Sophie, sixteen and from a very religious family is searching for twin brother Noah as the world around her is falling apart. A virus is spreading across the Y.S. Which makes people insane with lust. The end is nigh. Can Sophie and her group find safety?

In the wrong hands this book could have been an unreadable mess, and probably nothing but a great big trigger warning, and I would hope that most people are not interested in reading a book chock full o’ rape. However Leede deftly pulls this off, and actually turns it into something good.

In fact, this could even work as YA for the mature. There’s a good group of young characters (including the bestest boy). Religion is portrayed as a generally terrible thing and the billboard “the most powerful position is on your knees” is given two very different meanings.

There were some nice swipes at those who attempt to ban books from libraries and places that try to outlaw drag. In fact, nearly every book I’ve read recently has contained a great dig at Trump and/or Republican policies, regardless of the subject of the book. It’s nice to see that nearly all authors unite in their belief that these right wingers are nuts and it’s important that they be stopped.

I loved the Author’s Note, too. My husband and I have experienced that loss ourselves recently. It’s so hard, and there’s nothing quite like it. Book is recommended.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC!

I had very high expectations for this since I really enjoyed Meavefly, and this really kind of let me down! I kept expecting it to divert or change somehow, but it was a very cut and dry apocalypse story. I do resonate with the religious guilt aspects, but it felt very repetitive to me. Unsure!

first off: though you may gather from the synopsis of this one that rape, sa, and religious trauma may be prevalent in this book, what you may not also know is that there is a HORRIFIC ANIMAL DEATH (will dissect more at the end).

this story is about a girl named sophie that grows up in a hyper-religious catholic community. she's sheltered to the point of insane excess, making her an outcast in school due to her demure nature, the boxy, body-hiding dresses that her mom makes her wear. she also lives as a prisoner in her own home essentially, partly due to the whole religious fist of control her parents (particularly her father) exert over her, but also because of her burgeoning feminity.

because she's so sheltered, sophie isn't allowed to watch the news so by the time she understands that the pandemic that's been gaining in ferocity for months is within her own community, it's much too late.

the problem? it manifests in a cold, yes, followed by extreme sexually aggressive behaviors. she finds this out by walking in on her very restrained parents naked and having sex. a content warning: spoiler here: what follows next is some pretty bad trauma with her father attacking her with the intent to sa her in his infected state. that doesn't happen, but the scene is pretty traumatizing.

after connecting with a police officer as she escapes her community before it's quarantined, what follows is a crazy, fun, confusing road trip where they navigate escape. sophie? she wants to find her twin brother that was sent away when she was a kid, currently housed in a rehabilitation facility about 200 miles away. but to get to him, sophie and her crew will have to fight through hordes of infected, sex-crazed people and religious zealots that want to kill anyone that opposes their absurd christo fascist ideologies.

a note: along the way, sophie endears herself to a very upset dog, viciously guarding his deceased owners. she earned this dog's trust via tenderness and patience and gave a dog a chance that most people would have dismissed as "too vicious" or "feral". i really loved this. and i thought maybe a horror novel gets it right for a change! maybe we don't have to rely on violent animal death/harm in the name of "horror". boy was i wrong. one of the worst, most gratuitous animal deaths i've ever read about in fiction occurred to this dog. i don't care. it's not a spoiler.

the author wrote a note at the end about this point specifically, you can read it for yourself. what i got out of it was: we all die. and that's true, but i struggle with this - once you give your work to the world it belongs to the world to interpret from their own perspective. i read fiction for fun and entertainment. i do not find gratuitous animal death. with this dog's introduction into the story, i made the error of assuming there would be a subversion of the played out horror trope of gratuitous animal pain. maybe that's on me. rape is also a trigger of mine. based on the synopsis i was aware enough of what i was getting into to be prepared. with this death i was not and i found it massively disturbing.

another content warning: at 90% in, the issue of children in the midst of this pandemic hadn't been addressed. i was happy with that. i didn't want to read about children being raped. a throwaway comment was thrown in at the end about children being involved. i thought it was unnecessary and cheap, a late stage "oh here's a horror thing too, isn't this scary?" it just felt like an edge-lordy addition that was really out of place.

this book did a lot of things right, though. i really loved the religious dissection, particularly the displays of religious hypocrisy because i find that very much mirrors the world we live in. i realized that rape/sa was inventible in this book from the synopsis, but i felt like those displays of violence weren't excessive and gratuitous, though i know for some they'll be too much. and that particular part of this pandemic was a great foil for the way women's bodies are controlled, the way chastity is lauded as godly within the church, etc.

i really enjoyed this read MINUS the dog thing, the throw-in unnecessary trigger at the end. so i don't know what to rate it because i did find that part of the story so traumatic it pretty much ruined things for me.

This was certainly a very heavy, dark read for me but I did enjoy it. I thought the story told from the perspective of a younger main character was an interesting way to approach this story as the themes that it covers are quite heavy. Overall, an interesting read but one that can be very unsettling.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the arc! Oof, I have some mixed feelings with this one, but I did enjoy it. As always, rating is subject to change as I sit with this.


The negatives:

I’m bothered by the fact that the whole plot of this story was based around Sophie looking for her brother. We got a fakeout conclusion to that plot line only for it to just re-open, and then the book ends abruptly before we get any true resolution! That crippled the enjoyment of the book for me, with the closure we could have had to that plot line being yanked with a pole offstage, and for what? I loved where the ending was going before I got slapped in the face with a red herring. I’m annoyed, and I’m saying that as someone who loves open endings. Also, the writing style was sometimes too much. If you told me this entire novel was a transcript of a ex-Christian theater kid’s interpretive play, I would have believed you.


The positives:

I did love the characters of this book, which truly helped me enjoy this read. Cleo, of course, was my favorite, as well as Barghest (all though I loved our entire main ensemble). Rest in peace to some real ones. Ben and Sophie were cute together, my dear traumatized children. Speaking of Sophie, her head was extremely interesting and eventually satisfying to be in (hopefully she made it out, but either interpretation is satisfying). I also am a sucker for religious trauma and symbolism, which of course is what the entire book is about. Furthermore, Frank Lloyd Wright is my favorite architect, and I am a cheesehead, which also both elevated this reading experience. And lastly, this entire book was just atmospheric in general, and I truly felt transported to the Midwest with tornados, horny zombies, corn fields, and all. God I want to see a tornado in person one day (I’m a coast dweller).

All in all, love the materials we had to work with, but the finished product wasn’t perfect. Still, it’s definitely worth a read, and I’m very glad and fortunate that I was able to read an early version of it. 3.5-3.75 I think, rounded up to 4.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and the publishers for this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

This book fucked me up. In a good way. In the best way. I’m haunted. It’s heartbreaking, disturbing, tragic, devastating, and somehow hopeful. Sophie mirrored so much of myself and my thoughts from so long ago. I eat any book with religious trauma up. After reading Maeve Fly last year, I wasn’t sure what to expect from this author. A book that ripped my heart out and put it back in I did not expect.

First we say we love Barghest. I saw so many reviews say this and I mirror it. What a good boy. Literally everyone was so amazing. I loved Cleo the most. Fitting the big sister role who could tell you amazing life advice and then show you how to kill someone. Ben was solid and I’m so glad they found each other. Maro as well. He’s a real one.

Having the main character be 16 was a good move. We see everything through the eyes of a child. She’s frightened and questioning everything she’s ever known. Sinning, Hell, Heaven, God. Who’s good and who’s bad. What makes us rotten? At the root of this, Sophie is searching a hellscape for her twin brother. Her other half. The one her parents tossed aside. She is risking everything to find him. I was sobbing through this. I will say I loved this book and it is a favorite and nobody can tell me otherwise. Another great entry for C.J. Leede.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I don't normally put trigger/content warnings in my reviews, but this book really warrants them I think, since it made me so uncomfortable that I could not finish it.

Trigger Warnings for American Rapture include: [rape, religious trauma, Catholic guilt, misogyny, internalized misogyny, covid, pandemics, homophobia, parental abuse, sex shaming, religious abuse, and self negativity

I made it to about the 1/3 marker before I had to stop. This book made my stomach churn, it was too unsettling and upsetting. It's not a mark that the book itself is bad, but rather that it is a very heavy, disturbing read. American Rapture will have an audience with some people, but I'm a bit sad to say I'm not one of them.

The prose is very good, and that's perhaps why it hits so hard. It feels too possible and realistic.