Tender Is the Flesh

by Agustina Bazterrica Narrated by Joseph Balderrama

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

Prepare to be disturbed to your core by the sickening dystopia in which our characters are trapped and the depths of depravity they'll reach.

Working at the local processing plant, Marcos is in the business of slaughtering humans-though no one calls them that anymore.

His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the “Transition.” Now, eating human meat-“special meat”-is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.

Then one day he's given a gift: a live specimen of the finest quality. Though he's aware that any form of personal contact is forbidden on pain of death, little by little he starts to treat her like a human being. And soon, he becomes tortured by what has been lost-and what might still be saved.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

05/11/2020

Argentine writer Bazterrica’s uneven English-language debut disturbs with a vision of human cruelty and moral flexibility. Bazterrica efficiently establishes the premise: an animal-borne virus has led to the mass slaughter of all livestock, forcing the hungry populace to look for protein elsewhere (“At a chilling speed the world was put back together and cannibalism was legitimized”). Marcos Tejo works for a processing plant that slaughters genetically modified humans, or “head,” for consumption. Marcos is a dour character, emotionally hollow after the death of his son and working in a profession he despises to support his ailing father. After one of his clients gives him as a gift a “First Generation Pure” female—captive-bred, non-GMO human livestock—he begins to lust for her, though it’s a capital crime to “enjoy” females meant for breeding. Bazterrica is best when clinically describing the mechanisms of the harvesting process, from breeding to killing to butchering. These entrancing scenes normalize the brutality with euphemisms, demonstrating the Orwellian potential of language to “cover up the world.” The prose, though, can be overwrought at times—notably during a sex scene taking place on a bloody butchering table—but Bazterrica’s purposely unappetizing conceit makes for a powerful allegory on the human consumption of animals. Still, the execution will leave a bad taste in the reader’s mouth. (Aug.)

From the Publisher

PRAISE FOR TENDER IS THE FLESH BY AGUSTINA BAZTERRICA
WINNER OF ARGENTINA’S CLARÍN NOVELA PRIZE 2017

A USA Today Bestseller

“From the first words of the Argentine novelist Agustina Bazterrica’s second novel, Tender Is the Flesh, the reader is already the livestock in the line, reeling, primordially aware that this book is a butcher’s block, and nothing that happens next is going to be pretty.”
—New York Times Book Review

"The novel is horrific, yes, but fascinatingly provocative (and Orwellian) in the way it exposes the lengths society will go to deform language and avoid moral truths."
—Taylor Antrim, Vogue

“Taut and thought-provoking...a chilling and alarmingly prophetic book...this is an urgent cautionary tale...timely, crucial.”
—Words Without Borders

"A ruthlessly clever, Orwellian satire of our dog-eat-dog, er, man-eat-man modern world."
—NJ.com

“It is a testament to Bazterrica’s skill that such a bleak book can also be a page-turner. An unrelentingly dark and disquieting look at the way societies conform to committing atrocities.”
—Kirkus Reviews

"Propulsive and deranged, Tender Is the Flesh is a weird and quick read that strays far enough from our current reality to be utterly engrossing... and a book that will stick with you for a long time."
—Thrillist

“This translated prizewinner by Argentinian novelist Bazterrica exquisitely dishes up an intricate tale of a systematized dystopian society... a sagacious and calculated exploration of the limits of moral ambiguity; it sears and devastates.”
—Booklist, starred review

"Bazterrica’s writing is ferocious; she has vision and intent. When you least expect it, her narrative hits her target, and leaves you trembling.”
—Samanta Schweblin, author of Seven Empty Houses

"This book will pull you in, take hold, and not let go until you reach the final page—perhaps far longer than that. Without a doubt, my favorite read of this year.”
—Christina Dalcher, author of Vox

"What a compelling, terrible beauty this novel is. My heart was breaking even as my skin was crawling.”
—Lisa McInerney, author of The Glorious Heresies

“Provocative, muscular, and entirely unforgiving, this terrifying novel is a timely reminder that words have the power to strip us of our humanity. I gulped it down with my heart racing.”
—Sue Rainsford, author of Follow Me to Ground

“A brutal tale of what humans are capable of inflicting on themselves when social norms collapse. Grotesque, gloriously nasty. Utterly compelling.”
—Lucie McKnight Hardy, author of Water Shall Refuse Them

"A skin-crawling yet compelling read."
—Refinery29

"Grimly engrossing with a sucker-punch ending."
—The Times

"This is a hideous, bold and unforgettable vision of the future. Just make sure you've eaten before picking it up."
—i-D Magazine

"[A] thrilling dystopia that everyone should read for Bazterrica's stunning, electrifying language and story-telling—that is, if you can stomach it."
—Dazed & Confused Magazine

"Horribly effective... This provocative novel expertly wields a double-edged cleaver..."
—The Guardian

"A compelling dystopian novel."
—The Independent

"Told with a chilly allofness that makes the horror of it all the more disturbing."
—Financial Times

"Sitting comfortably? Not after even the tiniest nibble of this gut-churning, brilliantly realised novel."
—Daily Mail

"Unflinching... engaging."
—SFX Magazine

“At what price is a world without animals viable? That’s the question posted by Argentinian author Agustina Bazterricca.... With an artfulness perfectly calibrated with irony, [she] presents an astounding portrait of a humanity ready to do anything to satisfy itself, even at its own expense.
—Le Monde

“A dystopic fable as chilling as it is compelling.”
—Paris Match

“Hypnotic.... [Bazterrica’s] hell is akin to that of Richard Fleischer’s and Soylent Green.”
—L’Obs

“From a fear of the future (overpopulation and a shortage of meat), Bazterrica has penned a stunning novel on the plasticity of our moral values, and what Hannah Arendt called 'the banality of evil.'”
—Lire

“Heiress to Orwell, the Argentinian author deploys a voice as vivid as it is chilling. In an increasingly dehumanized world, she pushes us to a dizzying reflection on violence, love, [and] power."
—Livres Hebdo

“This Argentinian novel, winner of the Clarin prize in 2017, pulls no punches. Agustina Bazterrica succeeds in normalizing a cruelty beyond words.”
—Le Canard Enchainé

“A political fable, a denunciation by way of absurdity on the fate society reserves for animals and a love story outside conventional norms, [this novel] seizes you and won’t let go.
—Télérama

“Skilled seamstress, Agustina [Baztericca] unspools her thread and stitches the words to bring us wherever she wants, upending our sensibility through a ride that has everything in a final twist.”
—Maze

“A fable on the gruesome side of the modern world, impressionistic and poetic.”
—Clarin

“A biting and uncompromising expression of what happens daily in our society.”
—La Nacion

“Hypnotic, gruesome, beautiful, captivates the reader within moments.”
—El Imparcial

“Heavy, magnetic, disturbing—the novel of the year.”
—Culturamas

Kirkus Reviews

2020-05-18
A processing plant manager struggles with the grim realities of a society where cannibalism is the new normal.

Marcos Tejo is the boss’s son. Once, that meant taking over his father’s meat plant when the older man began to suffer from dementia and require nursing home care. But ever since the Transition, when animals became infected with a virus fatal to humans and had to be destroyed, society has been clamoring for a new source of meat, laboring under the belief, reinforced by media and government messaging, that plant proteins would result in malnutrition and ill effects. Now, as is true across the country, Marcos’ slaughterhouse deals in “special meat”—human beings. Though Marcos understands the moral horror of his job supervising the workers who stun, kill, flay, and butcher other humans, he doesn’t feel much since the crib death of his infant son. “One can get used to almost anything,” he muses, “except for the death of a child.” One day, the head of a breeding center sends Marcos a gift: an adult female FGP, a “First Generation Pure,” born and bred in captivity. As Marcos lives with his product, he gradually begins to awaken to the trauma of his past and the nightmare of his present. This is Bazterrica’s first novel to appear in America, though she is widely published in her native Argentina, and it could have been inelegant, using shock value to get across ideas about the inherent brutality of factory farming and the cruelty of governments and societies willing to sacrifice their citizenry for power and money. It is a testament to Bazterrica’s skill that such a bleak book can also be a page-turner.

An unrelentingly dark and disquieting look at the way societies conform to committing atrocities.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940177679938
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster
Publication date:	08/04/2020
Edition description:	Unabridged
Sales rank:	400,191

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