Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White

32 reviews

bookwormbi's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I am disturbed but the writing was beautiful 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Deadnaming, Gun violence, Transphobia, Violence, Vomit, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Ableism, Domestic abuse, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Racism

five_rats_in_a_trenchcoat's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Deadnaming, Genocide, Gore, Transphobia, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child death, Eating disorder, Homophobia, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Self harm, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, and Dysphoria

foiblesandfiction's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I've been sitting on this review for a couple of weeks because I'm just not sure how I feel about the book.

I loved it.  I also didn't necessarily like it.  And maybe those are two different things, just like we are able to love people without liking them, which makes sense for me because my mind tends to personify all books.  Books have feelings, too.

This story sank it's teeth right into my religious trauma, and the resonating ache from that is why I love this story so.  The character names, the Bible verses, the rules and judgements and negative self-talk.  I felt, I feel, all of that.  It's all very twisty and knotted up in my chest so I won't be able to say very much more than that, to be honest.  Too raw, too messy. 

Forget about the body horror, my issue was the Christians lol

Sorry Christians!  Kind of.

Why I disconnected from this story was due to the writing itself.  It's gorgeous and it's also a lot.  It doesn't read like the first-person point of view of a sixteen year old kid.  Unfortunately, this kept taking me out of the story.

Recommended for fans of Ava Reid.  If, like me, you found yourself highlighting entire paragraphs of The Wolf and the Woodsman, or disturbingly delighted at the cannibalistic horror of Juniper & Thorn, you'll find something to enjoy in this young adult horror novel as well.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Cannibalism, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Lesbophobia, Fire/Fire injury, Outing, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, and Injury/Injury detail

vulgarboy's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This was... a ride. A lot of internal struggles, which were fine in the beginning but quickly lost their magic and became more annoying as the book went on. The concept was interesting, but there wasn't enough of an explanation on how things had gotten so bad so fast. While I don't want to poorly summarize it as a "pseudo-zombie story," that's kind of what it is. Benji is immune and a more advanced form of grace/abomination/infected. There weren't times I was on the edge of my seat. I want to say I enjoyed this book, but I'm not so sure. 

The handling of queer folks, POC, and neurodivergent folks was pretty spot on. Some things were a bit blunt, such as an autistic character having a stim toy being acknowledged for the first time, followed by an immediate "he's autistic" exxplanation. Neopronouns were used, which I haven't seen before. There's a clear amount of care with these characters, but it fell short a few times. Benji's deadname being in the book doesn't sit right with me (a transmasc person), as well as it being used approximately eight times. Yikes. 

All in all, an excessive amount of vomit and gore aside (both of them happening Constantly), I didn't hate my experience. This story sure did happen.  

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Body horror, Child abuse, Deadnaming, Death, Gore, Homophobia, Transphobia, Violence, Vomit, Religious bigotry, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Gun violence, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Xenophobia, Suicide attempt, and Gaslighting

Minor: Cannibalism

cfell's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Racism, Self harm, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Dysphoria, and Injury/Injury detail

otherworlds's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

today, again, on books that made me cry -

(and in this case, books that also made me seethe in anger, delight in unapologetic queerness, and yell out loud: "oh, shiiiit")

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Deadnaming, Transphobia, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Physical abuse, Racism, Vomit, and Death of parent

Cults, religious abuse

goinghost's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful reflective tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

I loved this book. Read it in the span of like four hours and feel completely blindsided by finishing it. It was amazing the whole way through and I spent at least half an hour gushing to my partner about the reasons I loved it. Beautiful prose, well-crafted characters, a tight plot, and strong themes that punch you in the gut the entire way through the book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Deadnaming, Genocide, Gore, Transphobia, Blood, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Physical abuse, Racism, and Self harm

bi_n_large's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

This is so good and also WOW the body horror is a lot.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Medical trauma, and Death of parent

Moderate: Racism and Transphobia

aexileigh's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Dysphoria, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Racism, Self harm, Sexual content, Terminal illness, and Suicide attempt

cucuriouscarnifex's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Misogyny, and Violence

Moderate: Deadnaming, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Gaslighting, and Dysphoria

The antagonists are a right wing Christian cult and all bigotry and abuse is done by them and condemned within the narrative