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A review by garytay23
Agnes at the End of the World by Kelly McWilliams
2.0
TL;DR The book has a promising start with themes of pandemic, escaping a cult and finding yourself outside of rigid societal and religious structures, but doesn’t follow through and has a hollow ending where most of the characters are unchanged or end up exactly where they started.
First 100 pages were a solid read. I enjoyed the exploration of Agnes and Beth’s life in the cult, alongside the stress of the Outside, Ezekiel and the growing sense that something (the pandemic) is going wrong. However, after part one and especially part two, I feel like the plot was trying to do too many things, and I didn’t really like the direction they took with Agnes. I was happy that Agnes got out and enjoyed the character exploration of her and Ezekiel facing the real world and really having to confront their faith head on, but the plot of her becoming a prophet destined to end the pandemic felt kind of out of nowhere to me. (Also, I had a hard time picturing the virus and its effects. I feel like a bog standard zombie virus or even just deadly cold virus would have been more interesting and effective.)
Especially towards the latter half of the book, a lot of things felt contrived. They have to leave the library cuz people like burning down towns? Okay, fair enough. Wait Agnes is being called to some sort of mental trial that breaks her hand again? Okay, kind of out of nowhere but I’m with it for now. They walked all the way to the hospital only for it to be burned down? Hmm. Well that one is a bummer but-However don’t worry somehow she became friends with the leader of the bad burning people and he’s actually good and will give her insulin if she takes them to a safe place which ends up being her old cult home and she actually was SUPPOSED to go there the whole time on her mission to save the world! Okay wait hold on-And now suddenly this mission is a suicide mission and she’s going to die healing the world by touching the frozen cult members for some reason but fortunately her doctor atheist boyfriend manages to save her and now she’s running the religion and forgives the bad prophet who burns himself to death and all the bad adults died when she did her magic but fortunately all the good little kids were alive and okay and then for some reason she meets the great granddaughter of her ancestor who married the first bad prophet with powers and so somehow this ten year old has the powers too and she’s gonna run the church when Agnes dies cuz Agnes lost her powers saving the world but is still a great prophet of this totally-not-a-cult now OKAY I am officially very lost.
It was just way too much to throw at us in the last part of the book and I’m not even sure what the conclusion of everything was supposed to be. Agnes saves the world, but also kind of doesn’t because there’s still plague in the world. Agnes and Beth want to escape the cult and experience the real world, but end up back home by the end, Beth is just barely deciding to leave during the epilogue and Agnes decides to start her own religion for some reason run in the same place where she was abused for years. All the bad people die but without really any comeuppance (except for Beth hitting the prophet with her car, that was awesome. But even then he lives and gets to be forgiven by God/Agnes and chooses to kill himself. I think a forgettable, accidental death where he is left alone on the side of the road after abandoning his cult and being abandoned in return would have been way more fitting for an abusive, narcissistic man that thinks the world of himself.) and honestly the status quo kind of continues with Agnes ~but without the BAD religion stuff~ (which is questionable given that the diaries of previous leaders supposedly implied that most of the men started out righteous but went mad with power when they lost their special abilities, WHICH AGNES HAS ALSO LOST).
Ultimately it was a book with an interesting beginning and intriguing characters that however failed to deliver on any promises it made at the beginning. The conclusion left me unsatisfied and not sure what to walk away with.
First 100 pages were a solid read. I enjoyed the exploration of Agnes and Beth’s life in the cult, alongside the stress of the Outside, Ezekiel and the growing sense that something (the pandemic) is going wrong. However, after part one and especially part two, I feel like the plot was trying to do too many things, and I didn’t really like the direction they took with Agnes. I was happy that Agnes got out and enjoyed the character exploration of her and Ezekiel facing the real world and really having to confront their faith head on, but the plot of her becoming a prophet destined to end the pandemic felt kind of out of nowhere to me. (Also, I had a hard time picturing the virus and its effects. I feel like a bog standard zombie virus or even just deadly cold virus would have been more interesting and effective.)
Especially towards the latter half of the book, a lot of things felt contrived. They have to leave the library cuz people like burning down towns? Okay, fair enough. Wait Agnes is being called to some sort of mental trial that breaks her hand again? Okay, kind of out of nowhere but I’m with it for now. They walked all the way to the hospital only for it to be burned down? Hmm. Well that one is a bummer but-However don’t worry somehow she became friends with the leader of the bad burning people and he’s actually good and will give her insulin if she takes them to a safe place which ends up being her old cult home and she actually was SUPPOSED to go there the whole time on her mission to save the world! Okay wait hold on-And now suddenly this mission is a suicide mission and she’s going to die healing the world by touching the frozen cult members for some reason but fortunately her doctor atheist boyfriend manages to save her and now she’s running the religion and forgives the bad prophet who burns himself to death and all the bad adults died when she did her magic but fortunately all the good little kids were alive and okay and then for some reason she meets the great granddaughter of her ancestor who married the first bad prophet with powers and so somehow this ten year old has the powers too and she’s gonna run the church when Agnes dies cuz Agnes lost her powers saving the world but is still a great prophet of this totally-not-a-cult now OKAY I am officially very lost.
It was just way too much to throw at us in the last part of the book and I’m not even sure what the conclusion of everything was supposed to be. Agnes saves the world, but also kind of doesn’t because there’s still plague in the world. Agnes and Beth want to escape the cult and experience the real world, but end up back home by the end, Beth is just barely deciding to leave during the epilogue and Agnes decides to start her own religion for some reason run in the same place where she was abused for years. All the bad people die but without really any comeuppance (except for Beth hitting the prophet with her car, that was awesome. But even then he lives and gets to be forgiven by God/Agnes and chooses to kill himself. I think a forgettable, accidental death where he is left alone on the side of the road after abandoning his cult and being abandoned in return would have been way more fitting for an abusive, narcissistic man that thinks the world of himself.) and honestly the status quo kind of continues with Agnes ~but without the BAD religion stuff~ (which is questionable given that the diaries of previous leaders supposedly implied that most of the men started out righteous but went mad with power when they lost their special abilities, WHICH AGNES HAS ALSO LOST).
Ultimately it was a book with an interesting beginning and intriguing characters that however failed to deliver on any promises it made at the beginning. The conclusion left me unsatisfied and not sure what to walk away with.