Girls Against God is a heady tale set deep in the chambers of heavy-metal Norway. I'm a fan of Jenny Hval's music, and her latest single "Bonus Material" appears to be extracted from this novel. It's hard not to read this as a little bit autobiographical, but I did my best to abide by Hval's own attitude ("Death of the Author," Innocence is Kinky). The novel was literally cinematic, and as such, was almost solely descriptive with very little analysis as to why the events happened the way that they did. I wanted to see the happenings, but I couldn't. But my interest in Hval's voice and experiences and understanding of the world kept me moving on. She's an intensely intriguing person, and her descriptions of Christian southern Norway were new territory for me. This didn't reach the moody captivation that Paradise Rot inspired in me, but this has taught me that I will gobble up anything Hval produces. Just keep making art, Jenny.

A novel consisting of a seemingly endless train of thoughts of the main character. There's some beautiful writing in there, but I found it quite a slog to get through. I do like me an experimental novel, but this one didn't do it for me.

This book is great for fans of Jenny Hval. Like her music, her writing is hypnotic, strange, genre-bending with edgy twists and turns. This book is cinematic in feel (and cinema is mentioned frequently) and atmospheric. Admittedly, I did not finish reading this - mostly because there's other voices and viewpoints I'm more drawn to right now.

Reading the synopsis, and half knowing Jenny Hval as a performance artist, I was interested in Girls Against God. But it's clearly not for me. Although I found Hval to be an extraordinary writer, I was totally lost from page 1. There are lengthy meditations on black metal, religion, gender, language, but its surrealism and its total lack of a plot made it hard for me to connect.

There is an audience for this kind of writing, but unfortunately, it doesn't include me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Verso Books (US) for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. #netgalley #JennyHval #GirlsAgainstGod

I was exhilarated by this work. I'm not sure what it is. Is it a poem? An essay? A barbaric yawp? I moved forward through the text cautiously, not knowing how to protect myself from my own wild thoughts bouncing off the words on the page. I pretty much loved it. I was confused by it. I was annoyingly disturbed by questions about whether the hard-breaks in the text were meant to be there or were some artifact of me reading this book in digital ARC form, and on a first-gen IPad.

The publisher's description says "the narrative, the essayistic and the magical is organically woven together into a literary text that both genre-wise and by virtue of its content refuses to be boxed in" and that sentence really sums up what I think about this novel, at this moment--because this description from the publisher is irksomely UNGRAMMATICAL (please, dear verso, its 'the narrative, the essayistic and the magical _ARE_ organically woven together) and yet, with work on my part, the publisher's description also seems to mean something exactly like this novel means.

I feel like I was in communion with the semi-raw/half-baked thinking of a very interesting human being who is Jenny Hval.

Good. Try it. I'm going to buy it in book form when it's available so I can at least be sure where the author means to make her line breaks vs. being continuously bemused about whether there is any meaning at all to them, as they appeared in the ARC.

I want to thank NetGalley, Verso Books (US), and author Jenny Hval for providing me with an ARC of this novel!

The cover of Girls Against God drew me in, and I was not to be disappointed! We find ourselves in Norway, circa the nineties. White picket fences and Christian conservatism is the norm. As the Artist considers her works, things start to happen. A coven of witches begin casting some curses. A time traveler arrives in town to join a death metal band. Puberty has murder on her mind. While this is all happening, a group of girls deep within the forest find themselves lost, and things become very strange.

This was SUCH a strange read. You want to hate these characters, but you can’t. If you love strange and unthinkable, this novel is for you. I enjoyed the author’s writing immensely. I love that she wasn’t afraid to explore the dark and the different.

Thank you again to those named above for the opportunity to read and review this novel!

Unfortunately, I have to go with a 2 star rating. Even though there were a ton of beautiful quotes throughout the story, I had such a hard time following the plot. Many sections just felt completely random and nonsensical until I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to take away from it. Still, some lovely phrases that I’ll definitely look back to in the future.

Great book! Very well written. The character hates everything but the author makes up for it later.. the synopsis is what drew me to the book!

Oh this was not for me. This sounded super interesting based on the synopsis but I made it about 30 min in and knew this was going to be a DNF.

I’m not entirely sure what I even read. I always feel bad rating books that I did not finish but unless you are into a girl saying how she hates every three words, you probably won’t enjoy this. Granted, it probably changes the more you read but I’m so sad to report this as a DNF for me.