With the 3 women holding control of the narration it provides a 360 degree view of the world Starling creates-- physically and the interpersonal connections. Each woman, flawed but holding more good than bad inside of them-- need each other to make the right choices. 3 pieces make a whole, but will they make the correct choices and will they survive?

Phosyne: the excommunicated nun who clearly can do alchemy (at least) and serious magic (at best)

Ser Voyne: one of the king's most trusted knights-- who he asks to watch over Phosyne and see that she does the magic need to feed them all

Treila- a serving girl with a quick brain and a violent, secret

The plot is in the description and while it seems to tell you a lot, I promise, it is just the start,

This book is set in a time that is most similar to Medieval Europe, but it could be about any time as it is about human nature and power and how power corrupts. It is filled with horrors both real and imagined. Readers cannot help but see themselves and their current world in this "historically" set story of war and power and "salvation."

It is filled with magic and monsters. They build throughout. This is more than a dark fantasy story though. The fantasy is a trapping to tell a Horror novel. Much like Starling does with all of her novels-- they may have strong fantasy or SF elements/frames-- but her story is there to make you face the horror in yourself. She entices you with a highly original story, she takes you somewhere not of the world you are in and yet the story is about relationships, human nature, and the terrible choices we all make. This is why I chose the word unnerving above.

Richly detailed but also steadily paced. The detail does not sacrifice the plot in any way.

Highly original, thought provoking, unnerving-- can see yourself in this castle, forced to make choices and it doesn't make you feel good. Even the resolution itself is unnerving.

Readers feel the hunger, smell the decay, feel the heat, taste the water

A fever dream both to the reader, but also those living through the action in the story. You will be transfixed as a reader and brought into the world even as it gets less realistic and more dark and horrific. With monsters coming from so many angles.

Cover is PERFECT! It portrays the menace and also some key points in the story without being a spoiler in anyway.

Starling's books are never the same and in fact, this one holds a piece of all the novels she has written so far-- Nestles in the space where fans of Slewfoot by Brom, The Unworthy by Bazterrica, and The Queen by Cutter overlap.

[Esmay Rosalyne · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars (rounded up)

In the category of: "idk what the fuck I just read, but I think I liked it(?)". I mean, The Starving Saints really is the epitome of a mad, disturbing feverdream, yet somehow it just kinda works.

It's not even that the plot is complex or confusing, because it's simply three disaster lesbians (with VERY complicated feelings and relationships) trying to escape the medieval castle under siege where everyone quickly descends into bacchanalian madness when the Constant Lady and her Saints arrive to offer succor in return for blind worship. Also, there's cannibalism.

As I said, not that complicated, but for the love of all that is holy, is this book just capital W weird...
For the most part, I absolutely loved the dark medieval horror aesthetics, the obscure storytelling, the bee-centered religion and its hivemind mentality, the absolutely nauseating yet somehow weirdly sensual atmosphere and the glorious messiness of these characters.

Yet as much as I appreciated all that, I just couldn't help but feel like a lot of the deeper layers and commentary/symbolism went straight over my head, which sort of broke my immersion and enjoyment. Also, it took me a painfully long time to feel any type of investment in these characters and their relationships (I even had to switch to audio at the 30% mark in a desperate attempt to get me engaged), as they just didn't really come off the page with personality for me. Ser Voyne was probably my favourite for most of the book (hello, I will always be trash for a lady in armour), but it took me a lot longer to care about Phosyne and Treila.

However, the wild, unhinged banger of an ending totally made up for the frustratingly slow start, and the final 25% had me in an absolute chokehold. The character arcs for each of these three ladies are absolutely phenomenal, and I loved how everything unfolded and wrapped up in such a believably messy and perfectly imperfect way.

Even with my quibbles, The Starving Saints just had me in an absolute chokehold from start to finish, and I have a feeling that it's only going to rise in my estimation as I reflect on it and re-read it in the future. This book is not going to be for everyone, and I don't know if it was totally for me, but somehow I can't stop thinking about it and I kinda love that?

This is one of those psychologically challenging stories that just creeps under your skin and sticks to you like honey, whether you like it or not, and I think that is exactly where its brilliance lies.

[sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEE <3 don’t ask me to explain what happens in the last third but i had such a good time. when i say i like when books have a distinct atmosphere this is the atmosphere i mean (dirty, dank, starving, dripping, something distinctly Wrong). fucked up lesbians 4everrr

[Jessica Woodbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

This takes a while to get going. If I hadn't taken a quick peek at the reviews to see that it would eventually devolve into a really messed up bacchanal of horror, which is absolutely my jam, I probably would not have kept reading.

It's hard to classify this but I suppose if you must it is a fantasy in the historical style, something sort of Arthurian, with knights and nuns and magic. A castle is under siege, those inside are on the verge of starvation. And here we meet our three protagonists--all very queer, naturally. Phosyne has managed to magic clean water but isn't sure how she did it and is now under pressure to magic food. Ser Voyne is the king's closest knight, struggling to keep order. And Treila is pretending to be a servant while she waits to take revenge. It takes a while for these three to get their plot lines intertwined (like I said, this takes too long to get going) but this is not going to be a cozy little story of how they all become friends and/or lovers. These three are always in tension, but they often find themselves temporarily aligned. Because, well, there are the Saints to deal with.

The Saints are spectacular villains, very creepy, and Starling very deftly weaves us through their arrival. Even before we see what is really going on, we know this is not going to end well. There is no really big secret here, from the minute they become the castle's saviors you can make a fairly good guess of what they are doing. We don't need to reveals. Because what is happening is grotesque and the thing we don't know is who these Saints are and how to stop them.

Once we get into full fever dream territory, the book is at its best. Though the part that really got me was the monster that is also just a crack in the wall. Shivery goodness.

[Lexi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wish this was a novella because conceptually it was cool and some of the scenes were really really cool, but god damn, enough of it was just too boring to care