Reading this I couldn’t help but liken it to the Japanese and Korean horror movies I grew up watching. Monika Kim took her time setting up the story, building to an eventual tipping point almost halfway into the book where things eventually took a turn and started the descent into the psychological horror story that is this book. In The Eyes are the Best Part we follow Ji-won, a Korean-American college student dealing with her parents’ divorce, navigation through the first year of college, and an ever growing craving to eat eyes.
It starts harmless enough, finally trying a fish eye after being asked to for quite some time by her mother, but grows into an obsession. Ji-won starts to notice peoples’ piercing blue eyes and wonder about how delicious they must taste. As her wonder starts to grow, she begins to have nightmares centered around eyes, wakes up into dreams, and wakes into reality in strange places leaving herself questioning what’s real and what isn’t.
This is such a good read. I can’t recommend it enough. I will say if you get squeamish it may not be for you. While not overly graphic, the occasional gory detail is very vivid and even made my stomach churn a little at one point, and I don’t lose my appetite or get queasy easily. I thought I knew where the story was headed when I approached the last chunk of the book but I’ll admit, while not ultimately too far off, I was pleasantly surprised to find it take a turn that I wasn’t expecting.
While there was the occasional minor spelling or grammatical error, and I think the book could have done wholly without the very final paragraph, it’s a solid 10 stars from me. The book comes out on June 25th, and it’s absolutely worth picking up.
Cthulhuville 