Food of the Gods

Starred review from April 3, 2017
Khaw’s first full-length novel (a fix-up of two previously published novellas) is a gut-punch of a reading experience that swings the reader disturbingly between laughing out loud and beginning to retch. In a dense setting of degenerate old gods in the modern age, Rupert Wong—bureaucrat in the Chinese Hell, high-end chef to ghouls who dine on human flesh, and home to a large collection of ghosts who live in his tattoos—is drawn unwillingly into investigating a dispute provoked by the death of the daughter of the Dragon King. His search for a solution sends him from Kuala Lumpur to London, where the Greek gods desire both his culinary skills and his supernatural connections. Descriptive imagery dances viscerally on the edge between the delicious and the disgusting; clever wordplay twines with heavy profanity; the mood flips rapidly among comedy, horror, and tenderness. This amazing book is perfect for foodies, readers of modernized mythology and light supernaturals, and fans of the smart, underpowered survivor who wins in the face of cosmic might and mundane brawn.