Scan barcode
A review by leftovergarlicbread
Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White
adventurous
dark
emotional
hopeful
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
4.5
I absolutely LOVED this book!! Finding a story about a trans masculine main character that isn't tokenized, or made into a story about girlhood and femininity, and instead has him be not only so solidly sent in his identity but for the story to actually CELEBRATE his masculinity. As a transmasculine person myself it was so truly refreshing and gave me something I didn't know I needed.
I found all the characters to be incredibly lovable and fun to read about. I loved their dynamics with each other. Nick was easily my favorite. The few chapters we got from his perspective were all such a treat and added such a fun layer. I loved loved loved how his autism was written. AJW , the author is trans and autistic himself, and you can see that in how he writes these characters. Nick's autism felt so real and authentic without any of the weird stiltedness that can often come from non autistic authors trying to create autistic characters. I found him to be such a compelling and interesting character, how we got to see him do everything he could to avoid growing closer to Benji and still doing so regardless. How we got to see his outside persona, his masking, from Benji's perspective, and then got to see the rawness underneath in his chapters.
I also found Benji to be such a compelling main character. His motivation of "Be good" was done so well. We see him trying to honor his father with this, and trying to balance that with his personal desire for revenge and how he uses "be good" as reasoning for his actions even when it maybe doesn't exactly work. He was so desperate to be anything but what the church wanted him to be, and we see how that intense desire to distance himself from the church and their expectations of him affects him and leads him to decisions both good and bad.
I did find it a little distracting how Benji seemed to constantly switch between being very unaware of queer culture and shocked by diversity -on account of growing up in a literal evangelical cult- and then suddenly seeming quite well read on modern activist takes on race, class, and queerness. I wish we had gotten a little more of how growing up in the cult affected Benji socially and culturally. I wish we got to see him actively learn more about the actual world and learned more about these things from his peers rather than just coming in already with this oddly out of place activist knowledge.
I think the reason this doesn't have a 5 star from me is the ending. The ending is good, it's a nice ending, but I think my main problem with it is that it's a little too nice. The whole book is filled with tradgedy and hardship and death and struggles, and I feel like the ending comes together a little too nicely and happily in tone compared to the rest of the book. Like, i'm GLAD that the characters got a happy ending I was so rooting for them to be happy, but I feel it would have been a little more satisfying with a slightly darker tone to the ending. The ending is also rather open, leaving a lot of room for the reader to imagine where they go from there, but I felt like the ending was a little too open for me personally.
Overall though, this was, despite it's rather heavy story and themes, was such a comforting book to read. It was so unapologetically, loudly queer. It's defiant and hopeful despite the bleak circumstances. In the end it's about community and found family and acceptance and embracing your differences, down to your more "monstrous" and ugly ones. It's about breaking cycles of trauma and trying to be better, despite, despite, despite. It's resilient and beautiful and authentic and messily and angrily queer.
I can absolutely see myself revisiting this and I am absolutely planning reading White's other books too.
I found all the characters to be incredibly lovable and fun to read about. I loved their dynamics with each other. Nick was easily my favorite. The few chapters we got from his perspective were all such a treat and added such a fun layer. I loved loved loved how his autism was written. AJW , the author is trans and autistic himself, and you can see that in how he writes these characters. Nick's autism felt so real and authentic without any of the weird stiltedness that can often come from non autistic authors trying to create autistic characters. I found him to be such a compelling and interesting character, how we got to see him do everything he could to avoid growing closer to Benji and still doing so regardless. How we got to see his outside persona, his masking, from Benji's perspective, and then got to see the rawness underneath in his chapters.
I also found Benji to be such a compelling main character. His motivation of "Be good" was done so well. We see him trying to honor his father with this, and trying to balance that with his personal desire for revenge and how he uses "be good" as reasoning for his actions even when it maybe doesn't exactly work. He was so desperate to be anything but what the church wanted him to be, and we see how that intense desire to distance himself from the church and their expectations of him affects him and leads him to decisions both good and bad.
I did find it a little distracting how Benji seemed to constantly switch between being very unaware of queer culture and shocked by diversity -on account of growing up in a literal evangelical cult- and then suddenly seeming quite well read on modern activist takes on race, class, and queerness. I wish we had gotten a little more of how growing up in the cult affected Benji socially and culturally. I wish we got to see him actively learn more about the actual world and learned more about these things from his peers rather than just coming in already with this oddly out of place activist knowledge.
I think the reason this doesn't have a 5 star from me is the ending. The ending is good, it's a nice ending, but I think my main problem with it is that it's a little too nice. The whole book is filled with tradgedy and hardship and death and struggles, and I feel like the ending comes together a little too nicely and happily in tone compared to the rest of the book. Like, i'm GLAD that the characters got a happy ending I was so rooting for them to be happy, but I feel it would have been a little more satisfying with a slightly darker tone to the ending. The ending is also rather open, leaving a lot of room for the reader to imagine where they go from there, but I felt like the ending was a little too open for me personally.
Overall though, this was, despite it's rather heavy story and themes, was such a comforting book to read. It was so unapologetically, loudly queer. It's defiant and hopeful despite the bleak circumstances. In the end it's about community and found family and acceptance and embracing your differences, down to your more "monstrous" and ugly ones. It's about breaking cycles of trauma and trying to be better, despite, despite, despite. It's resilient and beautiful and authentic and messily and angrily queer.
I can absolutely see myself revisiting this and I am absolutely planning reading White's other books too.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Genocide, Gore, Blood, Vomit, and Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Deadnaming, Death, Transphobia, Religious bigotry, and Death of parent
Minor: Sexual content and Toxic relationship