Isabella's Reading Corner: The Hunger

The Hunger

Author: Alma Katsu

Publication Date: March 6th, 2018

Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons

The Hunger by Alma Katsu is a fictional account of what might have happened to the real life doomed Donner Party of the 1840s. The wagon train of approximately ninety people traveled west from Springfield, Illinois hoping for a new life and opportunities in California, but unfortunately their happy ending was not to be, as an unspeakable fate awaited them.  

Early in the novel the settlers are plagued with misfortune – one of the young wives gives birth to a stillborn baby, there are weevils in the flour and wolves have been stealing their food. When a six-year-old boy goes missing from his tent in the middle of the night and his body is found horribly butchered, suspicions arise that the abominable deed was done by one of their own. 

After a stop at Fort Laramie, those heading to Oregon leave behind the smaller Donner Party who are bound for California. Ominously warned not to take the route they are planning, George Donner seems more concerned about boosting his ego and controlling the group than about the practicality and safety of the journey. Fighting amongst the men begins as there are reservations about separating from the larger part of the wagon train, heading down an unknown trail and lingering for a picnic instead of moving as quickly as possible toward their destination before winter sets in. As the story progresses, more unsettling situations arise as livestock and people disappear and some of the party begin to exhibit increasingly aberrant behaviour…

The author tells her narrative through multiple viewpoints and with such a large cast of characters, there are many secrets among them as their backstories are also relayed. The real historic events that occurred were lurid and shocking enough, but Katsu adds in ritual sacrifices, supernatural and diabolical elements to her version, creating an utterly macabre and hair-raising novel.

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for the finished copy provided for review.

From the publisher:

A tense and gripping reimagining of one of America's most fascinating historical moments: the Donner Party with a supernatural twist.

Evil is invisible, and it is everywhere. 

That is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the wagon train known as the Donner Party. Depleted rations, bitter quarrels, and the mysterious death of a little boy have driven the isolated travelers to the brink of madness. Though they dream of what awaits them in the West, long-buried secrets begin to emerge, and dissent among them escalates to the point of murder and chaos. They cannot seem to escape tragedy...or the feelings that someone--or something--is stalking them. Whether it's a curse from the beautiful Tamsen Donner (who some think might be a witch), their ill-advised choice of route through uncharted terrain, or just plain bad luck, the ninety men, women, and children of the Donner Party are heading into one of one of the deadliest and most disastrous Western adventures in American history. 

As members of the group begin to disappear, the survivors start to wonder if there really is something disturbing, and hungry, waiting for them in the mountains...and whether the evil that has unfolded around them may have in fact been growing within them all along.

Effortlessly combining the supernatural and the historical, The Hunger is an eerie, thrilling look at the volatility of human nature, pushed to its breaking point. 

You can read my original Isabella's Reading Corner post on The Hunger here.