This was an enjoyable but tough read. It's hard to imagine such a young girl living in such awful circumstances and going through what young Lacey May did. The first part of this book dragged a little bit for me and I had a hard time really getting into it but I am so glad I stuck to it. I loved the character development, watching certain relationships grow, watching Lacey May start to come into her own thinking and certain people get what was coming to them.. A great story about how family is more than just blood. How we can't always make people be what we want and/or need them to be. Definitely recommend!

Loved this book! Wow when I first read the blurb I knew I’d be able to relate- growing up in a strict religion with cooky ways and values I kept shaking my head like omg I know what she’s talking about! This book had me laughing and crying and not wanting it to end! Female power to the core!

Thank you to the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book. This book totally gave me White Oleander vibes, which is one of my favorite books of all time. I really enjoyed this book about Lacey and her mother in small town Peaches, California and the "desperate" times that fall on them that lead them into a cult. I love it. Definitely recommend.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I give Godshot 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 because it is beautifully written. However, it was very slow in the beginning. I found it somewhat difficult to get into the story but kept reading because I thought it had potential. At times, the subject matter is difficult to read. My heart breaks for Lacey who has been let down by anyone and everyone she's ever met. This book is especially heartbreaking for me as a mother of two young girls. I can't ever imagine them having to go through anything even remotely close to what Lacey went through.

Overall, it is worth the read if you can get past the first quarter of the book.

What a painful and yet somehow hopeful read. I'll admit, it took a while for me to get into this one. The beginning seemed to stretch on forever but once it picked up I couldn't put it down. I adore the friendships in this book and the exploration of what motherhood means. At times my heart felt raw reading this but I'd highly recommend it.

The people suffering from a severe drought in the small town of Peaches in California's central valley are the perfect victims for cult leader Pastor Vern who promises to bring the rain if everyone obeys him and carries out their "assignments." 14-year-old Lacey, abandoned by her mother, wavers between subservience and rebellion--especially after is made to carry out her own "assignment."
This was a well-written, engrossing and quite disturbing picture of a cult life and manipulation of women.

"Godshot" was a tough, emotional and twist turning novel. I had no idea this was Chelsea Biekers debut novel. Phenomenal is all I can say.
Peaches, California is suffering a serious drought and the locals are following cult leader, Vern, who promises through "secret assignments", that rain is coming!
Lacy May is a 14 yr old girl, who's alcoholic mother has left her for a stranger, promising to make her a star. Lacy goes and stays with her bizarre grandmother, Cherry.
Revenge, redemption, and forgiveness in this gripping read!

Thank you to author, publisher and NetGalley for the eARC

Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy! A HUGE reason I found this book hard to get into was because the formatting was the worst I’ve seen of any book on NetGalley. Truly awful.

This was a tough read. I really had to slow down my reading of it because it was just awful circumstance after awful circumstance for our main character. It was hard to read. The last third was beautiful. I struggled with getting into it. I think it was a touch too unrealistic in some parts which kept me from getting sucked in right away. I think a lot of people will pick this up thinking it’s a story about a whacky religious cult, which it is, but more than that, it’s about the myriad ways society and humans can torture women. And this book is full of torture. Each woman in this story has a unique “situation” demonstrating this. I enjoyed the ending of this book so so so much that I gave it the 3 stars, but if not for that I would’ve rated lower because the awfulness seemed gratuitous at times. Phew, the world for women is bad enough in reality and this imagining was maybe too much.

Loved this book! Wow when I first read the blurb I knew I’d be able to relate- growing up in a strict religion with cooky ways and values I kept shaking my head like omg I know what she’s talking about! This book had me laughing and crying and not wanting it to end! Female power to the core!
Thanks to Netgalley for my advanced ebook copy! Put this on your TBR!!!

I'm not even sure what to say about this heart-wrenching debut! It's taken me days to collect my thoughts. When Lacey May's alcoholic mother leaves her for a stranger who promises to make her a star, fourteen-year-old Lacey goes to live with her eccentric grandmother Cherry who is obsessed with dressing her collection of rodents. Peaches, California is experiencing a drought, but fortunately Pastor Vern has guaranteed his congregation that he can produce rain as long as they follow his orders. As the readers, we recognize the hallmarks of this cult as it becomes horrifyingly clear that Vern has his own agenda and his people are blind to the plan. And this is only the beginning! So much more takes place as Bieker addresses multiple themes of empowerment, feminism, loss, motherhood, redemption, and forgiveness (just to name a few). The writing is poignant and there is both joy and pathos in the storyline. It may be unlike anything you've ever read before, but it will certainly keep you thinking deeply about concepts and people you care about!

The story was fast-paced and the characters endearing. The plot isn’t new - cult-leader, pregnancy, small town creepiness - but it does have a freshness to it that I found endearing by the middle of the novel. I did love the New Agey touches that felt of the current times, but also timeless in a way. A solid read.

I've heard amazing things about this book which tells me it's wonderful for the right kind of reader but this was just too much for my sensitive and blood-fearing soul. I couldn't get past the first few chapters; the cringe factor was too high.

4.5 stars. The only reason I didn't give 5 stars was because the ending felt slightly rushed. Otherwise, I thought the writing, pacing, and character development were all great. I will definitely be recommending this title to friends, family, and patrons.

Compelling? Yes, but that isn't the thing...Devastating? Also yes, but still no...Difficult, in some ways, but worth it in every way. Lovely, if sweaty.

Bieker has created a dark novel, that unfortunately bears many elements of truth, separating it from dystopian novels covering bleak ecological and personal subject matters. This novel takes place in California, in a small, drought-infested town, where the locals worship Vern, a sexual predator low life, who tells his followers he will provide them with rain after they follow his requests. The novel isn't as surprising as one would hope since we live in a world of men taking advantage of women.

In this novel, our 14 year old main character, Lacy, struggles to be a good follower of Vern and a good daughter to her mother, who struggles with alcoholism and fighting off Vern, who wants her as his sex slave. Vern tells the teenaged boys to impregnate the girls after they have their periods, hoping all the babies will be born on the same day, the day the miraculous rain will appear. Bleak shit. No rain. Lost youth.

Fortunately, there are a few "upbeat" characters in the novel. The spiritual midwives are useful. There are a mother/daughter (phone sex workers) team that basically rescue Lacy. It's unfortunate that the characters find Ina Mae Gaskin's book at the library but not Margaret Atwood's because there is a certain Handmaid's Tale to this hand over your babies after they are born novel. Basically this is a novel about Lacy trying to fit in and to stay connected to her mother, who drifts off into her head, until she is physically removed, and her search to be reconnected to her mother before she becomes a mother herself. At least this dark novel ends on an upbeat note where being a woman doesn't mean being abused all the damn time.

“Whatever’s happened to you can either make you beautiful, or it will ruin you forever. You decide”

3.5 stars rounded up for Chelsea Bieker’s debut novel “Godshot”. It was slow-moving, but profoundly deep, stunning and at times, heavy.

Picture this; our main character, Lacey May, and a church cult, living in a dry, desert wasteland which was once home to a thriving community and fruitful raisin farms. In their time of drought and desperation, they have turned to Pastor Vern, their creepy cult leader, to help restore the rains to their land. Lacey May endures increasingly horrific acts at the hands of various church members in the name of God. Fed up and alone, she sets out on a quest to find her alcoholic mother. But the truths she discovers about her family, her town and their beloved Pastor are far more devastating than she can imagine.

For a thought-provoking story that deals with themes of motherhood, loss, faith, and resilience... pick up Godshot. I do want to say this book for mature audiences only and while it is tough to handle at parts, I think that makes it’s messages all the more worthwhile.

I also want to include trigger warnings here for: rape, child abuse and endangerment and alcoholism.

I found this to be an interesting read. It was, however, a rather slow read and the running of words together I found distracting. It is a book that I would encourage others to read.

“Whatever’s happened to you can either make you beautiful, or it will ruin you forever. You decide.”

I have so many feelings about this book. I'll start by saying that the writing is phenomenal. Such beautiful sentences and such a pleasure to read them. It reminded me of White Oleander many different times. Really excellent imagery in her writing. The atmosphere of the draught was so stifling, so real that I felt parched as I read the story.

“I don’t think they were her ideas. I think they were yours, and then they were the beers’ and then they were that man’s from the phone. I think she learned to ignore her own ideas a long time ago.”

I also loved the character development. I think the characters were mostly well developed, especially Lacey May and her mom. Vern was less so but we don't really see much of him directly in the story so it would have been hard to do that. I loved Daisy and her daughter. There was so much texture in the characters.

"It was the same way I had. Her belief had accumulated like a tumbleweed and it became too hard to go back once she’d come so far, sacrificed so much."

But here's the thing: this story was so sad. So so so over the top terrible. Just one awful thing after another. I am not saying this kind of stuff doesn't happen. Of course it does. It just was so much that it almost felt manipulative. Horrible things happening to women all throughout this book. So you have to be ready for that. It just felt like I was watching a roadside accident and I am not one of those people who finds that fascinating, I find it devastating.

I'd give this a 3.5 but the writing was so amazing that I felt a strong need to round up.

With gratitude to netgalley and Catapult for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Wow – this was incredibly well-written, well-constructed, and a crucially important read, but also an incredibly dark and draining one. I didn't enjoy it, per se, but I'm glad I read it nonetheless and am floored by Bieker's talent; I can't wait to read whatever she writes next as she's one of the most promising new authorial voices I've read in years.

Literary fiction a girl searching for her mother who left her a search in the California desert survival a cult .A saga that drew me ion an author Inwill follow,#netgalley#counterpointpres.