This was an amazing read. It weaves current world events and issues seamlessly into a near future hellscape riddled with a polymorphic virus ready to take over the world. The three female MC's stories interconnected beautifully, while having vastly different experiences, exploring cosmic and body horror to its fullest, with a dash of seggsy times. I'm recommending this to so many of my friends that want to get into cosmic and body horror, because while disgusting and gory at times, the writing and experiences are breathtaking. I loved how the author addressed so many real world issues into this with such grace but with fire behind it. Amazing work! ( )

Wow. This is a bloodcurdling good time. This story has three parts where we follow three different main characters. The first part is about Erin who caught the new pandemic virus. This virus is way worse than Covid. It turns Erin into a brain eating thing. Part two we follow a prostitute who catches the disease and learns through eating brains and then regurgitating them. She also “gets off” on her murders as she can no longer “get off” from her old profession profession. The third part is about the chosen woman. The woman who’s lived her entire life growing tumors and the part those tumors play in the apocalypse. All the stories come together for lackluster ending. I listen to this on audiobook and was thoroughly engrossed. I didn’t want to stop, even when I needed to take breaks because of disturbing mental. The last hour of this book was ugghh. Some of the action was predictable and at times it was felt like the author had run out of ideas and couldn’t come up with anything better. The book also ends at a weird point. You think there’s a problem with your audiobook and that you’re not at the end of the story but you are. So, except for the last hour, this was a good book. This book is a four-star read. The last hour of this audiobook was a two star read. Trigger warning for everything. If you are not in hard-core blood and guts with a little bit of erotica thrown in, do not pick up this book. If you like a good monster tale, that leaves your eyes wide then pick this up and hopefully you like the ending better than I did. ( )

I wanted to love this book, but as a transgender reader and a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, all this book did was leave me pissed off and disturbed, and not in the way I was expecting to be disturbed.

I love Eldritch horror, I love body horror, I love (fictional!) fucked-up morally unsound gay sex and relationships. I was SO INTO THIS! While reading it!

And then two things happen:

1) The author invokes 14-year-old victim, Konerak Sinthasomphone, a victim of Jeffrey Dahmer, by name, in the most dehumanizing, stigmatizing way you possibly can. The PoV character is comparing herself and the things she wants to do to others, for her own sexual gratification, to what Dahmer did to this child, who was ultimately murdered after sexual torture. I will not transcribe the words used in the book, but it did include describing Sinthasomphone "bleeding from his ass."

This added nothing to the story, the narrative, or the character. You could remove that entire paragraph and nothing would be changed at all regarding the paragraphs before or after it. Why was it included? Extreme edginess for edginess' sake? The only impression this left me with is that the author saw a story of an extremely violent, racist pedophilic murder and thought it'd be funny to use it to enhance the grimdark shock-factor of her novel. It's really not funny, and it just feels like a slap in the face as a CSA survivor trying to read this.

2) There is one (1) entire implied trans character in the entire book. This implied trans character is a character introduced as a cisgender man, and giving one (1) very brief sentence about how the PoV character gets the feeling he "hates being in a male body." That's it. Then that implied-trans character attempts to murder the PoV character, gets violently murdered by her, she orgasms from his murder, and that's the end of it.

You could remove that line about his possible gender dysphoria and nothing would be changed. There's no other reference to trans people existing in the entire book, beyond the author sometimes throwing the word "cis" before man and woman. What did that possibly add to the character? All I saw as a trans reader was one of the most common transphobic tropes- the crazed, violent trans woman who has sex/relationship issues- and then the usual treatment of trans characters: being the only one in the entire cast, then killed off with no emotional fanfare and immediately discarded by the narrative.

I was enjoying it for 50-60% of the story until I hit these. I stopped reading it at 50% of the way in because of these. These two points are so short in the grand scheme of the story, but so thoughtlessly handled that they soured the entire book for me and make me regret picking it up at all. ( )

Thank you to netgalley for the ARC!

WHAT A FUN BOOK. Everything I hoped Lovecraft would be, spooky, gory, all over the place chaos. Finally a book that surprised me and I had no idea what would happen next! What a treat. ( )

The PVG pandemic has left a trail of destruction in its wake. Those infected have to adapt to their new lives depending on which Type they are determined to be - asymptomatic Type Ones, or Types Two or Three whose bodies have been so destroyed by the disease they now require a gorier solution to manage their symptoms.

The story follows 3 women - Erin, Savannah and Mareva- whose lives become entwined with each others. Erin and Savannah are helping usher in this new world, while Mareva has been burdened with a very special task...

I don't want to give much more away here. I went in blind to this weird, wild ride and recommend you do too.
SMM is a cosmic, body horror and such a fun twist on the post-COVID pandemic stories. It was gross, sexy, gory, and creepy all at the same time! ( )