In a world where the corrupt have taken over a postapocalyptic society, Benji, a sixteen-year-old transgender boy, makes the attempt to escape the cult he was raised in. After a mostly unsuccessful attempt, a group of people just trying to survive manage to get him out. One issue is that Benji is the one thing these people swore to destroy: Seraph, a mutated version of the monster tearing the world apart with the ability to control them.
“Hell Followed with Us” by Andrew White was an interesting story to say the least. The story itself was incredibly detailed, but also kind of confusing.
I really enjoyed the depth of the story. The little snippets of background information from all of the side characters slowly pulling the story together made for a great plot twist toward the end of the story.
Something I did not like, however, was the ending itself. It felt open-ended and rushed, leaving me kind of disappointed. That being said, the open-ended-ness leaves room for a sequel, should the author choose to make one.
I did like the fact that there seemed to be a balance between backstory and filler chapters and the chapters that carried the main story line. It allowed for the moments that were mentally tough to read to have slightly more lighthearted moments.
This book did feel incredibly cliché with the main character being an overpowered monster trying to hide their identity who is throwing themself a pity party 90 percent of the time. While the way the apocalypse itself was done was an interesting concept, the setting itself felt cliché.
I did, however, appreciate the fact that the apocalypse setting did not begin when the story started. There are too many stories that recreate the start of the apocalypse that are just all the same. I also appreciated the religious twist to it, too.
This book was interesting, that’s for sure. I did not love it, but I did not hate it either. It was incredibly gory, which is to be expected of a horror book taking place in some twisted version of the biblical apocalypse. The list of trigger warnings in this story feels longer than a CVS receipt, which was a bit alarming when I first saw it, but it made a lot of sense when reading it. When doing some extra research on it, I did find out that this book will be getting an animated film sometime in the near future. I give this book a 3.5/5 for the confusing ending and overly cliché storyline.