Here comes Esther. Tall Esther. Big Esther. Esther, the butcher.
Weaned on aspic and sausage, she has strong thighs and a short skirt. She loves her body.
She lives in a small town built around a meat factory. She has a natural talent for butchery and works at the slaughterhouse. She loves her job.
Life is simple and beautiful. There is only one thing missing: a child.
The whole town knows: Esther and her husband, an inseminator at the town’s pig farm, are trying for a baby. But is there a bump under that coat? No, not yet.
As the town pulses with rumour and Esther burns with an as yet unfulfilled desire for a baby, she grows to understand the secret power of her body. Her flesh is not weak, and her spirit is even stronger.
Already an international sensation – selling in thirty-one territories in a matter of weeks – this darkly comic, truly touching, gleefully grotesque modern fairy tale announces the arrival of Mariia Niskavaara’s extraordinary voice.
Weaned on aspic and sausage, she has strong thighs and a short skirt. She loves her body.
She lives in a small town built around a meat factory. She has a natural talent for butchery and works at the slaughterhouse. She loves her job.
Life is simple and beautiful. There is only one thing missing: a child.
The whole town knows: Esther and her husband, an inseminator at the town’s pig farm, are trying for a baby. But is there a bump under that coat? No, not yet.
As the town pulses with rumour and Esther burns with an as yet unfulfilled desire for a baby, she grows to understand the secret power of her body. Her flesh is not weak, and her spirit is even stronger.
Already an international sensation – selling in thirty-one territories in a matter of weeks – this darkly comic, truly touching, gleefully grotesque modern fairy tale announces the arrival of Mariia Niskavaara’s extraordinary voice.
Reviews
Esther, the Butcher is anything but a conventional novel. Its narrative is surprising, absurd, comic, and utterly extraordinary. The book brims with flesh and corporeality to the point of revulsion, its sentences honed to a razor's edge. In its strangeness, it shines with such irresistible clarity that the reader is drawn into its oddity - and may never fully shake it off
Frightening, disconcerting, I was deeply disturbed
Esther, the Butcher demonstrates exceptional literary imagination and reveals its author's profound understanding of literature
I read almost faint with amazement at what Niskavaara's imagination conjures. I love her blunt matter-of-fact sentences and absurd characters. There's the Perfect Woman, who has undergone a navel-removal operation. There's the Nude Model, who has pig's teats. The book is nominated for the Helsingin Sanomat Literature Prize. I'm not surprised. This grotesque fairy tale is wild and violent - but also wildly brilliant
There's a completely new way of telling the story of who we are. Her name is Mariia Niskavaara: she's ruthless, sharp, uncompromising, and she understands us with indescribable tenderness, right down to the very depths of our flesh
Esther, the Butcher is a captivating and delightfully absurd story about womanhood, motherhood, desire, and the highs and lows of having a body. Mariia Niskavaara is a singular voice in fiction. The prose is clean, sparse, and cuts right to the heart of the matter. This is one of the most wonderfully weird novels I've ever read. You've never met anyone quite like Esther before
Strange, visceral, and deeply moving, Mariia Niskavaara has written a debut that burrows itself under your skin, down to the flesh, hitting some nerves, and tickling a bone or two
A deeply melancholy and meaty tale. Undeniably surreal, sharp and daring, Esther, the Butcher has a perfect aftertaste that will leave you longing for seconds. An astonishing fairytale with bite
An unconventional novel, so disturbing that it evokes an irresistible pleasure