Reviews tagging 'Animal death'

Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White

27 reviews

blairextraordinaire's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child death, Deadnaming, Death, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Confinement, Grief, Dysphoria, and Classism

valpal77's review against another edition

dark hopeful mysterious sad 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Cursing, Deadnaming, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Sexism, Torture, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Excrement, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Outing, Gaslighting, Dysphoria, War, and Injury/Injury detail

evanbowie's review against another edition

emotional reflective tense medium-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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Physical abuse, Transphobia, Violence, Religious bigotry, and Dysphoria

Moderate: Animal death, Child death, Cursing, Death, Homophobia, Sexual content, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail

atlanticgiantpumpkin's review against another edition

challenging dark tense fast-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 now my favorite book. I love the characters, the fact that I felt like I knew these people in real life. Theo ripped my heart in two, Nick intrigued me beyond belief, and I felt Benji’s pain every step of the way. I felt punched in the gut, betrayed, stabbed in the back, and I resonated with so many emotions and thoughts. I totally recommend this to anyone during spooky season — if you can stomach it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Physical abuse, Torture, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Bullying, Child death, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Mass/school shootings, Suicide attempt, and Dysphoria

Minor: Animal death, Body shaming, Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, and Suicidal thoughts

Don’t read this if you’re easily queasy.

hailslynn's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional inspiring reflective sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

Required readying imo. I ate this shit up! I genuinely wish it was longer because I just wanted more of what the book was. My only critique is I wish there was a little more description on what the Graces were/looked like in the beginning. I hope to see a lot more from Andrew because he’s definitely now a must buy author for me

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Deadnaming, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Transphobia, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, and Death of parent

Moderate: Classism

schausjk's review against another edition

dark hopeful tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

The body horror in this was well written, and the religious nature of the cult was compelling. The religious trauma felt fairly authentic, and the biblical quotes throughout were very helpful in that regard. The dynamics between Benji, Nick, and Theo had a lot of potential, but I would have liked to have seen more from 

Nick regarding Theo and their shared history.

. Since the love of the queer community is a main component of the novel, it really would have been nice to have seen more acts of love or explorations of love in context.
However, I found most of the characters that weren't the main trio to be really one dimensional. It's one thing when it's just a random side characters that get that treatment, but even characters that are super relevant to the plot (like Benji's parents) felt like they were really boiled down to just one or maaaybe two traits in a way that didn't feel believable and took away from my general immersion. It gets worse when those really flat side characters are meant to be different types of representation. It's good in theory, but in practice it felt very tokenizing.
I also would have appreciated more worldbuilding on what more of the world looks like. 

If the main headquarters of the church is in a random city in Pennsylvania and they can't even stamp out a group of starving kids that have been systematically killing off their people, what would the rest of the world look like? I find it very hard to believe that the Flood decimated everywhere but the place it was created.

 
The last thing that bothered me was the sense of time. I know it's set like 15-20 years in the future, but it all reads very much like it's from 2020-2021. A lot of the same discourse within the queer community still happening despite the literal apocalypse, a lot of the same slang, and of course the obvious comparison to the ongoing pandemic. It really could have benefitted from either being set in the nearer future or from more development on how the community may have changed.

Ultimately, this book was an awesome premise, but wound up being mostly just disappointing. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Deadnaming, Death, Gore, Homophobia, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Grief, Religious bigotry, and Death of parent

Moderate: Child death, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Terminal illness, Torture, Vomit, Medical trauma, Dysphoria, War, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal death, Sexual content, Colonisation, and Classism

oliverreeds's review against another edition

challenging dark tense medium-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? It's complicated

5.0

im screaming. this is one of my favorite books. as a trans kid born in georgia, damn. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Cursing, Deadnaming, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Self harm, Toxic relationship, Transphobia, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Kidnapping, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Injury/Injury detail