[.ca] Eating The Cheshire Cat: A Novel (ISBN 068486441X)

From Amazon.com:
In Eating the Cheshire Cat, three little girls are born into the rigorous tradition of Southern womanhood, with all its standards of grace, beauty, and cutthroat competitiveness. Sarina, mean from birth and pretty as love, has the best chance of achieving Southern queenhood. Bitty Jack and Nicole are the two girls she leaves in her perfumed wake in this novel of friendship gone sour. Sweet-natured Bitty Jack attends summer camp with Sarina, who accuses Bitty Jack's father, the camp handyman, of being a pervert and ruins his life. Bitty Jack quietly nurtures a grudge. Nicole, meanwhile, suffers a frenzied obsession with Sarina throughout their adolescence and college years, an obsession that results in uniquely macabre expressions of love. Helen Ellis's first novel tries to walk with its two feet simultaneously in three different territories, and if that sounds a little uncomfortable, well, it is. Eating the Cheshire Cat plays at the Southern Gothic surreal: Bitty Jack's first love affair is with a circus freak and the novel ends in an unsurprising sororal bloodbath. But it also toys with the comic: Sarina hatches elaborate plans to cover her reputation-building lies. And, at its best, it casts a cold, even a sociological, eye on the doings of Southern American princesses: Ellis describes the pledging of the Tri Delt sorority in loving detail. If, for instance, a girl doesn't make the Tuscaloosa chapter, she could "rush Auburn two weeks later. Maybe the girl would make Tri Delt there. But everyone knew that wasn't as good. It was an agricultural college, for crying out loud. At the Alabama-Auburn football games, those girls were known as Delta Dogs." It's a relief when Ellis lets her cattiness run wild--and doesn't goop it up with fake gore. --Claire Dederer

You won't want to put it down!:
This is hands down one of the most amazing books I have ever read! It is such a twisted sugar free novel. It goes into the life of 3 very different girls Sarina, Nicole, and Bitty Jack. Their lives are all VERY diffrent while somehow connecting on one level or another. Ellis does a great job in detail and she really makes the book come alive. Some actions in this book just jump out at you and make you say "I can't believe she did that" or "OH MY GOD!!" This book is definitely my guilty pleasure and I can't wait to finish the last chapter to see how it all ends up.

Very dark comedy:
Well, this book held my attention... but probably for the wrong reasons. It wasn't especially well written, but did make me want to see what on Earth could happen next. This is very dark comedy... in other words, if you can't laugh at someone getting seriously hurt, then don't bother with this. I have to admit, I did laugh here and there... but was left a little disturbed after reading the entire book.

Impossible to like:
It is hard to like a book when all of the characters are unlikeable, the writing is mundane, and there isn't a shred of humor in it. Helen Ellis is no Lisa Alther. I spared myself by quitting after four chapters but I still want that 20 minutes of my life back.

Dark and Disturbingly Funny - I couldn't put this one down!:
Have you ever read a book that you can't take your eyes off of, that makes you laugh out loud, repeatedly? This book was certainly very dark, but it is also one of the funniest reads ever. I recommend this book to anyone who has a sick sense of humor.

Cheshire Cat ends with a big, boring bang:
Helen Ellis writes a fun first novel, but lacks a sophisticated style. When Sarina, Nicole and Bitty Jack are together, no good can come. The hatred, greed and, most dangerous of all, love the three have result in teasing, backstabbing and life ruining attacks. The characters in Eating the Cheshire Cat are well developed in an unusual way, and depict almost every stereotype one may have of southern young ladies. Ellis amplifies the eccentric side people can possess in this attempt at a Carrie imitation gone terribly wrong. The novel begins with Sarina Summers drunk in the emergency room. Her mother is by her side, worried not about the alcohol poisoning the doctor is concerned with, but about her daughter's pinky fingers, the one imperfection on the beautiful and popular sixteen-year-old. This is the first of many attempts Sarina and her mother make for Sarina to be perfect, date the perfect guy, live the perfect life. The Summers stop at nothing for what they think will bring them happiness. The two trust only each other, and don't really care about anyone else. Nicole Hicks is a friend of Sarina's and lives across the street. Her obsession with Sarina is an immense obstacle for Mrs. Hick's attempts at making her daughter a mirror image of herself. Nicole sacrifices all she has for Sarina - grades, dreams, reputation - yet Sarina only manipulates Nicole to get what she wants. Nicole's obsession with Sarina and Mrs. Hicks's obsession with Nicole's success lead to Nicole going crazy, cutting herself after the slightest stressful situation, chopping off her mother's ring finger at a Tri-delt social event and disappearing. Bitty Jack Carlson's attempts at making something out of her destitute past is always crushed by Sarina's, sometimes not deliberate, acts to stomp everyone down. The two met at an exclusive summer camp where well-to-do Southern families send their children. Bitty Jack's father was caretaker of the facility and she was forced to bunk with the snobs who thought of her as second-class. Her hatred of Sarina began with the teasing thirteen-year-olds often do, escalated when Sarina falsely accused Jack Carlson of spying on her in the bathroom, and peaked when Sarina used that lie to get Bitty Jack's boyfriend and a bid for homecoming queen. The storyline is unique and entertaining but is ruined by the outlandish ending. Ellis's book is an argument that fun reading cannot be well written. It's not a literary masterpiece but can provide mindless entertainment on a lazy afternoon. (But I just have to like a book that quotes the Bama fight song.)