Pride Month: media review 1
Okay so before I begin, I should offer a small explanation for this series. Obviously, it's Pride Month 🌈, and I would like to celebrate by consuming queer media and yapping about them (^_^). I hope you enjoy, Tumblr.
Side note: this will not be a consistent series. I also have exams. I'll update when I feel like it :)
Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White (a novel)
"If they want me to be a monster one step closer to God, that's fine.
In what world was their God ever a benevolent one?"
This book is an explosion of bottled-up rage, like a monster that is inside of you and clawing at your ribcage. That's what it feels like to be queer. Rage and loneliness. But this doesn't make you a monster. Even if you have six wings and a beak full of fangs that reaches up to your ears, you are still not a monster. And you are not alone: there is a community who loves you and who fully accepts you for who you are, from your sharpest claws up to the tips of your feathers. The REAL monsters are the people who don't accept you, who seek to cause hurt, who do horrific things in the name of holyness. This book is interesting not just because of the sizzling rage that radiates off of it, but also because of the way it plays with religion: christians who worship demonic monsters and wish to destroy the world with it, and the monster that wishes to save it. Horror often plays with religion, but not in the way Andrew Joseph White does it here. His horrorbook, that sometimes reminds of Fallen Thorns of the same genre, grabs you by the throat and keeps your attention until the bitter end. This type of horrorbooks are definitely an underrated genre.
So, this book has a lot of strong points: it's fun, dynamic, has interesting characters and themes, uses nice motifs, and is very thrilling. It isn't 'literary', but not every book has to be. The only negative feedback I have is about the cover image (gorgeous and one of the reasons I read this, but the boy on it looks nothing like Benji) and the predictability of some of the plot twists. Overall, it's definitely a book I recommend!
- Lou















