This science fiction, dystopian novel, came from (seemingly) nowhere to really spice up my reading experience! By spice, I’m trying to make a (admittedly, bad) chilli joke and is not a reference to the sexiness of the book itself.

In this novel we follow a couple of perspectives, but it is mainly focused on Vanna. In Vanna’s world (Eusistocratic Republic of Finland; ERF), society is made up of men, submissive women (Eloi) and ‘defective’ women. Vanna is a ‘defective’ woman, who becomes a part of a drug growing group (chillies) and her Eloi sister goes suspiciously missing. In all honesty, I think the dystopian society in this novel is fascinating and complicated enough that I could spend my whole review explaining it. Just know that I haven’t read a dystopian novel like this in a HOT minute so it is definitely worth reading, if only for the unique world building instead.

This novel is also epistolary. As mentioned there are a few perspectives, one of them being Jare, Vanna’s companion on her drug dealing career. We also get excerpts from different magazines and medical journals in ERF, which shows insight into how Vanna and other women were ‘brainwashed’ - basically we get to read the propaganda forced down women’s throats to make them believe they existed solely for men. All these different forms of storytelling made me feel like what I was reading was real. It’s one of those situations which sounds absurd, but the cynic in me wouldn’t be surprised if something like this did happen (again, I suppose) to women in the future.

There are many triggers in this novel including; sexism, propaganda, brainwashing, abuse, murder, rape, sexual assault, the idea of owning a woman, drugs, drug addiction, gambling, gambling addiction, and depression. Sexual content includes discussion of sex, behind closed doors intercourse, kissing, and sexualisation of young women.