Sly, surprising, and razor-sharp, Natural Beauty follows a young musician into an elite, beauty-obsessed world where perfection comes at a staggering cost.
Our narrator produces a sound from the piano no one else at the Conservatory can. She employs a technique she learned from her parents—also talented musicians—who fled China in the wake of the Cultural Revolution. But when an accident leaves her parents debilitated, she abandons her future for a job at a high-end beauty and wellness store in New York City.
Holistik is known for its remarkable products and procedures—from remoras that suck out cheap Botox to eyelash extensions made of spider silk—and her new job affords her entry into a world of privilege and a long-awaited sense of belonging. She becomes transfixed by Helen, the niece of Holistik’s charismatic owner, and the two strike up a friendship that hazily veers into more. All the while, our narrator …
Sly, surprising, and razor-sharp, Natural Beauty follows a young musician into an elite, beauty-obsessed world where perfection comes at a staggering cost.
Our narrator produces a sound from the piano no one else at the Conservatory can. She employs a technique she learned from her parents—also talented musicians—who fled China in the wake of the Cultural Revolution. But when an accident leaves her parents debilitated, she abandons her future for a job at a high-end beauty and wellness store in New York City.
Holistik is known for its remarkable products and procedures—from remoras that suck out cheap Botox to eyelash extensions made of spider silk—and her new job affords her entry into a world of privilege and a long-awaited sense of belonging. She becomes transfixed by Helen, the niece of Holistik’s charismatic owner, and the two strike up a friendship that hazily veers into more. All the while, our narrator is plied with products that slim her thighs, smooth her skin, and lighten her hair. But beneath these creams and tinctures lies something sinister.
A piercing, darkly funny debut, Natural Beauty explores questions of consumerism, self-worth, race, and identity—and leaves readers with a shocking and unsettling truth.
What, and I say this with all the intensity and fervor I can, the fuck.
If it wasn't so late in the year, if I weren't just barely keeping up with my Goodreads goal, this would've been a DNF almost immediately. Instead I said fuck it, let's see where this goes.
A weird body horror sex cult/human testing facility posing as a holistic makeup brand owned by a pedophile and managed by a woman nursing a monkey and who replaces her eyes with diamonds, is where it went.
This is honestly more of a 2.5 rounded up. I had a bizarre experience with this one. It was short and a breeze to read, so I did go ahead and finish, but it was kind of a mess.
I really enjoyed the writing style in general. The descriptions were evocative for me, and I'm someone who generally has a hard time caring about description. I also thought a lot of this was grotesquely creative. The disgusting imagery and the types of "spa treatments" Huang came up with got pretty wild.
Ultimately, though, it had too many problems for me. There was too much going on - between the narrator's past with the piano and her parents, the farm, the spa, the sex work, the pregnancy fix, Helen, Lilith, the cannibalism, Victor's attachment to the Conservatory - for such a short book, I needed more focus.
My other main problem …
This is honestly more of a 2.5 rounded up. I had a bizarre experience with this one. It was short and a breeze to read, so I did go ahead and finish, but it was kind of a mess.
I really enjoyed the writing style in general. The descriptions were evocative for me, and I'm someone who generally has a hard time caring about description. I also thought a lot of this was grotesquely creative. The disgusting imagery and the types of "spa treatments" Huang came up with got pretty wild.
Ultimately, though, it had too many problems for me. There was too much going on - between the narrator's past with the piano and her parents, the farm, the spa, the sex work, the pregnancy fix, Helen, Lilith, the cannibalism, Victor's attachment to the Conservatory - for such a short book, I needed more focus.
My other main problem was the narrator herself. I get being desperate for money - I get her going through all of this in order to help her parents. I even get a slow build of weird things making her less clear-eyed. But she came across as very dumb and passive. There often wasn't a slow build at all, so I needed her to react more than she was. For example, when she's told to see Imogen and then has to have an orgasm one way or another to be able to get back to work. That was a very sudden, weird thing but afterward our narrator is like "Well anyway!" I wanted to see her fully acknowledge how bizarre and uncomfortable it was, but come to a decision to stick to it for her parents. Or for her to feel it's all very strange but convince herself it's fine because the other women are acting like its normal. I wanted to see those thoughts play out in order to believe her as a character. Her "love" for Helen was also quite shallow (maybe intentionally? not sure), so I didn't care about that at all.
I do like how Huang ended the story for the narrator as a "monster." That was imaginative to me. I'm still interested in reading more from Huang because while I didn't think this execution worked, I do love this type of story. I hope she writes more like this.