Caught somewhere between 'I am perturbed' and 'I'm having the time of my life' the entire way through. Rupert has to be one of the most relatable main characters I've seen in a long while, and I don't know what that says about me, but hey, I'm not complaining. Someone give the poor bastard a raise, he's not paid nearly enough to deal with all this bullshit.

Last year I first read Cassandra Khaw’s work and was absolutely astounded by the quality of her writing. It seems she can turn her hand to anything, whether it is the intensity of Breathe, the dexterity of Speak or the weirdness of Hammers on Bone. She has so far not got anywhere near as much attention as she deserves, so hopefully this fabulous book will help change that.In the Rupert Wong stories she creates a wonderfully strange world that we are thrown into head-first. Landing straight on th...

You could summarise this book as a recipe (and I can't imagine I'm the first to think of that): one part recipe book, one part mythology, one part Harry Dresden, one part Lovecraft. But like any good dish, it ends up being completely a thing of its own. Rupert is an engaging character, flawed as he is, and you're on his side from the start. His world is complex, layered, and real - there's a wonderful sense of place, and you feel like you could step through the pages of the book to join him. Alt...

“I used to wonder if death kills your sense of humour. It does.” (Loc 72)Rupert Wong, “cannibal chef,” prepares food for gods and ghouls. Sometimes he is the food. He used to be a triad and has a dark past he’s not proud of. These days, he’s just trying to make enough for him and his girlfriend to get by, as well as keep the right gods and monsters happy enough to keep him out of hell. That’s hell with a capital “D” or “Diyu”, the Chinese realm of the dead. “The holy man didn’t tell me anything

This version is a combo-model, consisting of entries 1 and 2 in the Rupert Wong series: Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef, and Rupert Wong and the Ends of the Earth. They form something of an over-arching tale, so I might as well rave about them together.Rupert Wong is no hero; in fact when we meet him, he's a human working off certain damnation one meal at a time, preparing gourmet repasts of his fellow-man for snooty ghouls as part of a deal he's struck with the Ten Chinese Hells. Who sometimes contr...

Bizarre, violent, super gory mish-mash of different genres, Asian & European mythologies and the new deities, the living, the ghouls and the tattoos (omg the tattoos) with a healthy sprinkle of snarky dialogue. Loved it!

As other reviewers have said - this is not a book, it's two; and they're both fantastic.Cassandra Khaw's writing is always exceptional, and there's no change here. This is beautifully written and utterly horrifying - often cringe-inducing, and only early Stephen King has ever made me actually squirm with his descriptions of physical pain before. But chalk this one up, because such evocative writing is sometimes used to really make the reader wish that the author was, perhaps, just slightly less

This book is actually two short stories hanging together, and they're messy, sprawly, bizarre and gore-filled ickfests - but quite fun! It's not a perfect book, with constant the smart quips and crazy similes sometimes feeling like they overloade the narrative, but at many other times, they actually do make me snigger.It's also a very bloody, messy book that feasts in entrails, blood, violence and viscera. The first half was originally published as "Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef" and this is a lot

Between the violence and gore, and Rupert Wong’s flippancy and selfishness, I wasn’t sure if I could keep reading after the first few chapters. But Cassandra Khaw can write, and past the pus and viscera were some beautiful word choices. And Rupert’s commentary on various situations was funny, at times. Though I felt kind of wrung out by all the violence in these two stories, I want to check out book one of her Persons Non Grata series eventually.

Okay, so I didn't actually finish this. But I didn't DNF it exactly either. Food of the Gods is the first two books in the Rupert Wong series, Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef and Rupert Wong and the Ends of the Earth. I read the first but not the second. So I guess I did DNF. At 34%. But that sounds harsh. Can I instead say that I read the first book but decided not to continue with the series?So here's the deal: The premise is very interesting and I love Khaw's writing style. I like the main charact...

This is the second book that I've read by Cassandra Khaw - the first being Hammers On Bone - and there are a few similarities, although the protagonist is different. Both draw on Lovecraft without reproducing the racism which totally underpins the original. And both, curiously, prominently feature Croydon. It's sort of flattering in a way, and I think the idea of Croydon has a lot of potential for this sort of story, although both books have a few geographic discrepancies which could become grat...

💀 DNF at 21%.No rating because how the stinking fish am I supposed to rate a book that isn't bad and that I know I should have loved but didn't?! Beats nefarious little me and stuff.The Slowpoke Queen Herself In Person 💕lurved💕 this book so much she boldly recommended to me (what a brave, fearless little soul she is). My Nefarious Daughter 💕lurves💕 it so much she convinced me to put it at the very top of my tbr (to the utter dismay and absolute consternation of the many YA Historical Paranormal

Rupert Wong was destined to damnation until he cut a deal with the gods of the Chinese underworld to work some of his bad karma off. Doubling as a cannibal chef and part time pencil pusher, doing who knows what well not him, he has his hands full. Too bad he's so good at his job because now a Dragon King is enlisting his help and he can't refuse because it is the only way his ghost girlfriend Minah can be granted a chance at reincarnation. Unknowingly though Rupert gets caught up in a scheme to

The premise of the book was interesting, the myths were fun. I liked learning about the Kuala Lumpur culture, all the foods and customs. But the writing style was not for me and the main character was really annoying.

Rupert Wong wears many hats. His day job is as a gourmet chef preparing food for a family of rich ghouls, mainly out of human meat. The remainder of his time is spent as the Chinese Hells' seneschal in Kuala Lumpur. His family life revolves around his girlfriend who's a flesh-eating spirit with a demon baby. In the first novella of this volume Rupert gets a visit from Ao Qin, the Dragon King of the South Sea with a promise of riches in return for an impossible job. Ao Qin's little task soon sees...

Rupert Wong, former bad dude, is paying his karmic debts. He's a chef to ghouls, coming up with the most delicious ways to prepare human flesh (mostly hapless European tourists to Kuala Lumpur: "Scottish rump roast is exactly what you're imagining"). He's also a clerk/union agent/gofer for the Ten Chinese Hells. In his spare time, he relaxes with his girlfriend Minah, a langsuir. Nope, his life is nothing like normal. And neither is this book. Wow, it is utterly gruesome and slightly disgusting...

I really wanted to like this book. It had all the elements of a fantasy novel I would enjoy, mixing Constantine with Cthulhu. The writing is, sometimes, quite good. But too often it felt like a lot of very finely crafted sentences strung together without reason, and the greater story made no sense. Why was a chef under the employ of an undead mobster acting as a private investigator to a greater deity? Or being shipped off to spend some time with the Greek Gods for unknown reasons (I still don't...

Rupert Wong, cannibal chef and fixer for hire. Working in the food industry can literally be hell, with a fillip of outer cosmic horror. A very snarky and violent trip into the bowels of supernatural cooking and warring gods. An original and amusing read that combines two earlier works.

Oh lordy. When it comes to genre mashing, I'm usually first in line and chortling with glee when it comes to the wild and the wacky. Coming into this one relatively free of any expectations other than knowing it was a group read with some friends, I blanked my mind and began it.First impressions: Oh! Chinese gods, the underworld, a damned chef and the problem of keeping the ghouls happy with their meals. Oh! Godfather. Oh! This is GORY. Oh! Rupert has one hell of a snark going on and even if I d...

What if the American Gods mythos was reimagined by a foody with a gift for Lovecraftian horror and Gene Wolfe-style allusive prose?This. This is what would happen.And it's glorious.