Thank you Saga press for the advanced copy to review!

This is probably the most disgusting horror book I’ve ever read and I mean that as a total compliment. So many times while I was reading I said out loud “ugh!!!” Or “ew!!!” Or “that’s so gross!!”

Crane is just doing his best to survive. I really don’t want to give any spoilers at all, but wow was the social commentary in this book on point. Bodily autonomy. Protecting yourself. Found family. Doing what you have to in order to survive.

That ending was absolutely wild and diabolical!!!!

Fully recommend.

A mute, autistic, trans young trans man, Crane (Sophie dead name) finds himself right smack in the middle of an alien parasitic alien species invasion in rural West Virginia. This is a crazy fast paced and gory ride. Check trigger warnings because this one starts out the gate with the beautifully morbid and macabre craziness. Triggers: cannibalism, pregnancy/childbirth as body horror, child death, transphobia, sexual violence, domestic abuse, abortion, murder, vivid body gore, and graphic violence.

Its hard to say much without spoilers but picture a lost and mentally unhealthy teen who is struggling with their identity and looking for acceptance. They find what appears to be a cult (the hive) that accepts them for who they are. Makes them feel accepted and wanted. Then you find out that the hive is really an alien parasite staging an invasion and the members are insanely brutal.

Overall this was an insane read with so many WTH just happened moments but I enjoyed every minute of it. As I already said just make sure you check the triggers and the week need not apply.

Official Review

4.2 / 5 Stars

I normally break my ARC reviews down to plot, characters, setting and writing but I can’t do that with this book I need to just straight up talk about it. This book is disturbing, I will put that frankly, there were many times in this book that I needed to take a moment and breath. That being said, PLEASE please please look at the trigger warnings before reading.

Now, this book was SO well written the way that Andrew Joseph White wrote about the unwanted pregnancy, autism, identity, toxic relationships (both intimate and friendship) is just astonishing. The book felt raw, it felt real, it made my skin crawl and my heart ache. I was just put through the ringer with my emotions.

We watch the main character Crane, a trans male, fall pregnant to Levi, the toxic “boyfriend” and the Hive wants Crane to have the child. During this time we watch Crane absolutely spiral into the thralls of an identity crisis and need for self preservation. My heart was so broken for Crane and watching him reach out to those who support him but be pulled back into his toxic relationships. It just ripped my heart out.

This is truly a fantastic novel that speaks to the topics of reproductive and ab**tion care becoming impossible for some to obtain, it speaks to living in abusive relationships, it speaks to the importance of self identity and just so much more. Having these kinds of topics covered in a horror novel just really amplified them, it made them really stick with me.

Read this book, it makes you think.

"You were not meant to be human" is a visceral read, a very personal work for its author, and will resonate with a lot of people who are made to feel "other".

However, as a book, it is pretty slow, and it feels like most of the actual plot is jammed at the last third of the book, including a deus ex machina encounter that opens a can of worms (pun not intended!) and then doesn't get to close it before an abrupt ending. Overall, it feels rushed and would have probably benefited from another round of editing.

The misterious worms announced in the summary act no different than your off-the-mill Christian cult. It would have been more powerful to go full realism a la "The Handmaiden's Tale", and also develop the secondary characters to not be easily classified as pure good or pure evil (fortunatelly there's a couple of good exceptions to that).

Heed the trigger warnings! Most of the book did not feel much worse than the author's previous YA works, but when it goes worse, it goes really WORSE.

I feel a bit bad about this, because it is not the author's fault, but in the years this book was in development, things have gotten so bad in real life when it comes to its central topic of body autonomy that the dystopian future pictured is basically a normal day now, so it was difficult for me to feel sympathy for a fictional character going through their personal hell while being bombarded with far worse things happening to actual real people.

I recommend this book if you are a fan of the author, if you like dark gorey stories, and if you want to read about body autonomy, identity and/or cults.

There’s so many queer/trans specific nuances that are so beautiful and it’s really cool to experience this level of representation in a book. I don’t know if cis/het folks will get it- I love that.

It’s so obvious how much of Andrew’s heart and souls has been put into this book. There is so much vulnerability. The afterward is so important to read. The ending leaves you feeling raw so it’s nice to hear directly from Andrew in that moment.

Goddamn. This would be such a hard read for people don’t get it. Like don’t know what it’s like to have intrusive thoughts and self destructive feelings. Andrew wrote so much of what I would never have admitted thinking or experiencing. I def thought that level of fucked it was only my own.

I can’t word it with brevity but if you don’t end up liking this book, it’s simply because it’s not for you. Andrew is an amazing author and this book is incredible. It’s rough, gross, raw and heavy. I love it. 🖤

The way Crane experiences dysphoria and desirability is so important. Also Stagger is probably my favorite character, next to Crane. He’s just a little worm boy.

🪱

I... honestly don't know how to feel about this book. I really, really wanted to like and recommend it, but, despite being very impressed with it in certain ways, am struggling a little. On the one hand, I devoured the entire thing non-stop in four hours. I thought it was well-written and engaging, that it was a phenomenal character study of Crane in particular, and that it was a horrifying read in any number of ways (appropriate for a horror novel). It also engaged with various issues in a thoughtful way. I thought its handling of a particular kind of abuse re: Levi's treatment of Crane and the toll that takes on Crane was well-done, and it also got far deeper inside the characters' heads than almost any book I've read (which I didn't entirely like--more on that later), but which is still an accomplishment. All this is why I've rated it four stars, rather than three.

With that said, I felt very uncomfortable with some of the content (re: disturbing sexual fantasies) on screen. I might just be prudish and am also not a horror expert (though I love Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Agustina Bazterrica, and Grady Hendrix), but a lot of that content just felt unnecessary and I honestly also felt as though it was being tied to Crane's trans identity in ways I wasn't entirely comfortable with (ie, almost as though the book were implying trans people are mentally ill/have sexually tinged suicidal fantasies simply because they're trans). Yes, many trans people have mental health issues--but those issues come from all sorts of external strain, be that non-accepting parents, peer cruelty, etc... yet in Crane's case, his vivid fantasies and desires (particularly relating to arson) seemed to be chalked up to mere dysphoria, which I felt as an actual force in his childhood wasn't evoked clearly enough on screen (though I may have missed things)--he honestly seemed like a fairly happy, popular high school kid, all of which was maybe a facade to cover up severe mental health issues... but, to be clear, I didn't get a sense that an inner conviction that he was a guy and an accompanying anguish at the refusal of society to recognize that was one of those issues. In fact, it only seemed to come up after he escaped to the hive. Crane stated multiple times that he hadn't gone through very much, which, to be honest, seemed very true. His parents were literally incredible, and it drove me crazy that he didn't seem to think about how concerned they'd be about him disappearing. Granted, there was a much more well-adjusted trans couple in the book, so there is hope. But this book did depress me a non-zero amount, and left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth.

With all that said, however, a lot of this is very subtle and I might have misread certain aspects of the book. The reception it has received so far suggests that's probably likely. A main character also doesn't have to be likeable for a book to be good. While I very much wanted the best for Crane, I can't deny that I found him almost abysmally self-centered--but that doesn't make the book bad and the fact that I was so focused on it while reading is a strong sign of how well done this was. I'm a huge Andrew Joseph White fan, and very much did enjoy this book, hence the four stars--it's a shocking, bracing horror novel which was impossible to put down, and was, in certain respects, far more timely than I wish.

Thank you to NetGalley and Saga Press (specifically Christine Calella!) for giving me an eARC of this title in exchange for an honest review!

Jesus H. Christ. Holy Shit. AJW you've done it again but Good Lord. Of course I loved this book, OF COURSE. But also I will never be the same again.

This is an incredibly powerful and important novel that I expect will be targeted by book bans across the nation. I have little words to describe how incredible this book was. It feels like AJW can see into my soul, my deepest and darkest thoughts. I am going to carry Crane with me for the rest of my life.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

If you're familiar with or a fan of the terms "dead dove: do not eat," then this book is for you.

This was exactly the writing I needed after I left fandom and stopped reading fanfic. And I don't mean that to discredit the author's talent- so many fanfic authors are insanely talented as well - but the "problematic" content within is *chef's kiss.*

There are so many deeply personal aspects written about that I don't think I can do a review justice. But I encourage anyone who likes pregnancy/body horror and severely toxic relationships to give this a shot.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me this ARC of "You Weren't Meant to Be Human" in exchange for a review! 4/5

Andrew Joseph White remains one of my favorite authors, first with his YA books and now with this, his adult debut! "You Weren't Meant to Be Human" was filled with all of the gore that's been seen in his other novels, but turned up to fit an adult debut and I think that's Incredible.

I thought that Crane was such an interesting main character, with his identity as a trans man, his pregnancy, and his relationship with those factors and who he was before he transitioned made this a great read. With the reflection of today's politics, the book made for excellent commentary, and it worked well. Honestly, I think that everything that AJW did worked out so well as far as the story goes, and every awful moment that happened made the story even better.

Even though this didn't hit me as hard as some of his other books have, I still thought "You Weren't Meant o Be Human" was an incredible read. Keep the trigger warnings in mind, of course, but I would genuinely recommend reading this whenever it's released!

I can't imagine AJW writing a bad book, honestly. Truly one of my favorite authors.

Thank you Andrew Joseph White, Saga Press, and Netgalley for this eARC!

Overview: Crane is given a second chance at life after devoting himself to the hive. He’s given the space he needs to live a life that is of his choosing. But after getting pregnant, the hive wants the baby, no matter how anyone else feels about it, especially Crane.

Please make sure that you check the triggers for this before getting into it. I cannot stress that enough.

Andrew Joseph White is forever my favorite horror author and this was exactly what I was hoping for his first adult novel. It was gritty, gory, and revolting. I felt so many emotions throughout this read and it’s so hard to pin down each of them without spoiling anything. Just know that you’re in for a wild and disgusting ride when you pick up this book.
Crane as a character really showed the parts of autism that people try to hide away. From being non-speaking, to struggling with hygiene, and having an unhealthy relationship with kink as a form of validating himself. He was relatable and frustrating and real.
Levi SUCKS. I think I probably said that like 1,000 times while reading this and I stand by each time I said it. He is, was, and will always be THE WORST.
As much as I wished for a pretty ending with a bunch of explanations, I’m glad that it ended the way it did. Bittersweet.

Regardless of your personal beliefs, this read will make you uncomfortable, upset, and confused.

Crane is a complicated character and is another of Andrew Joseph White's figures that he handles with care in their presentation. His beliefs and prior identity haunt the present in the text in ways both horrific and unnerving.

I think the world presented by White hurts more in it's accuracy than anything I have read this year. The problem I have is that it feels poignant yet oversaturated with awfulness.

This is a prime of example of unfunny satire. There is a single line about a quarter into this book that will stick with me, won't be quoting here since it's not out yet though! The thing is though is this line is broken by terminology used by Crane at the end of the novel.

This read is self-destructive and mean spirited to a point where I almost could not stomach it. Is that horror? For some definitely. There were several moments where I genuinely hated the thoughts of Crane and the actions of the majority of the cast. I kept reading though, and I read it voraciously. Call it masochism or sadism, protagonist Crane would understand.

I think this will be another instance similar to Witchcraft to Wayward Girls in which the marketing aesthetics and blurb are going to make people expect a much different type of horror. Especially the "alien invasion" mentioned, even though it drives the narrative, the horror remains rooted in the reality of a forced birth. That's fine! But I think most upon picking this title up are going to expect that sci-fi element to be more prominent and it not being there is going to confuse people.

I don't know where I stand on this read, as a cis, asexual reviewer, overt sexuality can be alien to me and this book is several galaxies away. I really grew uncomfortable with Crane's initial treatment of Jess and several lines directed at Hannah although it shifted in the last quarter.

I just wonder what cramming this much abject agony into one narrative is meant to do. I feel like I'm looking into the parts of a mind that are too private to bear.

I think people should be more aware of the type of read this is, not even the trigger warnings are enough for me.

You Weren't Meant To Be Human is not going to go how you'd expect. Truthfully, I don't think it can be "expected" in any real way. You are probably not going to like Crane, nor will you understand him. You aren't supposed to. In a way, I don't think this book is for readers—It's for Crane. He is not justified to the audience, but he is explained, thoroughly and continuously. It is up to you to interpret him.

There was a point about 85 or 90% of the way through where I realized I had been viewing Crane through the context of being a horror protagonist which dehumanized him in a way. But when he urges Jess to run away, when his parents arrive at the gas station, a switch flipped. I understood him better than I had. Despite the birth taking place mere pages later, these events outside of the gas station in the snow were the climax of the story for me. Introducing characters outside of the hive brought the greater world into the context of the story and recontextualized it all in an almost gentle way.

I never found myself feeling that I had to "stick it out" with this book, but I did feel very lost for much of it, especially the middle third. As I've said, you cannot reasonably "expect" any part of what happens or what path will be taken to get there. If this frustrates you, I highly recommend pushing through because it does feel like it all comes together in the end.

To me, Jess is the hidden gem of this book. I won't say much, but I found myself completely enamored with her by her last scene. I found myself hoping for her in a way that the narrative makes you feel you shouldn't be hoping for any of these characters. Not because they're all inherently bad, but because they are all doomed.

I have a mere few complaints:
• I wanted more exploration on the hive itself. While it is a driving plot for so much of the story, we don't dig deep into what the hive is or what it wants. People follow it because it promises understanding. In return it asks for corpses to feast on. It wants to see the sun, but it can't, and that desire isn't explained nor expanded upon in any real way. For a being so impactful, there should have been more build up into what gives it the power to be that. I did completely understand the purpose behind the "they're just bugs, they can die" narrative taken towards the end, but that falls a little flat when you consider that they seem to be capable of physically controlling their subjects in some way once they are physically inside their bodies, a la Stagger. In short the mechanics behind the hives purpose and power were not extremely well fleshed out (no pun intented).

• As much as I wanted to, I never saw how Crane's hypersexuality fit in with the rest of his traits and trauma responses. As a trans autist myself, I expected to understand him right off the bat more than I did—This isn't a complaint, just a surprise. It took me a while to understand that his fixation on self-mutilation stemmed from untreated dysphoria (among other things), that his lack of agency and autonomy came from a sort of pessimistic view of himself and his need to submit, to be given permission. I ended up getting most everything about him, but not his sexual fantasies. It just didn't feel connected to the rest of it, if that makes sense.

• It's explained right off the bat and continously discussed that Crane's muteness is due to him speaking "never being worth it anyway," in the sense that what he says doesn't matter and has never done him any good anyway. It's a form of self protection. This could have been very interesting, however, despite all of the exploration into Crane's teenage years/school and home life, nothing seems to suggest that speaking has caused great harm to him in the past, at least from my perspective. He knows that his parents would listen to him and walk to the ends of the earth to help him. He hasn't been bullied or mistreated based on the times he has spoken in the past. When he sees his parents again, he does briefly think that all of his fears have been "excuses" for him to run away from asking for help because he didn't know how to do so and didn't know that he would have been allowed. I appreciated this while reading it but I would have liked it all to be connected a little bit more cohesively. The point behind it needed to be hammered home and it wasn't.

While I explained these things in length, know that they are not narrative failings nor do they ruin the experience of reading the novel! They're just things I wish would have been touched on and tied in more. Overall, I highly enjoyed this reading experience and would recommend it easily. AJ White is yet to release a flop. Four for four!

4.5⭐️

This was incredible and I feel sick to my stomach. I don't read much horror outside of AJW's YA books, so I knew going into it that this would be a brutal read. Knowing it was coming didn't make it any less gut-wrenching.

This book is disgusting and grotesque and deeply cathartic. It's is about abuse and a loss of autonomy. The sci-fi elements are fairly secondary. The alien bug/worm hive is one of Crane's abusers, and its alien nature affects its mechanics, but at its core it's just another abuser. In a lot of ways it's more metaphor than anything else, another parasite feeding off Crane, violating his mind and body.

AJW's adult writing style is distinct from his YA books, but Crane's story is just as consuming and compulsively readable. This was a disturbing read, and I'll need to some time to recover, but the more I sit with it, the more I appreciate it.

4.5 stars, rounded up.

Thanks to NetGalley for an eARC of this title!


This is a tricky book for me to review. It is very good, and I enjoyed reading it, but I was also very disturbed by the content. I think if you have the stomach for it it is a valuable read, but PLEASE read the trigger warnings first.

You Werent Meant to be Human is a book set in a near-future America that deals with a lot of triggering topics. The main character is a trans autistic man named Crane who is part of a cult led by the Hive, a sentient pile of worms and flies. When he finds out he's pregnant, the Hive commands he carry the child to term. What follows is the emotional journey Crane goes through as he struggles with body dysphoria, an abusive partner, and the desire to end his own life.

This doesn't sound like a good time, and it was not a good time reading about, but I did finish the book in 5 days as opposed to the usual month it takes me to finish a novel. It pulls you in the same way a car crash does: you know you shouldn't look but you need to know how bad the damage is. This is not to say AJW is a poor writer, quite the opposite: he knows how to keep his readers on edge, disgusted at what is happening but desperate to know how it all ends.

This is probably the most disturbing book I've ever read (and I read a fair bit of horror). Because of that, I find it difficult to recommend to the average reader. I think fans of AJW's previous works will enjoy it, along with readers of extreme horror. Overall, it is a terrifying and powerful book that serves as a grim warning of the possible future we face after the fall of Roe v. Wade.

For anyone who loves a really disturbing horror with uncomfortable themes, with questionably deeper meanings, this book is for you. Just wow. I won’t lie, there were parts I had to skip over because it just made my stomach twist, but this was an incredible read.

This book was horrible in the best way possible. It was a perfect horror novel because I was so scared for the main character and for the impact this story would have on me for years to come. This book is disgusting, disturbing, and heartbreaking. Crane endures so much violence from those who are meant to care and support him. The story focuses on how Crane’s bodily autonomy, his identity, and his safety is being ripped away from him, and he is left powerless to endure it.

The horrors of this book felt so real because it is the reality for so many people who are denied their right to bodily autonomy and the right to live safely as themselves. Set in the very near future, this book provides a speculative look at our reality as trans people are constantly under attack and abortion is criminalized.

Multiple times throughout this book, I would have to stop because of the panic I felt over whether this would be how I felt if I was forced to carry a pregnancy I did not want. How far would I be pushed to regain control over myself as it’s ripped away from me. This book deeply speaks to the wrongness and the harms endured when people who are capable of pregnancy are forced against their will to carry that pregnancy. Crane’s pain throughout this story is so real because it is real.

I loved this book from page one, but by far the best part of this book was the ending. It was visceral and real and both scary and comforting. I mourn the end of this book. This will be a book I will always remember. I am so grateful for Andrew Joseph White for sharing this story with us.

Dark, disturbing, tragic, twisted and sick are words that I would use to describe You Weren’t Meant to Be Human by Andrew Joseph White. For his debut adult horror novel it’s both shocking and heartbreaking. There are questions that I’m left to ponder about the worm cult. The characters were flawed and fleshed out. The pace felt right. The action at 95% in was unexpected. ARC was provided by Saga Press via NetGalley. I received an advance reading copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

As a new and first time mother, I want to start off by saying this book is NOT for the faint of heart, especially the ending, so please read trigger warnings before going into it.

✨️ PLOT: 5/5

There was something so intriguing about everything that was happening in this book that made it impossible to put down. I kept wondering more about the hive, about what it meant. I kept finding myself saying, "ah, isn't that just like how our country is headed now?" and it really kept me at the edge of my seat the entire read.

I was hoping for a happy ending but I obviously did not actually expect one. The ending was very sad and made me want to cry, but I understand why the author ended it this way.

✒️ WRITING: 5/5

This book is incredibly well written, to the point where I can easily say I will read anything this man writes on the future, it was so easy to follow but deep at the same time. The descriptions had a lot of depth without being over the top.

🪱 CHARACTERS: 5/5

It was really easy to hate the characters I was supposed to hate, like the characters I was supposed to like, and feel all of the sympathy in the world for Crane for what his life turned into, how even having a loving childhood cannot always save people who have mental health problems, and that even parents who would love their transgender child cannot save them from a country who tells them they are less than human. I hope this book changes the rhetoric of at least some transphobic people out there today.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this beautifully disgusting book. I was given this opportunity as an ARC reader on Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

You Weren't Meant to Be Human was so repulsive and absolutely nauseating, but like in the best way. Like everything ever written by AJW, 5 FREAKING STARS