Trigger warning: this book review discusses topics related to eating disorders. Reader discretion is advised.
With its mysterious dark red cover, Rhea Krčmářová’s MONSTROSA defies all expectations. The novel, published in 2023, navigates the life of Isabella Vleck, a talented opera singer who has been fighting with her inner monsters since childhood. By her ‘monsters’, Isabella refers to her relationship with food, resulting in a battle with Bulimia, referred to as ‘Mia’ in the text. The passionate singer is referred to an eating disorder clinic by her vocal teacher where she encounters the problems of the 21st century but amplified in this enclosed space. She witnesses how the other younger patients suffering with eating disorders engage in harmful social media trends and chat groups hindering their recovery. The novel is as a result at times brutally raw.
The author has herself experience with the world of opera, having been engaged with theatre studies. Born in Prague, Czech Republic, and then growing up in Vienna, she graduated from the Institute of Language Arts at the University of Applied Arts. Her mixing of both the themes of opera and text production fits well into the form of MONSTROSA.
What makes this story unique is its contemporariness, taking place in 2020, when the Corona Virus began to impact everyone from all walks of life. Referred to in the book as the ‘virus’, the progression of the story aligns itself with the extent to which COVID-19 affected the daily goings-on in healthcare services, such as a lack of staff available to care for the patients, as well as an overloaded health service on the brink of collapse, struggling to handle the unprecedented situation at hand. It also affects how she sees her future after the clinic, causing concerns as to whether her upcoming singing contest will be cancelled or not (it ends up getting postponed because of the virus).
Not only is the story multifaceted in its themes, but the form of the book is too. Split into acts, as if the entire novel is an opera, the author plays with the idea of the significance of singing to Isabella by letting it inform the structure of the book. In addition, italic texts are visually separate from the main dialogue, whereby a side-story about the monsters in Isabella’s life runs alongside it. The reader thus receives a diverse perspective on the main character's thought processes and how her illness affects her everyday life. The author’s engagement with multiple text genres within the book should not come as a surprise – her artistic practices focus primarily on transmedial text art projects. More information on the author can be found here.
MONSTROSA is a timeless piece of literature which informs, scares, but also reminds us that being there for one another and loving ourselves and our bodies for what they are, are some of the most important things contributing to our happiness and quality of life.
By Chloe Beechinor-Collins
This review was written for the ACF London's EXPLORE OUR LIBRARY initiative.
