Raphael Montes, the internationally bestselling writer who has been touted as Brazil’s most prominent thriller author, brings his most lauded novel to America --- the tightly paced and provocatively drawn THE SECRET DINNER.

Hailing from the rural, deeply Christian village known as Pingo-d'Água, Dante, Piglet, Miguel and Hugo are just your average students trying to make it in the adult world amid the ashes of the financial crisis. Though they have been able to secure a spectacular apartment near Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, their luck has otherwise run out. 

Dante, who dreams of becoming a major entrepreneur, wastes away his days at a dead-end bookstore job. Piglet, who never even made it past his first semester of college, gorges himself on fast food, marijuana and video games. Miguel is embarking on what should be a lucrative medical career but worries about his mother back home, who is dying of stomach cancer. Hugo, an ego-ridden chef, has become blacklisted at every restaurant and kitchen in Rio thanks to his smart mouth. 

When the young men blow what little savings they have on securing a sex worker for virginal Piglet, they lay the groundwork for the beginning of their downfall. Enamored of Cora, Piglet uses their rent money to buy her extravagant gifts, putting them $25,000 in debt and leaving them nearly homeless. With little left to do, they have an idea. Working from a credited dining site (think Airbnb, but for food), they agree to host a fabulous, upscale dinner in their apartment at $3,000 a plate. But in trusting Piglet --- he’s a tech genius, if a slovenly, overweight one --- they make their second mistake. Either on a lark or as a result of his own twisted childhood trauma, Piglet makes the listing but with one major swap. According to their post, they will be serving a delicacy: human meat.

"Montes wields his chainsaws and body bags with aplomb, making even the young men’s worst actions seem strangely --- dare I say satisfyingly --- inevitable, right down to the novel’s cinematic ending that readers will never see coming, complete with an ironic soundtrack."

The plan is outrageous, shocking and morally reprehensible. Dante, Miguel and even smarmy Hugo swiftly decline…until they start to see reason. Miguel has access to already deceased bodies through his job at the hospital; Piglet has the means to digitally verify every guest and ensure no ties to the police; Hugo has the culinary skills; and Dante, the charming, well-dressed one, is more than capable of acting as host and manager. Even Cora --- who was born and raised on a rural farm --- is entrusted with the task of, ahem, butchering their meat.

For their inaugural event, they host a lawyer at a boutique firm, an aging socialite, an activist, an engineer, a congressman, and, most notably, Umberto M. M., an aristocrat in name if not in liquid capital. The dinner is a rousing and lucrative success, and if the young men are still uneasy about the main ingredient, their discomfort is soon assuaged by the fact that their rent is paid and they all can breathe a little easier.

However, it isn’t long before the greedy and power-hungry Umberto manipulates Dante, Piglet, Miguel and Hugo into not only hosting more dinners, but including him in their scheme to the tune of a 50-50 split: 50 to him and 50 to be divided among the four of them. It’s an unbalanced deal, but with Umberto’s notoriety comes expensive gifts, police paid to look the other way, and eventually bodies. Lots of bodies. As it turns out, human meat is addictive, and Rio’s wealthy elite are more than happy to pay for a new experience. 

But with every dinner comes a fracturing. Miguel, sworn to heal and protect patients, begins to crack under the notion that he has inadvertently contributed to the taking of human lives and the abuse of their remains. Hugo delights in the praise heaped upon his elaborate dishes, but also turns mercurial and abusive. Piglet, obsessed with his now-girlfriend, Cora, continues to gorge on food, sex, and his increasingly hacker-like dives on the dark web to discover everything he can about their guests, Umberto and the human meat trade. And Dante, who speaks to us directly as he unpacks every sordid, gruesome, gory detail, descends into a life of addiction and excess, embarking on not-so-safe orgies at night. Simply put, the gang is falling apart. But the demand is higher than ever.

As Umberto’s control over the group tightens, they learn that he is only second in command to someone much larger, more powerful and more violent. As Miguel in particular struggles with the weight of their actions, Dante starts to question the chain of command and how he can protect himself and his friends…before they wind up on the table themselves. 

Though the ensuing scenes are full --- and I do mean full --- of gore and deeply unsettling discussions about the price we pay for consumption, Raphael Montes takes a searing, razor-sharp edge with his commentary. He weaves conversations about the economy, systemic pressures, childhood trauma and the ethics of wealth into bloody, shocking scenes as horrifying as those in a Stephen King novel --- if King wrote a particularly horrifying cookbook. 

Dante implicates us into his plots and schemes, from the most mundane (reading Cora’s terrible poetry) to the harrowing (a literal human slaughterhouse). This creates an immersive, fast-paced plot that reads a bit like a car crash in that you simply cannot look away, no matter how disturbing the scene. Setting the men’s actions against the aftermath of the financial crisis, Montes asks readers to wonder just how far they’d go for success, money and rent, and what it means when we start to pay with our morals. “My survival instincts,” Dante tells us in one powerful scene, “took over my sense of justice.” And when you read this book, you’ll understand why.

THE SECRET DINNER is a propulsive blend of literary thriller and outright horror. Though some may balk at the excessive gore, Montes wields his chainsaws and body bags with aplomb, making even the young men’s worst actions seem strangely --- dare I say satisfyingly --- inevitable, right down to the novel’s cinematic ending that readers will never see coming, complete with an ironic soundtrack. Montes is deft with his use of literary devices, from red herrings to childhood trauma and even unsent letters, employing them to push forward his narrative and to confront his audience with difficult questions of morality and complicity. 

This book is perfect for readers of Adrian McKinty, Mark Edwards and Peter Swanson, as well as those who loved the 2022 horror/comedy film, The Menu. Bon appétit!