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Godshot

Chelsea Bieker (Goodreads Author)

3.77 · Rating details · 6,315 ratings · 996 reviews

Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen-year-old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it’s an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms. In their desperation, residents have turned to a cult leader named Pastor Vern for guidance. He promise ...more

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Hardcover, 336 pages

Published March 31st 2020 by Catapult

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Dec 23, 2020 Kat rated it liked it

parts of godshot are aggressively overwritten. however, underneath those initial layers is a powerful story about mothers and daughters, loneliness, and coming of age as a woman under strict religious and patriarchal ideals.

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Mar 18, 2020 Emily May rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2020, contemporary, arc

“It hurts.”
“Get used to it,” she said. “Women have a long history of suffering.”

How to describe this book... well, it's a book about women and girls. About mothers and daughters, and the often difficult relationships between them-- about what it is to love so deeply a mother who has failed you. About religion and the way it can be used to control women's bodies. It feels dystopian due to the claustrophobic, stifling feel of the novel, but it's not really.

The White Oleander comparison is a good one. I also think this might be the kind of thing Elana K. Arnold would write if she turned her talents to adult fiction. A gritty, ugly, yet oddly empowering tale about girls. I'm also surprised no one has thought to pull out the ol' The Handmaid's Tale comparison. The religious zealotry, the single narrow perspective, the control, the idolization of pregnancy and pregnant women… I can see the parallels. Though the main difference here is that they didn’t have to overthrow an entire system and install a new government. It was simply the use of fear that got people to believe a charlatan was a messiah.

The book is set in the fictional town of Peaches, California, which is experiencing a devastating drought. The lush greenery of the past has been replaced by cracked earth, and the local residents, in their desperation, turn to Pastor Vern to guide them away from sin and towards a new world-- one where God rewards their faith with water. To do this, they are given assignments, but they are warned not to speak of their assignments with one another.

I don’t know why I loved her the way I did, in this aching way that could not be explained, other than she was my mother. There was no reason beyond that.

Lacey May's mother is everything to her; her whole world. So when she is exiled from the church, Lacey May cannot understand why she abandons her completely and runs away with a man. What follows is Lacey May's search for her mother and her search for the truth about the community in which she lives. When she is given her own assignment, the story takes a dark turn.

It's a bildungsroman of sorts. Lacey May is an extremely sympathetic character-- naive in a lot of ways (but without being irritatingly so) plus smart and resourceful in others. Her mother is a very complex woman. I spent the whole book stuck halfway between pity for her and anger at her selfishness. This is intentional, I feel. The author wants us to have the complicated relationship with her that Lacey May has.

For nothing could take away who my mother and I had been when we had loved each other, when we’d driven the town, heads back screaming along to her favorite songs, the way she looked so melancholy and how she’d rested her chin on my head while we slow danced in the living room to “Tears in Heaven.”

Beyond this, it is quite hard to explain all that the book does. Godshot takes on so many themes relating to girlhood and growing up and religion. One thing I love is when authors figure out how to tell old stories - in this case, about a difficult mother/daughter relationship - in new, creative ways.

Whether it is about love for a mother who doesn't deserve it, or love for a religion that is a lie, at its heart, it feels like this book is about how growing up and changing can mean opening your eyes and losing faith in the false gods you've always believed in. It's about looking back over everything that has happened to you and being able to reevaluate it through new eyes. And, I guess, it's a bittersweet story about letting go.

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Apr 27, 2020 Meredith (WIFI is working! Slowly catching up!) rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley

4.25 stars

"Be filled with gratitude, ladies. You've been Godshot."

On the surface, Godshot appears to be about a cult. While the cult is a huge part of the storyline, this is really a book about mothers and daughters, loneliness, friendship, and love.

14-year-old Lacey May Herd is a true believer in GOTS, a religious cult located in Peaches, California. Peaches, once a thriving agricultural town known as “the Raisin Capital of the World,” is now barren, the land is dry, the crops are dead, the wat 4.25 stars

"Be filled with gratitude, ladies. You've been Godshot."

On the surface, Godshot appears to be about a cult. While the cult is a huge part of the storyline, this is really a book about mothers and daughters, loneliness, friendship, and love.

14-year-old Lacey May Herd is a true believer in GOTS, a religious cult located in Peaches, California. Peaches, once a thriving agricultural town known as “the Raisin Capital of the World,” is now barren, the land is dry, the crops are dead, the water is gone, and its residents are fleeing. But those who have stayed believe there is still hope that Vern, the leader of GOTS, will bring the rain back to Peaches.

When Lacey May’s mother is excommunicated from the cult, she abandons her daughter. Forced to live with her eccentric grandmother, who cares more about the cult and her “stuffed pets,” than her granddaughter's well-being, Lacey May struggles to find her place. When she becomes a prime member of Vern’s divine plan to make it rain, she is forced to face a brutal series of realities causing her to question all that she believed in.

I was really moved by Godshot. This is a dark and compelling read that focuses on gender roles, religion, faith, sexuality, sexual assault, and motherhood. I struggled a bit with Bieker’s writing style a little in the beginning, but once I got used to the cadence, I was completely enthralled and found myself transported to another world filled with quirky, fascinating characters.

There are a lot of vile characters featured in this book, but characters like Lacey May, Florin, and Daisy shined some light on the darkness. It was easy to root for Lacey May, especially when her circumstances go from bad to worse to horrendous to hopeful. She is very much a child, but at the same time, wise beyond her years. Her relationship with her mother is heartbreaking to read. There are some very difficult parts of this book to read, especially scenes involving rape and incest. The final sentences left me teary-eyed, yet hopeful for Lacey May

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher.
...more

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Apr 16, 2020 Elyse Walters rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, spirituality-religion, literary-fiction

Going hiking ... will gather my thoughts ... and return to review soon.
But yikes.... I lost HOURS of sleep / will need to nap later!

I’m back!!! Incredible thought provoking moving affecting read!

Penetrating—Razor sharp—Disturbing—Edgy—Repressive—Terrifying—Scintillating.....transformative.....and painful depths of sadness that scratches continuously at your emotions.....*Debut*.

From the first page- to the last- ( crazy-addicting towards the end)....I couldn’t put this book down. I lost hours o ...more

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Apr 17, 2020 Karen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

4.5
A really good first novel!
There is a drought going on in Peaches, California.
There is also a religious cult in that town, led by Pastor Vern.
14 yr old Lacey and her alcoholic mother, well..actually her whole family are members of this cult.
Her mother abandons her, she’s stuck in this cult.
Pastor Vern comes up with a secret “assignment” given to the teenagers in this cult that once it is completed, is supposed to make the rains fall in the town again.
This is a horrific assignment!
I loved Lacey ...more

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May 05, 2020 Jenna rated it did not like it

Shelves: fiction

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. ICant Take It Anymore Headache GIF - ICantTakeItAnymore Headache Crying GIFs

ICant Take It Anymore Headache GIF - ICantTakeItAnymore Headache Crying GIFs

What I liked about this book:
The publisher's blurb

What I disliked about this book:
Everything else

I don't usually rate a book that I DNF but will make an exception with this one. Why?

1) Because it's just so god-awful that it doesn't deserve its high rating on here. In fact, I wonder if most of those 5 star ratings are from the author's friends, because I sincerely do not know how it could otherwise be so high. Then again those equally god-awful Fifty Shades books had a lot of fans too, so maybe ...more

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May 07, 2020 Brenda ~Traveling Sister Book Reviews rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley

I decided to request this one after seeing a few reviews from my friends and dived into it right away, looking for a deep connection to a story and the characters. I started to get a little worried about the way it started and wondered what I got myself into. I hung in there and was rewarded with an unquie look at the bond between our main character 14-year-old Lacey and her mother.

The story is set in drought-stricken cult ran town by Pastor Vern, who preys on the vulnerabilities of the members ...more

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Mar 25, 2020 Cheri rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: literary-fiction, contemporary, 2020, arc, california, debut-author, religion, debut-novel, netgalley, nevada

Take a deep breath before you begin reading this dark, dazzling and deliciously entrancing novel, for it won’t be long before you’ll holding your breath in anticipation of what lies waiting in Peaches, California for you.

’To have an assignment, Pastor Vern said, you had to be a woman of blood. You had to be a man of deep voice and Adam’s apple. And you should never reveal your assignment to another soul, for assignments were a holy bargaining between you and your pastor and God Himself. To spea

Take a deep breath before you begin reading this dark, dazzling and deliciously entrancing novel, for it won’t be long before you’ll holding your breath in anticipation of what lies waiting in Peaches, California for you.

’To have an assignment, Pastor Vern said, you had to be a woman of blood. You had to be a man of deep voice and Adam’s apple. And you should never reveal your assignment to another soul, for assignments were a holy bargaining between you and your pastor and God Himself. To speak of them directly would be to mar God’s voice, turn the supernatural human, and ruin it. So not even my own mother could tell me what her assignment was that unseasonably warm winter, wouldn’t tell me months into it when spring lifted up more dry heat around us, and everything twisted and changed forever.’

’I imagined her floating above our beloved town of Peaches, dropping God glitter over us like an angel, summoning the rain to cure our droughted fields. I imagined all these things with a burn of jealousy, for I had not received my woman’s blessing yet, the rush of blood between my legs that would signify me as useful. I’d just turned fourteen but was still a board-chested child in the eyes of God and Pastor Vern, and so I prayed day and night for the blood to come to me in a river, to flood the bed I shared with my mother. Then I would be ready. I could have an assignment too.’

If you took the real story that made headline news in 2008 of Warren Jeffs and his YFZ Ranch and scaled it down in size, and then shared the story through the eyes of one of those young women, and you blended it with a dash of the young women in Emma Cline’s Girls, you’d come close to an idea of this, but throw in the unceasing drought, this community’s lack of water leading to baptism by immersion in cola, along with the community’s desperation building. Add young, vulnerable, Lacey May, whose mother has just been driven out of the Gifts of the Spirit Church as your narrator in this coming-of-age debut novel, and you’ve got Godshot.

Of course there’s more to this story, but you’ll want to experience this story yourself, a story with themes of extremist religions, socially constructed gender inequality, and a bit about the current and future state of the environment.

In a year so relatively new, I am amazed by how many extremely gifted debut authors’ works I’ve read. This is another one you won’t forget.

Published: 17 Apr 2020

Many thanks for the ARC provided by Catapult ...more

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Apr 04, 2020 Elle rated it it was amazing

Shelves: netgalley, author-is-nice, 2020

I’m absolutely one of those people who judges a book by its cover, for better or for worse. This is going to be one of those covers that either draws people in or repels them away. Something about the unapologetic use of glimmering, gold glitter and the evocation of God on the title is going to be too captivating for some to ignore. It almost feels gratuitous, but in a way you just have to be a part of.

While I’m sure Chelsea Bieker also loves glitter (according to her Instagram, she most defini I’m absolutely one of those people who judges a book by its cover, for better or for worse. This is going to be one of those covers that either draws people in or repels them away. Something about the unapologetic use of glimmering, gold glitter and the evocation of God on the title is going to be too captivating for some to ignore. It almost feels gratuitous, but in a way you just have to be a part of.

While I’m sure Chelsea Bieker also loves glitter (according to her Instagram, she most definitely does), this cover also perfectly encapsulates the mindset surrounding a cult-like personality. You’re reeled in with the promise of riches or glamour, only to discover what’s being offered is just the same fool’s gold that’s been dug out of the craft store bargain bin. All this to say: don’t let this cover deceive you. It’s anything but the light or glitzy novel you might be expecting. This is a story about female power and breaking free of constricting community and family ties. It’s relentless and strong in a way that only a story about girls and women could be.

In Godshot, Bieker shines her golden spotlight on parts of American society that the majority of us passively choose to ignore. Religious leaders that can act with impunity, domestic violence hidden behind closed doors, child abuse, child brides, devastating poverty and lack of proper education—these are all things we don’t hesitate to decry in so-called ‘3rd-world’ nations, but neglect to address at home. They’re woven into the fabric of our country, as American as apple pie, and yet just enough obscured from our day-to-day that we can convince ourselves that they don’t exist.

But they do. Characters like the tenacious Lacey May, her susceptible mother, Louise, and the rest of the inhabitants of the fictional town of Peaches, California represent real, living people. I haven’t read a lot of the books this one is being compared to, The Girls or White Oleander, but for ones I have, like The Handmaid's Tale, I see it to a point. But I think the story here goes beyond the circumstances these female characters are thrust into. At the heart of this book are the ways the women close to us can lift us up out of hardship, and sometimes how they let us down. It’s complicated and can be difficult to navigate, but those relationships are almost always worth pursuing.

I’m excited to see more from Chelsea Bieker. And if I’m not mistaken, there was an Easter Egg for her upcoming book, Cowboys and Angels, hidden in Godshot. It sounds like something that would be right up Lacey May’s alley!

TW: Sexual assault against minor(s); religious cults

*Thanks to Catapult & Netgalley for an advance copy! ...more

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Apr 10, 2020 Esil rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley, ew

3.5 stars

This is not the first time recently that I came around to liking a book by the time I finished it. Godshot takes place in Peaches, California. There is a terrible drought in Peaches, and many of its residents are in the grip of a cult led by Vern, who promises that the drought will end if the members of the cult do his bidding. His idea of what the members should do is pretty outlandish and brutal. Lacey May is 14 years old, and it seems that nothing good has ever happened to her. Her m ...more

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May 02, 2020 Barbara rated it really liked it

Shelves: suspense, adult-fiction

What an interesting and disturbing novel “Godshot” is. Author Chelsea Bieker explores cult religion, poverty, desperation, ignorance, and sexuality in a sort of feminist and coming-of-age story. There are many ideas considered in this, at times, deeply disturbing novel.

Lacey May is the fourteen-year-old narrator who is one resilient girl. She begins informing the reader that Pastor Vern has proclaimed that to have an assignment, a girl has to be a woman of blood. Yikes. And you cannot reveal you What an interesting and disturbing novel “Godshot” is. Author Chelsea Bieker explores cult religion, poverty, desperation, ignorance, and sexuality in a sort of feminist and coming-of-age story. There are many ideas considered in this, at times, deeply disturbing novel.

Lacey May is the fourteen-year-old narrator who is one resilient girl. She begins informing the reader that Pastor Vern has proclaimed that to have an assignment, a girl has to be a woman of blood. Yikes. And you cannot reveal your assignment to another soul. Right from the start one knows this will not end in a healthy manner.

Pastor Vern is your standard creepy cult leader, although it’s difficult to understand how he collected his followers since Bieker expertly writes him as slime. The setting is in the always drought-ridden California valley where fires are rampant, and rain is nil. Vern “made” it rain in the valley thereby gaining his followers. Since that initial Vern-induced-rain, it hasn’t rained in years, and the followers are becoming desperate. Vern promises his believers that rain will come when his devout follow his rules.

Lacey May becomes a woman of blood and her assignment is disturbing. At the same time, her mother abandons her for a “turquoise Cowboy” leaving Lacey with her certifiably crazy grandmother.

In an NPR interview, Bieker stated that her own mother abandoned her when she was nine, leaving her with her born-again Christian grandparents. Bieker wanted to explore the dangers of religious groupthink and religious programming, along with parental abandonment and the never-ending search for why a mother would leave her child. Bieker also wanted to deliberate on how people want to do something with religion, appeasing a God, rather than exploring the science behind their problems. She wanted the reader to consider the danger of blind obedience; to use logic in life decisions.

Bieker adds a feminism touch when Lacey May finds help in an unlikely source: a female run phone sex operation. Through that relationship, Lacey learns about her body and sexual discovery.

What also makes this a consuming read is Bieker’s addition of humor in her story. These characters are odd, and some are funny in their quirky ways. It’s situational comedy at times of darkness.

This isn’t a read for everyone. It’s disturbing in that it’s reality fiction in so many ways. Cult leaders and desperate people combined form an unholy mix.
...more

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May 02, 2020 Jilly added it

Shelves: dnf, dystopia

I can't do this right now. It's not the right time for something this deep, moving, and full of pain. Yes, the writing is amazing. I could see this being a HUGE book because of how it grips you. But, the hell-in-a-handbasket ride is taking all of my focus right now and the last thing I need is for Debbie Downer to jump in my handbasket with me.

Maybe I will pick this back up when happy-happy-fun-times return. Or, you know, normal life.

...more

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May 27, 2020 Kelly (and the Book Boar) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: liburrrrrry-book, mommy-issues, dysfunction-junction, you-had-me-at-hello, nutters, read-in-2020

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/

3.5 Stars

““You smell like hell rolled in going nowhere fast.”

To put it real bluntly, if it’s about a cult then I’m gonna read it. I actually didn’t request Godshot until I found out it was culty. The cover had me thinking it was going to be trash like Glitter - remember that????

Woof!

And if I would have read the blurb I probably would have avoided it because White Oleander was not my cup of tea and there’s zero chance this ...more

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Jul 14, 2019 T Madden rated it it was amazing

This is a perfect novel. From my blurb on the cover, which I mean with my full heart: "Chelsea Bieker's Godshot is an absolute masterpiece. A truly epic journey through girlhood, divinity, and the blood that binds and divides us, it is a feminist magnum opus of this, or any, time. Bieker is a pitch-perfect ventriloquist of extraordinary talent and ferocity. Imagine if Annie Proulx wrote something like White Oleander crossed with Geek Love or Cruddy, and then add cults, God, motherhood, girlhood, ...more

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Apr 04, 2020 Cortney LaScola - The Bookworm Myrtle Beach rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: giveaways-arcs

What a fantastic, enthralling, and utterly heartbreaking story. I started this before bed (mistake) and then immediately picked it back up when I woke and didn't put it down again until I finished it.

Chelsea Bieker's writing gave me goosebumps at times... "I had no bruises on my body to show my motherloss, and so to anyone else, did it exist?" I could feel the oppression of the heat and the despair of Lacey May through her words. The way she painted all the characters was just done so, so well.

T ...more

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Nov 28, 2019 Paris (parisperusing) rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: lovers of cult stories with a hard bite of feminism

Shelves: 2020, arc, debuts

"Whatever's happened to you can either make you beautiful, or it will ruin you forever. You decide. … I mean, beautiful. I mean, deep and changed. Affected. Wise. When you see a woman like that, you know. She's beautiful because of her undoing. Beautiful because she rebirthed herself from ashes."

Chelsea Bieker’s Godshot is a dynamite of a debut novel about the true grit of girlhood under the long arm of religion and patriarchy. The story dawns in the drought-stricken town of Peaches, California, "Whatever's happened to you can either make you beautiful, or it will ruin you forever. You decide. … I mean, beautiful. I mean, deep and changed. Affected. Wise. When you see a woman like that, you know. She's beautiful because of her undoing. Beautiful because she rebirthed herself from ashes."

Chelsea Bieker’s Godshot is a dynamite of a debut novel about the true grit of girlhood under the long arm of religion and patriarchy. The story dawns in the drought-stricken town of Peaches, California, a place where the sun has made a rusted wasteland of what was once verdant and bountiful; it is no place to raise young girls.

This is the misfortune of 14-year-old Lacey May, who, along with her alcoholic mother, decamps to Peaches at the advent of Pastor Vern — a white man claiming to be Christ’s reincarnate — who turned infidels into believers after summoning rain from the sky. Hellbent on driving out the evils of the decaying city by way of unthinkable practices — from cola baptisms to god glitter sermons — Vern allots the young men and women of his cult different “assignments,” one that banishes her mother into exile, another leaves Lacey May with a child of incest. Cast into such motherlessness, our plucky heroine must discern the contradictions of the church on her own before another of Vern’s prophecies come to pass. Just when the light begins to pierce the darkness that has overtaken Peaches when she finds refuge among phone sex operators ("witches") and other outcasts, life tasks Lacey with one last assignment: to abandon the girl she was before to become the mother she needs to be.

While feminism motifs are at the front of this story, I deeply respected Bieker’s unflinching approach to using her heroine's journey to undermine the duplicitous complex of straight white men, all of whom are exposed as abusers of power (i.e., cult leaders, pedophiles, rapists, etc.), to inform an even larger concept on how much of a menace they really can be to a society. And who better than Bieker to evoke such a terrifying yet touching take on the coming-of-age cult narrative. The brooding darkness and feminist energy from which she draws to bring this nightmare to life made the story feel eerily dystopian, and I savored every page of it.

Bieker writes with a stroke of fever and ferocity I have yet to read in a debut in a long time, which is why Godshot will be one of the most flaming-hot forays you’ll read next year.

(Thanks, Catapult, for sending me Bieker's debut novel in exchange for an honest review. ✨)

If you liked my review, feel free to follow me @parisperusing on Instagram. ...more

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Apr 28, 2020 Erika Lynn (shelf.inspiration) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: netgalley, 2020-books, all-time-favorites, cult-books

4.5 STARS

"Life was pain and this was mine. Was it more or less than anyone else's?" - Godshot.

SYNOPSIS: Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen-year-old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it’s an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms. In their desperation, residents have turned to a cult leader named Pastor Vern for guidance. He promises, through secret “a 4.5 STARS

"Life was pain and this was mine. Was it more or less than anyone else's?" - Godshot.

SYNOPSIS: Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen-year-old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it’s an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms. In their desperation, residents have turned to a cult leader named Pastor Vern for guidance. He promises, through secret “assignments,” to bring the rain everybody is praying for.

Lacey has no reason to doubt the pastor. But then her life explodes in a single unimaginable act of abandonment: her mother, exiled from the community for her sins, leaves Lacey and runs off with a man she barely knows. Abandoned and distraught, Lacey May moves in with her widowed grandma, Cherry, who is more concerned with her taxidermy mice collection than her own granddaughter. As Lacey May endures the increasingly appalling acts of men who want to write all the rules, and begins to uncover the full extent of Pastor Vern’s shocking plan to bring fertility back to the land, she decides she must go on a quest to find her mother, no matter what it takes. With her only guidance coming from the romance novels she reads and the unlikely companionship of the women who knew her mother, she must find her own way through unthinkable circumstances. - Godshot.

REVIEW: Thank you so much to NetGalley, Catapult, and Chelsea Bieker for providing me with an Advanced Reader Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I am so happy I received this book because once I read the synopsis I knew it would be a story that I would love. This is a book about Lacey May and her journey in life. Having a rough childhood, Lacey and her mother are saved and join into a cult led by pastor Vern. The book follows Lacey and her mother's life in the cult which is settled in a town plagued by drought and the absence of rain. The story is heartbreaking and page-turning. I don't think there was one moment of it that I didn't love or wasn't interested in. The story, although fictional, seemed so real and almost like something that has really happened. I could feel for all the characters, their troubles, and heartbreaks.

The characters of this book were amazing and not like any I have read before. From the beginning, I fell in love with Lacey May and was very invested in her story. In the book, she battles a lot between her head and her heart and also her religion versus her freedom. This makes for some very interesting thoughts and considerations in my opinion. The other characters in the book were also very memorable in their own ways. Most of them were seemingly "normal" people who were fanatics about their religion but also had some sort of quirk about them. I thought that each character was well thought out, and played significant roles in the story, even helping to set the tone and the overall setting of the town of Peaches.

This book felt so deep to me and raised a lot of feelings, thoughts, and emotions. Also, as I mentioned it seemed so real in a way, something not entirely fiction. After finishing the book, I went to the author's social media page and found a piece she wrote about the book and the connecting themes between the novel and her personal life. I will post the link here because I think it adds to the story, but I would suggest reading it only AFTER you have read the book. You can find her piece here: https://lithub.com/motherloss-that-th....

Overall, I am so glad that I picked up this book and know that I will read it again in the future. In fact, I plan to also purchase a physical copy so I can have it in my collection. I would recommend this book to others. I would recommend this to anyone who likes emotional, character-driven stories. Or honestly, anyone who is interested in cults, religious sects, and the power and loss of relationships. I am already looking forward to reading whatever Chelsea Bieker puts out next.

"I don't mean beautiful like you're thinking. I mean beautiful. I mean, deep and changed. Affected. Wise. When you see a woman like that, you know. She's beautiful because of her undoing. Beautiful because she rebirthed herself from ashes."- Godshot. ...more

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Apr 11, 2020 Suzanne Leopold (Suzy Approved Book Reviews) rated it really liked it

Lacey May and her mother live in Peaches, California which was once a prosperous town known as the “raisin capital of the world”. The future is now very uncertain after a prolonged drought and those who remain rely upon the guidance of Pastor Vern. The townspeople believe that the rain will return if they obey his rules and complete his assignments.

Lacey’s alcoholic mother is thrown out of town for not obeying Pastor Vern’s rules. Lacey is left to live with her grandmother and the location of he ...more

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Mar 29, 2020 Lacey ♡☆ Ailene rated it it was amazing

I am so thankful to Netgalley for this early book. Well written and couldn’t stop to put it down. Reminded me a little of the Book of Essie, but better. The details were perfect and I felt like I was there with each character through their ups and downs. I would recommend to people that like the Handmaids Tale as well. What an ending and to finish in a day with three kids is rare for this mamma. Thank you again for such an amazingly spiral of a book!

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Oct 25, 2019 Catapult rated it it was amazing

Shelves: spring-2020, our-books, 2020

For fans of Janet Fitch’s White Oleander and Emma Cline’s The Girls, Godshot is a dazzling literary debut by Rona Jaffe Award winner Chelsea Bieker about one teenage girl’s feminist awakening and her search for her missing mother. Forthcoming April 7, 2020!

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Nov 12, 2019 Geonn Cannon rated it liked it

This book is well written, and I liked the flawed and well-rounded characters, but I'm to the point where I cringe when I see a book described as "feminist" simply because of how often that translates to "terrible things happen to women, and they might have a few victories and eventually get to show their strength, but mostly it's just a series of bad things happening to them over and over." I'm clearly in the minority here based on the other reviews, but it's like the Lifetime Movie paradox. Li ...more

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Sep 07, 2019 Sarah rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

Updated, actual review 1/18/20:

I received an ARC from the publisher, opinions are my own.

This book is so surprising on so many levels. It's about a teenage girl named Lacey May who lives in a drought-ravaged town called Peaches in California's central valley. A good chunk of the town is under the spell of a glitter-loving pastor named Vern, who uses the permeating scarcity of resources and desperation of people whose agricultural identity has withered to gain power for himself through the church Updated, actual review 1/18/20:

I received an ARC from the publisher, opinions are my own.

This book is so surprising on so many levels. It's about a teenage girl named Lacey May who lives in a drought-ravaged town called Peaches in California's central valley. A good chunk of the town is under the spell of a glitter-loving pastor named Vern, who uses the permeating scarcity of resources and desperation of people whose agricultural identity has withered to gain power for himself through the church/cult he creates, Gifts of the Spirit. Vern has lots of secret "assignments" for his disciples which are unsurprisingly very horrifying, but Lacey doesn't know this when she seeks her assignment after getting her first period. Lacey's mother is the town beauty, a former pageant girl and current alcoholic. When she relapses and is banished from the church, she abandons Lacey to live with her grandmother Cherry (a *very* compelling character, but I'll let you see that unfold on your own).

As Lacey navigates her new motherless life, one filled with new eye-opening abuses, dead flies, manipulative men, and a haven of phone sex workers in a red house at the edge of town, she longs for her mother, eventually leaving to search for her.

The imagery of climate change as it snakes around in the landscape and bodies of the people in Peaches is visceral, and tightly connected to the idea of motherhood. Death, hope, despair, survival, pain, and humor curl up in this prose, and it will probably break your heart dozens of times. The style and plot stand alone, and I love it. Highly recommend.

Original "review" 9/7/19:
This novel grabbed my heart, mind, spirit, and language aesthetic and MASHED IT ALL TOGETHER INTO GLITTER GOO. If someone had told me a synopsis of this story I honestly probably wouldn’t have picked it up based on that alone, because I usually think I know what I’m going to like (like a fool). But the combination of having heard the author read an essay at AWP that I loved, and the hype from basically all of my other favorite writers (T Kira Madden, Genevieve Hudson, etc.), I was excited about it. To the extent I had any expectations, they were exceeded. It’s a story about the relationships between women, motherhood, cults, climate change kind of, California, sex workers, heat, blood, and glitter. I think I’ll just leave it at that. (In case it’s not clear I highly recommend this book.) ...more

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Mar 15, 2020 Amy (Bossy Bookworm) rated it it was ok

Shelves: netgalley

The premise hooked me: a California cult, with followers desperate for even the most misguided hope and leadership during a drought, a broken mother-daughter relationship, and elements of misogyny, battle for control of the self, and the strong female fighting spirit.

But each detail was more over the top than the last. Because of that I found this book difficult to read because so much of it felt implausible, yet the tone was not farcical or campy. Gold glitter rains down on the congregation du ...more

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Feb 17, 2020 Nancy rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley

What I was reading repulsed me but I could not put down Chelsea Bieker's debut novel Godshot. Lacey's narrative voice drew me in, her conflicted nativity and faith struggling to survive as her family and community fails to protect her. The novel reaches into the deepest questions of life and illustrates the limitations of love and faith.

The tragic series of events and abuse endured will be hard for some to follow; this is a dark story. But just when it seems that Lacey has lost everything, inclu ...more

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May 02, 2020 Mldgross rated it did not like it

I struggled to finish this book because I didn't like it from the start. But the high rating on Goodreads and my difficulty in finding good e-books right now made me decide to push through. I can usually stomach some pretty tough subject material and I was actually interested in the cult storyline. But the writing and the characters were so distasteful i couldn't stand it. The only redeeming part of this book was the last few chapters, when the misery could finally end. Thanks to the author for ...more

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Apr 07, 2020 Tammy(PeaceLoveBooks) rated it really liked it

Shelves: netgalley-read, read-in-2020, read-in-april-20

Godshot is a ripped from the headlines glimpse into a religious cult. I was pulled in from the first page of this story of Lacey May, a young girl trapped in the grip of a cult. Chelsea Bieker’s debut is dark, gritty and hard to put down. I look forward to her next novel!

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Mar 31, 2020 Rebecca marked it as unfinished

Shelves: environmentalist, dystopian, theology-religions, parenting-or-not, 2020-release, feminist, read-via-edelweiss

Like a cross between The Handmaid’s Tale and Gold Fame Citrus, this is a wholly believable speculative novel about repressive religion and transactional sex. However, a combination of the gritty subject matter and a CV-related lack of focus and loss of Kindle reading time led me to put it down. (I read the first 30% and skimmed to 52%.) I don’t honestly care what happens in the rest.

A quick summary: Peaches, California, once the raisin capital of the USA, is suffering a severe water shortage. Pa ...more

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Apr 28, 2020 Marilyn C. rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2020

3.5 Stars

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Aug 14, 2021 britt_brooke rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: religion-cults

This title and cover are absolute fire, but between this, and The Project by Courtney Summers, I can unabashedly say that cult stories should be reserved for nonfiction. The fictional accounts lack authenticity. Rarely is there enough about the leader or how vulnerability is exploited. I need more emotion, not just stage direction-like storytelling. The real life versions are always more fucked up, but sadly, more entertaining.

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Jan 31, 2020 Anne rated it it was amazing

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. A ...more

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Play Book Tag: GodShot by Chelsea Bieker; 3.5 stars	1	8	Dec 13, 2021 02:37AM
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About Chelsea Bieker

Chelsea Bieker

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Chelsea Bieker is the author of the novel GODSHOT which was a finalist for both the Oregon and California Book Award, longlisted for The Center For Fiction’s First Novel Prize, and named a Barnes and Noble Pick of the Month. Her story collection, HEARTBROKE, will be published in April 2022. Her writing has appeared in The Paris Review, Granta, The Cut, McSweeney’s, Lit Hub, Electric Literature, an ...more

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Quotes from Godshot

“But that was the way with boys. Always getting things that made them better -- pants with pockets, tools for building -- while girls received adornments, things to make us appear better to others.” — 5 likes

“I decided then to tell Artichoke to be ugly. To make herself as ugly as possible and not worry too much about beauty or what anyone thought of her. To be unpainted, to live in the breeze and stand under waterfalls and not be worried over the height of mountains, of quiet trails deep in the woods. To not be scared of roads slick with rain, of valleys dry in drought. I'd tell her 'no fear' and she'd know it was the deepest truth and she would be everything I was not. She would be wild and free. And I wouldn't worry because I knew the secret. That through all of her ugliness, all her hiking and running and jumping and falling and getting back up and saying no and saying what she wanted, her scraped hands, her freckled skin, her smart brain, she would of course be beautiful.” — 4 likes

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