I, uh. Think maybe if I was ex-Catholic all the repetitive religious unlearning of dogma would have resonated more, but unfortunately I was raised Protestant and am currently an atheist and I don't have any of that good old Catholic guilt. The horror is honestly such a background in this book that removing it entirely would not have changed a thing. 

I think, based on Maeve Fly and the description, I was hoping for a main character more on par with Maeve - someone whose transformation is entirely new and different and very in charge of her own destiny. As it is, in my opinion, the main character is kind of stagnant the entire novel, and she finishes the book with basically the same mental narrative and beliefs as she started it. Like, okay, yes, she decides not to be religious anymore - but the entire book, including the end, involves her relating everything to God and demons and other religious figures. 

Also, so much of this book is based on step-by-step unlearning religious dogma in such a "Baby's First Look Into Not Being Catholic" that it almost felt insulting (and certainly boring) to read through. I didn't care. The main character was so flat and wooden that she didn't make me care. In many ways, it felt like a checklist of "Have her read/think something controversial" followed immediately by her reverting to following her teachings growing up, and THAT followed immediately by "but wait! what if?" as she wishy-washy chooses both options. And in the meantime, nothing of note is happening. 

I understand how much of this book focused on not feeling shame for sexual exploration - especially as women - but so much of it falls apart when 

A) nothing can actually be explored in a safe way considering the rape virus going on, forcing every conversation of sexual arousal to also have an underlying "are you even actually feeling that or are you infected?" which CAN'T be good for the "sexual deviation is demons possessing you" when that's actually happening, except instead of demons, it's a virus. 

B) the inappropriate attraction between a girl who turns 17 during the events of the novel and a fully adult man in his 20s. Her being attracted to him is whatever, but why is him having feelings of attraction and arousal towards her never addressed properly? Like, I'm sorry, but that absolutely should be repressed and felt guilty about, and I'm not even Catholic I'm just not attracted to teenagers. 

C) SPOILER FOR THIS ONE - the main character never actually acts on these feelings of attraction. We just get a lot of (boring) flowy language about her being attracted to people, and then by the end she's like "I've transformed into someone in charge of her own sexuality 😊" when. Nothing has actually happened. 

So much of the horror of a virus that makes people quite literally rape others is so washed out that it almost felt fetishized as a concept - we get many descriptions of people being assaulted, but (somehow 🙄) it never fully affects our main character. One scene near the beginning I remember because it rubbed me the wrong way involved a man assaulting another man, being beaten to near death, breaking into the main character's car, but then sensing and attacking some random woman who got out of her car to see what was going on - and this being only described as "she screamed for a long while." It just? Felt superfluous. 

The way the world so quickly ended, and the response of the religious cult that popped up, seemed like it just copy-pasted a zombie film and didn't bother with worldbuilding or making things make sense. I think maybe the virus making people sexually assault others and making them extra strong and violent was a hard sell - especially since it's so barely explored, and even when it is, it doesn't feel realistic. 

This isn't a real criticism, but maybe if I knew the locations being described I'd have enjoyed them more, but as it is I started skimming when I got to the house of weird music and religious figures where the main character runs around in because everything was so coated in weird religious descriptions in a place that sounds made up that my eyes glossed over during those parts. 

None of the characters made me care about them. The main character is a wooden caricature that just has things happen to her, none of the other characters she meets meant anything to me - and I was waiting for half of them to be infected (or the main character herself to be), that when they weren't made me question them as people. 

Maybe it's because I'm aroace, but all of the "romances" were nothing, went nowhere, and were pointless. (they weren't even romances, the entire thing was "Oh no, my 'secret place' feels warm - am I infected? Wait, no, I decided this was Normal and I'm going to embrace it on someone completely inappropriate for me!") The only reason the main character ends up with who she does is because they survived together - legitimately if anyone else had survived with her I don't think the ending would have changed. 

Also! The one romantic interest was literally introduced as being friends with skeevy boys who were harassing her for being "innocent" and a "virgin" and this is never brought up as something to be alarmed about? Even when she learns that he himself speculated that she was a virgin, it's never seen as a negative. The entire time, I was waiting for a heel-turn of him getting close to her just to have sex with her and leave her. Because those are the kinds of boys he's hanging out with! Why is he, then, portrayed as someone healthy who liked her long before the outbreak, when they'd barely spoken any words together - and the entire time they do it's when she's realized her clothes/bra are too tight and her clothes are soaked through and almost see-through (leading credence to him only being interested in sex with her) but once they reunite all his slightly-red flag behavior is glossed entirely over?

Basically all the deaths that happened around the main character were pointless. There is one scene of an attack that is almost beat for beat identical to the previous attack, so much so that I was wondering why we were just repeating the same thing over again if only to extend the word count. 

As a whole, this book wasn't Bad but it wasn't what I expected - the only reason this book is horror is because of the random inclusion of rape, assault, and murder and nothing else. This would better be classified under something about unlearning toxic religious upbringing, but this is done in such a surface level way that I don't really think it could be enjoyed from that aspect either. I really wished I liked this book more, as I was so excited for it, but unfortunately it was not for me.