I really REALLY wanted to love Herculine, but this just did not hit the mark for me. The vibes just weren't vibing... I just genuinely don't even know what to say, Herculine was a wild ride.

😈🍃Herculine🍃😈

Genre: Horror, litfic, LGBTQ+
Page count: 272

"All is fair in love and demonology."

The prime example of if "they're an ex, it's for a reason" and you should never go back. But if the MC would've abide by that, we wouldn't have a story. This story is filled with sex, drugs, finding yourself, demons, frienships, secrets did I mention sex? and of course, a totally-not-a-cult community.

There were red flags everywhere, and our MC was colorblind.

This was a fast-paced fever dream fuled by k*tamine, demons, and lube. I learned a lot of new terms as well of the day to day LGBTQ+ struggles. This book is a little closer to litfic with a good dose of horror, enjoyable, nonetheless, but do check your trigger warnings!

I would like to thank NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this e-book ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Pacing bogs down a plot that otherwise has Faustian potential. At least this is a trans spin on the "sad white woman in NYC" subgenre.

This book feels like a series of one-liners masquerading as horror, and the greatest offense is that it is simply so *boring*. It feels like the author had a concept for a self-insert fic and in order to spice it up a little, demons were introduced, but the prose isn't interesting enough to be literary and the horror elements aren't big enough to appeal to the scream queens and kings. This is a weird one, since I'm not sure who it is "for" and I can't tell if it's the editing or the style, but the pacing felt jarring and the writing was choppy. Overall a massive disappointment.

Man, I really REALLY wanted to like this more than I did. Demon commune??? sign me up!

I found our protagonist to be very "Not Like Other Gurlz" and very unlikeable for no real purpose of being unlikeable. I also found the pacing on this book to be very uneven, and was left at the end going "that's it?" The book's ending dissolved in a very underwhelming way for me.

There were some themes I liked and I did find the writing to be engaging, but this just didn't hit for me. Also, I found this to have a little too much sex in it for me but I am a prude so I mean?? that's on me.

Although this was a short read the first half of this book felt like a drag to get through. I think the horror elements presented in the first half were downplayed by the main character, which in turn didn't give the reader any reason to feel scared or question what was happening. One aspect I did enjoy was learning the daily life of a Trans-Woman which included a lot of information that I am not aware of which made for a read that kept my interest. Just wish the horror had been sprinkled more throughout.

The second half was well paced and was the best part of the book. One moment (which most might agree) made my jaw drop, but once the card was played, it transitioned too quickly into the subject matter where I would've liked to see it questioned and explored more.

The book wasn't for me but I could see others enjoying this.

I enjoyed this one, but not as much as I expected to. Byron's prose is stunning and a pleasure to read, but I felt that the pacing of the book was off. Once the narrator arrives at Herculine, the plot speeds up to a gallop without letting readers or even the MC herself really get to know the other women there - their personalities, their motivations; even, sometimes, their names (the narrator will refer to some characters exclusively by their physical attributes, i.e. "The Hot Butch" or "The One With Pink Hair"). I would argue that we, as readers, don't really get to know many of the characters, even the "villain" of the story.

While enjoyable to read, this one just didn't quite live up to my expectations. I believe that many of my issues with this book can be chalked up to the fact that it's a debut. With that being said, if the author decides to write more trans horror, I would be eager to read those future works.

I didn't need a herculean effort to finish this novel. On the contrary, time flew by while I read. This was haunting, scary and dark and I loved every second of it.

This book walks into a rave of horror and screams, and refuses to calm down. Our narrator, a trans woman haunted by sleep-paralysis demons and a haunted past, flees NYC for an all-trans commune in the woods. At first it feels like cozy sisterhood… until it’s not. We’re talking disemboweled pigs, cryptic rituals, and vibes so suffocating I nearly tossed my phone into the nearest lake. But damn, when the tension hits? It’s electric—like your teeth are buzzing and your heartbeat’s glitching. The atmosphere is thick, layered, and dripping with paranoia.

Okay, let’s be real—some of the cultish mumbo-jumbo can feel a little extra. A few scenes read like horror bingo: creepy breakfasts, secret whispers, symbolic bookshelves… it’s moody, but sometimes overcooked. And while the narrator’s trauma is raw and vivid, the pacing dips into contemplative swamp occasionally—my adrenaline dipped into a graveyard at moments. Still, I was obsessed enough to soldier on, heart racing and eyes twitching. It’s a messy, moody hymn to belonging, identity, and why you might *not* trust a commune in the woods.

**Verdict:** Horrifically poetic, emotionally loud, and beautifully chaotic. Just don’t expect a neat wrap-up—this one’s a slow, creepy burn.

I really like the premise of this book so I’m super bummed that I didn’t really like it. It should have been a slam dunk for me: LGBTQIA+ rep, culty vibes, religious trauma… I eat that right up!

Unfortunately, I just could not get into it. I don’t need main to be likeable, redeemable, or even relatable, but I did not enjoy reading about this one. I’m kind of unsure how to explain what it is about her I disliked, but I was frustrated by how much she annoyed me. I think part of it was that she made so many assumptions women she didn’t know. Her jealousy is an obvious reason for that, I just didn’t like the way it was done.

I also found a lot of the dialogue very strange. At one point, the MC is talking to an older trans woman at a party, and their conversation is so disjointed, I had to reread it a few times. Neither woman responded to the other one in an appropriate way and it didn’t really make sense - it felt like they were having different conversations. This issue wasn’t limited to that one interaction. A lot of the dialogue felt like the people were talking at instead of to each other.

At about 30%, I decided to do a sort of skim-read because I wanted to know what happened, but I didn’t want to be with the MC any longer. I understand Ash’s motivations and I think that aspect of the story was interesting, but ultimately, the writing and the characters themselves just weren’t for me.

I sometimes struggle to put my thoughts into words when it comes to novels like this. I tend to enjoy books that are a little bit raunchy, and I appreciate lewd storytelling—especially when it centers marginalized groups—because there’s a kind of power in that honesty. This book had some of that, which drew me in.

One thing that surprised me was how late the supernatural element, specifically the demons, came into the story. For about 85% of the book it seemed like the "demons" were metaphorical, representing inner trauma or emotional baggage. When the actual demons appeared, it felt more like an attempt to inject horror into the plot rather than something that added real depth. Personally, I didn’t think the supernatural twist contributed much to the story.

What I did enjoy was the exploration of relationships, especially the one between the main character and Ash, the commune’s leader. I'm always interested in reading about power dynamics, particularly within queer women’s relationships, and this book gave some interesting moments in that regard. The conversations between Indigo and the main character also stood out to me as thoughtful and compelling.

Overall, though, the story didn’t really stick with me. It was easy to put down, and when I came back to it, I often forgot what had happened. The plot wasn’t especially engaging—it mostly centered on a group of queer women with traumatic pasts, all living together and navigating their complicated, sometimes toxic, romantic histories. A lot of their interactions came off as tense or petty, which could be interesting, but here it started to feel repetitive.

I devoured Herculine—a sharp, fast-paced nightmare glittering with insight about desire, trauma, and the unique joys and disappointments of t4t intimacy. In a literary landscape long-plagued by bloodless depictions of contemporary transsexual life, Herculine splashes onto the scene sparkling red and wreathed in viscera.

It took so long to get to the horror and “yellow jackets” of it all I kept feeling like I picked up the wrong book.

I received a free copy from Saga Press via Netgalley in exchange for a fair review. Publish date October 7th.

I requested this book because I was intrigued by the trans horror premise. In Herculine, the unnamed trans narrator is attempting to pursue writing career in New York, where she is haunted by the demons that taunt her when she's half asleep. When she suddenly loses her job, she impulsively takes an ex up on her offer to join an all trans girl commune in rural Indiana, where things are not as they seem...

Herculine is a novel where the horror feels more inspired by literary fiction than the orderly explanations of urban fantasy. Even the goriest horror sequences in the book feel much more metaphorical than scary, and all of the fantasy elements are possible to explain away as the narrator's hallucinations or schizophrenia. The literary fiction feel is emphasized by the prose--Byron has a gift for excellent turns of phrase. There's a particularly good passage where she links the narrator's pushy landlord with a description of god as the heavenly landlord, and then quips that her mother taught her to pray for rent money. However, Byron also has a bit of a tendency to dedicate large passages to philosophizing, which may not be to everyone's taste. I wouldn't say Herculine navel gazes, but it certainly glances occasionally at the midriff.

The plot itself is more metaphor than campy horror novel. We learn that demons are tied to people in their worst moment of trauma, and haunt them in attempt to steal their souls. Here, trauma tears apart the trans woman community literally, in the form of demons eating people. Our unnamed narrator is a prime target for demonic manipulation: haunted by the conversion therapy she suffered through as a teen, bitterly jealous of other women writers posting about their successes on instagram, and scraping her way through living in New York with ketamine and parties full of people she despises. And the trans utopia her ex promises her doesn't turn out to be much better...

A dark and spiky trans horror book about intracommunity violence. It leaned a bit too far into litfic stylistically for my taste, but if that's more your thing, you may enjoy it.

Full on fever dream read!
I really enjoyed the details and tone of the story overall. However, the pacing seemed stalled and at times sentences felt too wordy and repetitive. I also wish the horror elements were a little more spread throughout the story instead of just the last few chapters.
In general the plot is unique and I would like to give this one another shot maybe as an audiobook for summer.

Thank you Saga Press for the ARC🖤

Grace Byron is an incredibly talented writer. Her prose is beautiful and poetic at times. Her writing quality deserves a 4-5 rating, but I do feel as though the book itself needed more revision.
I'm hoping the ARC isn't the final version being published. There was a lengthy opening of the character's life in NYC, and immediately after arriving at Herculine the pacing, plot, and sense of the author guiding us disappears. Transitions between scenes and chapters are jumpy and left me checking if I had accidentally skipped pages, and the scenes with the demonic rituals are rushed through. In the first half, the narrator's personal hauntings and such are EXCELLENT--scary, visceral, we are there with her! But this aspect seems to dissipate and even when literal demons are evoked and insane things are occurring, I struggled to picture and grasp the severity of the moments. I think that with revised pacing and more continuity of the narrator's personal hauntings we might be able to succumb fully to this commune.
Thank you for the ARC and I look forward to reading more by Grace!

I requested this book before it had a cover and I have zero regrets. This book will have you hooked immediately! This book felt like a fever dream! This is a book everyone needs to read

Our main character is invited to an all trans girl commune from her ex girlfriend..... red flag from the beginning but I couldn't stop reading!!!!
When you read this.... take your time and truly digest the horror occurring at the commune.... Im at a loss of words on how to describe this book and the events that took place. Similar to Blair Witch, I feel each person should read this book and see if we have similar concepts of what we read or did you experience something different from the mysteries Grace put us through.

It was… fine. It’s pretty slow and a little too niche for a debut author. The point of the plot doesn’t come until way too late in the story, and breaking down other trans women within the community took up a lot of the beginning half. I understand that it’s easy to go after people in your own circle, but in a state of the world where trans people are actively being hunted by politicians and alt-right ideologies, perhaps ranking levels of transness and thus what is “more trans than you” isn’t the way to go.

I went into this book expecting a campy, queer horror story with a sharp edge and compelling characters, but unfortunately, it fell short on nearly every front. While the premise had real potential, the execution left much to be desired. The narrator in particular came across as grating, often embodying the "I'm not like other girls" trope in a way that felt condescending—especially toward other trans characters. Rather than building complexity or nuance, the character's voice just made me angry.

I found most of the cast insufferable, which made it difficult to stay engaged. The pacing was uneven, with a plot that seemed to stall just when it should have been building momentum. The ending felt rushed and abrupt, leaving little payoff after pushing through a frustrating narrative. Additionally, the repetitive and excessive use of certain language (especially one particular word) became increasingly distracting and took away from the overall reading experience.

In the end, this book didn’t deliver on its promise for me. While I appreciate what it was trying to do, the tone and characters made it a tough read, and it never quite found its footing.