A review by andipants
The Hallowed Ones by Laura Bickle

3.0

This was an interesting take on the apocalyptic horror genre. For the most part, I really liked the Amish angle — it made for a believably isolated community, and the protagonist's struggle with her faith makes for some compelling character moments. I will say, though, the extreme naiveté and isolation seemed just a bit overplayed in places; most Amish communities that I'm aware of have no problem with people using the library, for example, and there was some remark early on about Katie reading forbidden books about dinosaurs and...planets? I mean, yeah, a lot of Amish are young-earth creationists, but they don't deny the existence of planets. (Then again, how much realism we're going for here seems open to debate, given the prominence of the Hexenmeister to the plot, since hex signs are an aspect of specifically non-Amish Pennsylvania Dutch culture; the oddity is touched on in the book, but only very lightly. So maybe this is just supposed to be a weird Amish community.)

Overall, the plot was interesting and tense, with what seemed to me a surprising amount of edge for YA horror. If you can't stomach gore, consider this your content warning, as it gets rather graphic at times, although it doesn't stray into cheesy or exploitative territory. The story is fairly self-contained, but does leave plenty of room for the sequel. Overall, a solid horror offering with good characters and a unique hook — I'll definitely be interested to see where the sequel goes.