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“Men are forever thought of as boys. But girls? Once we’re mamas or once we’re ripe, we can never be girls again. Not in their eyes. But we are always girls and daughters, underneath. Always.”

What is the Book about?

Margot and Mama have lived by the forest since Margot can remember. When Margot isn’t at school, they spend quiet days together in their cottage, waiting for strangers to knock on their door. Strays, Mama calls them. Mama loves the strays. She feeds them wine, keeps them warm. Then she satisfies her burning appetite by picking apart their bodies.

But Mama’s want is stronger than her hunger sometimes, and when a white-toothed stray named Eden turns up in the heart of a snowstorm, little Margot must confront the shifting dynamics of her family, untangle her own desires and make a bid for freedom.

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Rating
Plot ★★★★☆
Characters ★★★★★
Creep Factor ★★☆☆☆
Atmosphere ★★★★★
Writing Style ★★★★★

Favourite Character
Margot

My thoughts while reading it

The Lamb did not just touch my heart, it ate it. And in that lies the truth of this novel. It devours you, takes you apart, tastes every emotion you have and leaves behind only the pieces you never dared to hide. Like a cannibal that does not eat the body but the soul. I have rarely read a book that entered me so deeply that I felt it chewing on my thoughts, my fears and my questions about love, motherhood and human dependence. This book is not horror in the traditional sense. It is horror in the form of emotional truths. It is an ancient folktale pulled into the present, wrapped in blood and longing. A story that feels as if it was once whispered around a fire, yet cuts painfully close to modern life. A fairy tale that writes itself into your blood.

When a book makes you ask yourself what motherly love even is, whether it is a natural instinct or sometimes simply a duty or maybe a way to stabilize your own sense of worth, then you know it will never let you go. These are exactly the questions The Lamb stirred in me. I could not help but pause and wonder whether love is always something pure or whether it is in truth much more often a craving. A need. A hunger. A hole that must be filled with something, anything. The cannibalism that many initially see as the central horror element is in truth only the tool Lucy Rose uses to dissect love with brutally honest precision.

Cannibalism in this story is not presented as a wild or desperate act but as something the mother plans and performs with unsettling intention. She does not simply kill strangers who wander too close to the cabin. She brings them in herself. She softens her voice, offers warmth, lets them sit by the fire. She gives them wine, kindness, a sense of safety. And she does it deliberately, because she believes that people taste better when they feel calm, cared for, even special. Margot watches this from the sidelines, not with shock but with the quiet acceptance of someone who has never known another version of life. She learns early that a smile from her mother can be part of a trap, that hospitality is only the first step of a ritual. And once the door closes, everything shifts. What follows is methodical. Practical. Bodies become food. Meat is cut, cooked, chewed. The book describes this plainly, almost casually, mirroring the way Margot has learned to see it. Cannibalism is not the core horror of The Lamb but the system that sustains the household, a daily practice meant to satisfy a hunger that goes far beyond the physical.

And all of this unfolds in a setting so filthy, raw, and unpleasantly real that you can almost smell the stale air inside the cabin. Yet beneath the grime and decay, there is something deeply folkloric about it, as if this place belongs to an old story where the forest watches, the walls remember, and hunger becomes a living thing. This is not a romantically decaying fairy tale house, but a space where life itself seems to rot. The kitchen is sticky with old grease, the floor layered with dirt, the bathroom drain clogged with dark, repulsive hairs clinging to the grate. The walls are stained, the mattresses thin, and the stench of damp clothes, blood, and physicality lingers in every scene. A thousand small details tighten your throat. The dull knife that never becomes clean. The bowls crusted with scraps. The water that never runs clear. The crumbs that never disappear. The cold seeping through the wood. This cabin is not just a setting. It is the physical expression of a decaying inner life, the heart of a dark legend where desperation and routine coexist.

The mother figure embodies this hunger in a way that shocked me and unsettled me deeply. And I want to be very clear: she is a terrible mother. Her actions are cruel, selfish and inexcusable. I do not idealize her. But The Lamb does not try to explain her away either. Instead, it shows something far more disturbing. That people are often driven by their own needs, their own ego, their own sense of entitlement. Not every cruelty has a tragic origin. Sometimes it simply grows quietly, unchecked, until it consumes everything around it. The mother is not meant to be understood or forgiven. She is meant to be seen. I have rarely read a mother character who felt so raw, so ugly, so human. Her love for Margot is not gentle or unconditional. It is fragmented, desperate, transactional. The taboo of motherhood is cut open here like meat on a board. She does not love her child enough or she loves her in the wrong way or only as long as Margot gives her something in return. She is overwhelmed, lonely, frustrated and everything she cannot give her daughter she seeks elsewhere. The most painful truth is that Margot is never enough for her.

And yet, Margot remains the emotional center of this story. It is fascinating how she manages to preserve a quiet sense of normality within herself despite everything that surrounds her. Despite blood, hunger, neglect and a mother oscillating between control and need, Margot remains remarkably clear and grounded. She does not collapse. She does not disappear into the chaos. There is a core of humanity inside her that refuses to be consumed. She reflects everyone who grew up in toxic or destructive environments and still tried to become something gentler. A child raised in such a world can still dream, hope, love, and build a moral compass of her own. Her strength is quiet, but it shines through every page.

One character who affected me deeply was the bus driver, a figure I initially mistrusted. Because the book is so grotesque, I assumed he would be another threat, another corrupted presence. Instead, he became the only genuinely kind person in Margot’s life. The only one who gives her warmth without expecting anything in return. The closest thing to family she ever has. His presence stirred something personal in me. I remembered sitting on a bus as a child, overwhelmed, and being noticed by a bus driver who spoke to me kindly and made me feel safe. Sometimes it is strangers who offer us our first experience of real humanity.

In terms of language, The Lamb is relentless. Lucy Rose writes with a voice that is sharp and tender at the same time. Her prose is poetic, visceral and brutally honest. The horror is never there just to shock. Every scene has purpose. Every description matters. This is not a book you simply read. You experience it. You taste the words. You smell them. You feel them. And sometimes you want to look away, but you cannot.

What unsettled me most is the emotional honesty that runs through every line. This book does not just question motherhood, but love itself. The desire to be accepted. The fear of emptiness. The question of whether love is ever selfless, or whether it is often just a way to keep ourselves from falling apart. The Lamb shows love not as salvation, but as hunger. As need. As consumption. Something that can comfort and destroy at the same time.

For me, The Lamb is a masterpiece. A modern folktale with deep roots in myth and teeth sunk firmly into the present. A book that does not rely on cheap shocks, but on psychological depth, emotional brutality, and literary power. It is dark, grotesque, poetic, and unforgettable.
In the end, The Lamb leaves you with a single, devastating truth: the most dangerous form of cannibalism is not eating flesh, but feeding on love until there is nothing left of the person being consumed.

Reading Recommendation? ✓
Favourite? ✓