calebaltair 's review for:

Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White

4.5

adventurous challenging dark 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: No

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thank you netgalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for an honest review!

the first thing i want to talk about before i even start talking about the book itself is the cover. hell followed with us said sorry to the ugly cover community but that ain’t me. 

hell followed with us is a queer post- apocalyptic where a fundamentalist christian cult think it’s in god’s word to bring the end days. the main character benji was chosen to be god’s holy messenger, but essentially escapes. 

i read this book in less than a day, so i’m going to try to make this review as coherent as possible while also collecting my thoughts. 

i could not praise the rep in this book ENOUGH. the mc is trans, his love interest is autistic, along with a ton of other queer representation including neopronouns (which this is also one of the few books i’ve read that’s included them). the book itself is horrific, and that’s the thing that always irks me when it comes to dystopian books, because they’re so real and so close to our reality, but what got to me the most was one of the villain’s theo. to me, he was so fleshed out, and every time he came on a page, i found myself needed to take a deep breath to prepare. i think he was the true proof of just what corruption could do to a person.. but also like, fuck him lol

i think this book is great for people who suffer from religious trauma, because as someone who grew up in church, i found myself relating a lot to some of benji’s internal monologue. i highlighted so much because i would read some of it and be like wait, is this me? 

my only issues (and there’s very little) was i felt like nick didn’t get as much page time (i got very excited the couple of times we got his pov) and wasn’t as fleshed out as he could be, given his backstory. i would’ve loved to see more of him and the alc group in general. another thing was i found the world hard to follow at times, but that could just be my lack of understanding rather than the author’s fault. i also felt that the ending needed a bit more, but that also could be the beauty of it, leaving you with wanting more. 

i will definitely be picking up more books andrew writes.