There was never any doubt that I was going to read What Feeds Below. You know it, I know it, errbody knows it. Why? Because it is the first book being published by Boozhoo books, an imprint at Bindery being run by one of my close friends, @Naomi Darling.

So yeah, I read it. Now, let's talk about it.

What Feeds Below follows two teenagers who work in The Void--a huge cave system that descends miles into the earth, made up of five distinct layers. The Void has drawn large crowds of tourists since it was discovered years ago. Especially wealthier, more privileged people, because it is layered in treasure and advanced technology. However, it is also filled with unimaginable horrors: monsters, creatures, aggressive animals, even plants and fungus that can and will kill anyone who comes near enough to be caught. Which is where people like Petra and Jade come into play. As locals, they have been trained since a young age on how to survive the void. So it falls to them to act as tour guides for the privileged visitors who are hungry to grow their fortunes. They guide them down and get paid to make sure they make it home.

They have been doing this job for years now, saving up to start a more stable, less dangerous business of their own. But they have grown tired of the hustle. Tired of wondering when one mistake will be the end for one of, or both of, them. So this time, they are going to go deeper than they have ever gone before. They have played it safe for years, only going so far as they know they can keep themselves safe. But they know if they go deeper, even by one layer, they will have a better chance of finding a treasure that could set them up for life. Only when they do, as you would expect, it doesn't go as they expect. They are attacked. One of them gets lost. And when the other goes for help, the only one willing to help makes her promise to accompany them to the very bottom of the Void in exchange.

I'll leave it there and transition to talking about the conversations the book is having. Because you know me. I love a conversation.

What Feeds Below is obviously having a conversation about capitalism. It is taking a terrifying (and DISGUSTING) story about twelve legged cave worms and zombie neighbors and talking about the way that the systemic exploitation of the poor doesn't just create a class of people who horde an immoral percentage of the world's wealth, but actually creates conditions that endangers everyone not privileged enough to be born on top. In The Void, everyone is in danger. But only those unlucky enough to be born on its borders are forced to spend their lives facing its dangers over and over and over again. Only the people so poor that their only hope of a future is to learn how to navigate certain death in order to feed the curiosities of the rich.

For the rich, danger is a thrill that they may face once and then go back to their life just as rich as they've always been, or even richer if they are lucky. Meanwhile people like Petra and Jade will spend their entire lives pretending there is a way out, while knowing that their actual future will probably end one day right there in the place they have spent years fighting for a way out.

In What Feeds Below, Tatiana asks us to question what price we are actually paying when we play the game the oligarchs and politicians insist is our way out. She asks us to examine the American dream and to refuse to look away from the long trail of missing limbs and rotten corpses as we try to imagine the fame and fortune we are pretending to believe is possible.

This book is not a criticism of the rich, but of the world that was built to feed them. And at its core, it is a reminder that the one that was built for the rest of us was never meant to be survivable.

I definitely recommend you order a copy to support Tatiana and Naomi. And I am going to ask you to use this specific link, because I get a small commission when you order from my bookshop storefront: https://bookshop.org/a/87137/9781967967247

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