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3.07 AVERAGE
3.07 AVERAGE
3.5. whenever i’m excited for a new book, it usually turns out trash (catherine house, lmao) but this one was different. my excitement was well worth it.
a creepy, gothic lovecraftian story which hooked me from the moment i saw the words “snake-handling cult.” i had a thoroughly good time with this one!
a creepy, gothic lovecraftian story which hooked me from the moment i saw the words “snake-handling cult.” i had a thoroughly good time with this one!
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Loved the premise but the book is amateurishly written and the characters are cardboard. Also, print journalism is nothing like how it's portrayed here. I gave up reading about halfway through as I just couldn't dredge up the motivation to finish it.
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Hoo boy. The description of this book was so compelling! And a woman horror author! I had really high hopes. Cosmic horror, cults, investigative journalist looking to expose secrets of a cult and stumbling into things far more messed up than she assumed...
But the writing is bad. This book is bad. I thought at first I was being too harsh on it, it's a debut novel, and while the execution wasn't great, maybe the great concepts could carry it through to being a decent read.
They could not.
The characters in this novel are caricatures. Within the first two pages of the book we are introduced to a 'tough woman journalist' with trauma from sexual abuse as a child from a religious leader. We never learn anything else about her in the remaining 300 pages. No really. She is a journalist and maybe she enjoys her job? We're told she's good at it but never see it. Her sexual abuse continues throughout the book and not only is she consistently denied any agency in what happens in the book, she's essentially a fucktoy for ANOTHER pedophilic priest and then an ancient god. It's gross gross gross. She chooses nothing. Everything is forced upon her but the book presents her acceptance/kind of weird happy ending.
This book has a WEIRD relationship with sex??? Like at first sex is the dark dirty thing and I was like, ah, a commentary on puritan values!! But it basically IS just the dark dirty thing that brings about the end of the world. This evil books makes people have sex from its presence! This teen girl wants to fuck a priest and then AND THEN the sexual abuse survivor makes a fucking SMARTASS COMMENT near the end that she wanted the end of the world and victims choose to be abused basically and AUGHGHGUGHGGH I FUCKING HATTTTE THIS BOOOOOOK ITS GARBAAAGE
Allllll the women are LITERALLY whores or mothers. If it was meant to be commentary, it really sucked! Because it did not subvert expectations at all! It really felt like the author was working through feelings on sex and kinks, and it was gross! Lots of weird 'hate your mother but love your mother CONSUME YOUR MOTHER' stuff that felt so pointed considering how the 'great worm' is a DUDE and where the fuck is the father parallel also? Hey why is it a bunch of women are primarily responsible for the end of the world hm??????????????? Said women don't even get to enjoy CHOICE of destroying the world. They fight against it and then suddenly they're cool with it offpage and now they're evil.
Along with all that, the prose is painfully awkward. Characters talk in grandiose paragraphs and philosophical debates and it does nothing to better explain character development or serve to be interesting parables. It's just filler.
The horror scenes play like edgy creepypasta. Ooooooh the WORM CHILDREN play TIC TAC TOE with TEETH from CORPSES!!!!!!!!!! so scary. snore. Also the weird ass pacing in the last half of the book where time becomes irrelevant made me keep flipping back pages thinking I had missed a page somehow because there was no connection between scenes.
I wanted to like this book. I really did. But it's just awful. It's not even fun awful that can be enjoyed from a satirical lens. It's just bad and has a shitton of internalized misogyny and I'm throwing this baby out tomorrow.
But the writing is bad. This book is bad. I thought at first I was being too harsh on it, it's a debut novel, and while the execution wasn't great, maybe the great concepts could carry it through to being a decent read.
They could not.
The characters in this novel are caricatures. Within the first two pages of the book we are introduced to a 'tough woman journalist' with trauma from sexual abuse as a child from a religious leader. We never learn anything else about her in the remaining 300 pages. No really. She is a journalist and maybe she enjoys her job? We're told she's good at it but never see it. Her sexual abuse continues throughout the book and not only is she consistently denied any agency in what happens in the book, she's essentially a fucktoy for ANOTHER pedophilic priest and then an ancient god. It's gross gross gross. She chooses nothing. Everything is forced upon her but the book presents her acceptance/kind of weird happy ending.
This book has a WEIRD relationship with sex??? Like at first sex is the dark dirty thing and I was like, ah, a commentary on puritan values!! But it basically IS just the dark dirty thing that brings about the end of the world. This evil books makes people have sex from its presence! This teen girl wants to fuck a priest and then AND THEN the sexual abuse survivor makes a fucking SMARTASS COMMENT near the end that she wanted the end of the world and victims choose to be abused basically and AUGHGHGUGHGGH I FUCKING HATTTTE THIS BOOOOOOK ITS GARBAAAGE
Allllll the women are LITERALLY whores or mothers. If it was meant to be commentary, it really sucked! Because it did not subvert expectations at all! It really felt like the author was working through feelings on sex and kinks, and it was gross! Lots of weird 'hate your mother but love your mother CONSUME YOUR MOTHER' stuff that felt so pointed considering how the 'great worm' is a DUDE and where the fuck is the father parallel also? Hey why is it a bunch of women are primarily responsible for the end of the world hm??????????????? Said women don't even get to enjoy CHOICE of destroying the world. They fight against it and then suddenly they're cool with it offpage and now they're evil.
Along with all that, the prose is painfully awkward. Characters talk in grandiose paragraphs and philosophical debates and it does nothing to better explain character development or serve to be interesting parables. It's just filler.
The horror scenes play like edgy creepypasta. Ooooooh the WORM CHILDREN play TIC TAC TOE with TEETH from CORPSES!!!!!!!!!! so scary. snore. Also the weird ass pacing in the last half of the book where time becomes irrelevant made me keep flipping back pages thinking I had missed a page somehow because there was no connection between scenes.
I wanted to like this book. I really did. But it's just awful. It's not even fun awful that can be enjoyed from a satirical lens. It's just bad and has a shitton of internalized misogyny and I'm throwing this baby out tomorrow.
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Body horror, Child death, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexual violence, Blood
Moderate: Alcoholism, Animal death, Panic attacks/disorders, Death of parent
4.5
Beneath deserves to be on your list of horror books to read sooner, rather than later. I enjoyed every minute of this ride. This is my first Kristi DeMeester but it will not be my last. I hope she writes more sick reads!
And this book is sick.
Dark and disturbing, the prose sort of washes over you like briny, brackish water and leaves you feeling unsettled and dirty at the end of the day.
The blurb on the back of the back of the book gives you a great, surface level capture of what this story is about but it keeps its secrets and so I will too. Just know, you will plumb the depths of a very dark place before this book is over.
I really enjoyed our protagonist Cora-a journalist with a sensitive past who is sent on an assignment to cover a story about a cult.
She meets a "preacher man", Michael who, despite all his flaws, I couldn't help being invested in his character and wanting him to push through to the end.
DeMeester is masterful at setting, character development and building suspense--by the time the story climaxes, you're ready for it!
Even though the plot feels a little familiar... the evil DeMeester develops is disgusting and horrifying. Plenty of times, the graphic, vivid detail was so stomach turning and frightening, I found myself trying to skim over the descriptions but I forced myself to read every yucky word, Ha!
I loved it! My only *smallish* complaint was that ending. It didn't sit right with me--but I'm not going to tell you why. Too spoilery. Just add this book to your horror stack for Fall. You won't regret it.
Beneath deserves to be on your list of horror books to read sooner, rather than later. I enjoyed every minute of this ride. This is my first Kristi DeMeester but it will not be my last. I hope she writes more sick reads!
And this book is sick.
Dark and disturbing, the prose sort of washes over you like briny, brackish water and leaves you feeling unsettled and dirty at the end of the day.
The blurb on the back of the back of the book gives you a great, surface level capture of what this story is about but it keeps its secrets and so I will too. Just know, you will plumb the depths of a very dark place before this book is over.
I really enjoyed our protagonist Cora-a journalist with a sensitive past who is sent on an assignment to cover a story about a cult.
She meets a "preacher man", Michael who, despite all his flaws, I couldn't help being invested in his character and wanting him to push through to the end.
DeMeester is masterful at setting, character development and building suspense--by the time the story climaxes, you're ready for it!
Even though the plot feels a little familiar... the evil DeMeester develops is disgusting and horrifying. Plenty of times, the graphic, vivid detail was so stomach turning and frightening, I found myself trying to skim over the descriptions but I forced myself to read every yucky word, Ha!
I loved it! My only *smallish* complaint was that ending. It didn't sit right with me--but I'm not going to tell you why. Too spoilery. Just add this book to your horror stack for Fall. You won't regret it.
I am not sure what to think about this book. I really enjoyed it at the beginning. As the story progressed, I felt like there was a lot of disconnect between what I was expecting to happen and the events that unfolded... Maybe that's on me? But when the story finished, I still had all of the questions I had at the beginning of the book. I wanted to learn more about the religion, the snakes, the book about the Great Worm... The only reason I finished this book was because I was hoping that it would have answered some of the questions I had. It didn't.