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The Crooked God Machine
The Black Planet is an oppressive world terrorized by a masked god. Charles is a young idealist who lives in constant fear of being taken from his family for his heretical ideas. When Charles meets an enigmatic and scarred woman named Leda, she gives him hope for an existence outside of the god's regime. When Leda disappears, Charles leaves his small town to search for her. Along the way he will uncover the truth of the origins of the Black Planet, and confront the god that would destroy all life in the pursuit of a perfect and unchanging paradise.
The Crooked God Machine is a dystopian horror about a broken family and a broken world. Compared to the work of David Lynch, H.R Giger, and Philip K. Dick, it's at once darkly romantic, violent, and uncomfortably familiar.
The Crooked God Machine is a dystopian horror about a broken family and a broken world. Compared to the work of David Lynch, H.R Giger, and Philip K. Dick, it's at once darkly romantic, violent, and uncomfortably familiar.
341 pages, Kindle Edition
First published December 23, 2011
107 people are currently reading
2470 people want to read
About the author
Autumn Christian
15 books339 followersAutumn Christian is the author of the books "The Crooked God Machine," "We are Wormwood", and "Ecstatic Inferno," and has written for several video-games, including Battle Nations and State of Decay 2. When not writing, she is usually practicing her side kicks and running with dogs, or posting strange and existential Instagram selfies.
She's been a freelance writer, a game designer, a cheese producer, a haunted house actor, and a video game tester. She considers Philip K. Dick, Ray Bradbury, Katie Jane Garside, the southern gothic, and dubstep, as main sources of inspiration.
She's been a freelance writer, a game designer, a cheese producer, a haunted house actor, and a video game tester. She considers Philip K. Dick, Ray Bradbury, Katie Jane Garside, the southern gothic, and dubstep, as main sources of inspiration.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 100 reviews
July 10, 2013
WOW! There’s some really raw talent here. This is good, it’s really raw, but the imagination at work here is fantastic. The one thing that bothered me a little, and I’m going to breeze through this because I don’t want you to focus on it, is it needs to be proof read about two more times. Not to dwell on this, but it also needs a professional editor to go through it and clean up some of the awkward sentences and imagery. It can get muddy at times.
***Slight spoilery ahead***
Ok, now to the stuff I LOVED! Right off the bat, I got the feeling something was wrong. There’s a lot of crazy messed up things going on in this world, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I got the feeling that something was wrong on a deeper level. She never said it, or even hinted at it. The writing its self tells you. The voice of the story tells you things are probably not what they seem. There’s something going on. And that’s HARD to do! But Autumn executed it perfectly.
Which brings me to the next thing. The story. I felt a connection to the characters. I felt like I understood who they were and why they were acting the way they did. I genuinely cared about them and liked them. As the story unfolds, and I was sitting here going “What the F is going on?” I didn’t give up on it, because I wanted to know what was happening next. And I wanted to get to the bottom of this WTF feeling I was having.
It’s a difficult book to classify. If you held a gun to my head and said, “CLASSIFY OR DIE!” I would reply.
“I don’t know! Maybe slipstream / bizarro with horror tendencies?” And then you would shoot me, because what does that even mean?
Not recommended for Literature Nazis, but highly recommended for those who like a good brain raw-dogging.
***Slight spoilery ahead***
Ok, now to the stuff I LOVED! Right off the bat, I got the feeling something was wrong. There’s a lot of crazy messed up things going on in this world, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I got the feeling that something was wrong on a deeper level. She never said it, or even hinted at it. The writing its self tells you. The voice of the story tells you things are probably not what they seem. There’s something going on. And that’s HARD to do! But Autumn executed it perfectly.
Which brings me to the next thing. The story. I felt a connection to the characters. I felt like I understood who they were and why they were acting the way they did. I genuinely cared about them and liked them. As the story unfolds, and I was sitting here going “What the F is going on?” I didn’t give up on it, because I wanted to know what was happening next. And I wanted to get to the bottom of this WTF feeling I was having.
It’s a difficult book to classify. If you held a gun to my head and said, “CLASSIFY OR DIE!” I would reply.
“I don’t know! Maybe slipstream / bizarro with horror tendencies?” And then you would shoot me, because what does that even mean?
Not recommended for Literature Nazis, but highly recommended for those who like a good brain raw-dogging.
July 18, 2012
This is one cool frickin' book.
I'd never heard of Autumn Christian before. I found Crooked God Machine when I saw on Goodreads that someone who enjoyed my novel, Alex, had given this a 5-star review. I read the sample just to check it out, and it was like black arms reached out from the mud, grabbed me by the ankles, and pulled me under.
An Amazon reviewer mentioned Salvador Dali - I had the same thought. The writing is like the love child of Salvador Dali, David Lynch, and HR Giger. It's sinuous, cutting, insidious, unapologetic.
The setting is a nightmare that won't end. If hell existed, this is what it would be like. All the elements of life that frighten us - losing the people we love, discovering there's nothing in life worth living - are here, but magnified and grotesque. From day one these people are battered with horrors. Most succumb. Some - somehow - survive. A rare few even learn to fight.
Now, please, consider that this book is not for everyone. You have to have a deep love for the macabre. You have to enjoy true horror. Here's a good litmus test. Look at the following phrases.
Hell shuttles
Plague machines
Black planet
God on the television, screaming
If you're intrigued, read the sample, then buy the book. If not, you won't enjoy this. Me, I enjoyed it. Deeply.
I do have one caveat that it pains me to mention but I do feel has to be mentioned. There are quite a few typographical errors in this work. Missing periods and sentences that aren't capitalized are pretty common, as are misused or missing quotation marks. The worst offenders are sentence fragments, presumably the leftover products of bits of text that were moved around during revision. I don't mention these because they should make you doubt whether to buy the book - in fact, the fact that I kept reading despite them is actually a powerful testament to how much I enjoyed the book. But they occur with such frequency that at times they actually pulled me out of the flow and forced me to re-construct what the author was trying to say. I mention them because anything that interferes with a reader's ability to become completely absorbed by this book is a horrible shame. When they occurred in the last fifteen pages, I truly, actively hated them - but only because they were in my way.
I also mention them so that you're warned going in. They're there, and they are well worth ignoring. Ms. Christian's voice is strong enough that the brittle pieces of typographical detritus that try to weigh it down will just crumble away if you let them.
Thank you for a wonderful novel, Autumn Christian. I picked up A Gentle Hell and I'll be watching for more from you.
I'd never heard of Autumn Christian before. I found Crooked God Machine when I saw on Goodreads that someone who enjoyed my novel, Alex, had given this a 5-star review. I read the sample just to check it out, and it was like black arms reached out from the mud, grabbed me by the ankles, and pulled me under.
An Amazon reviewer mentioned Salvador Dali - I had the same thought. The writing is like the love child of Salvador Dali, David Lynch, and HR Giger. It's sinuous, cutting, insidious, unapologetic.
The setting is a nightmare that won't end. If hell existed, this is what it would be like. All the elements of life that frighten us - losing the people we love, discovering there's nothing in life worth living - are here, but magnified and grotesque. From day one these people are battered with horrors. Most succumb. Some - somehow - survive. A rare few even learn to fight.
Now, please, consider that this book is not for everyone. You have to have a deep love for the macabre. You have to enjoy true horror. Here's a good litmus test. Look at the following phrases.
Hell shuttles
Plague machines
Black planet
God on the television, screaming
If you're intrigued, read the sample, then buy the book. If not, you won't enjoy this. Me, I enjoyed it. Deeply.
I do have one caveat that it pains me to mention but I do feel has to be mentioned. There are quite a few typographical errors in this work. Missing periods and sentences that aren't capitalized are pretty common, as are misused or missing quotation marks. The worst offenders are sentence fragments, presumably the leftover products of bits of text that were moved around during revision. I don't mention these because they should make you doubt whether to buy the book - in fact, the fact that I kept reading despite them is actually a powerful testament to how much I enjoyed the book. But they occur with such frequency that at times they actually pulled me out of the flow and forced me to re-construct what the author was trying to say. I mention them because anything that interferes with a reader's ability to become completely absorbed by this book is a horrible shame. When they occurred in the last fifteen pages, I truly, actively hated them - but only because they were in my way.
I also mention them so that you're warned going in. They're there, and they are well worth ignoring. Ms. Christian's voice is strong enough that the brittle pieces of typographical detritus that try to weigh it down will just crumble away if you let them.
Thank you for a wonderful novel, Autumn Christian. I picked up A Gentle Hell and I'll be watching for more from you.
August 12, 2018
Insanely brutal dystopian nightmare that almost makes Orwell's world look like a paradise. The fact that Christian wrote this when she was only 19 is pretty fucking amazing.
August 19, 2020
I have never read anything even close to the outright insanity that is in these pages. It's is a mean explosion of ideas, an epic quest to reconcile a lost faith, a dystopian novel that continuously rewrites the limits of the genre. But in all of the horror, there are moments of tenderness that strike like a hammer blow to the head. In a book this crazy, it's a pretty masterful balance.
Autumn Christian's "The Crooked God Machine" is vivid, visceral, and relentless. Just read it and see for yourself.
Autumn Christian's "The Crooked God Machine" is vivid, visceral, and relentless. Just read it and see for yourself.
December 9, 2018
This book is unburdened by plot or character. It reads like the stream of consciousness ramblings of someone who is supremely and unreasonably confident that they will be a great author.
I must admit I couldn't get past 20%; I had to give up. I don't like to give up on a book, but I found Crooked God Machine intensely displeasurable.
The good? Lemme try at least... The descriptions were creative, sorta... They were wordy at least. But in the service of nothing. Crooked God Machine seems like a writer's early attempt at a novel that should've been thrown away, not published. Well, at least in the first fifth that's what it seemed like to me. And there was a good quote: "The world doesn't need your head, only your body. It never wanted your head."
The description misrepresents the book in my opinion.
I must admit I couldn't get past 20%; I had to give up. I don't like to give up on a book, but I found Crooked God Machine intensely displeasurable.
The good? Lemme try at least... The descriptions were creative, sorta... They were wordy at least. But in the service of nothing. Crooked God Machine seems like a writer's early attempt at a novel that should've been thrown away, not published. Well, at least in the first fifth that's what it seemed like to me. And there was a good quote: "The world doesn't need your head, only your body. It never wanted your head."
The description misrepresents the book in my opinion.
October 2, 2012
Right off the bat: this book is not for everyone. If you can’t untie your mind and let in some seriously surreal dystopian horror wander in, you may not enjoy it. I implore you, for the good of your soul, to try, because this book is fucking fantastic. This debut novel from Autumn Christian is full of a thick, ancient darkness; Christian has a voice and a worldview unlike any author I’ve ever read, able to twist the most unexpected objects and symbols into a cohesive, unforgettable story. The book follows Charles, who lives on the Black Planet, where dead babies are fed to a swamp witch, plague machines roam across the land terrorizing the citizens with ice storms and locust swarms, and God himself is on TV in a black horned mask is on TV, nightly damning mankind and warning of the coming apocalypse. The emotional tone of the work is thick and heavy, and almost feels like a sludgy poison in your veins. And yet there is a lightness that shines through in the irrepressible hope of Charles, a hope that keeps drawing what little beauty is left in the world to him like moths to a flame, which only strengthens his hope and keeps him fighting to somehow undo the horrifying world he lives in. The imagery is unlike anything you’ll read: demented, blazingly imaginative, unsettling and unforgettable, far above par for any novel, let alone horror. Christian’s pacing has a deliciously crawling dread that builds to a somewhat abrupt ending, but it doesn’t leave the reader unsatisfied. It’s only that you, like its poor inhabitants, become completely trapped by the black planet by book’s end.
March 14, 2021
I review horror, science fiction, and fantasy novels professionally for several publications. I ordered this novel as a rare pleasure read after reading Girl Like A Bomb from CLASH Books, which I found to be immersive, innovative, and highly entertaining.
The Crooked God Machine is a book in a stratosphere of excellence that makes its general obscurity criminal. The world-building is delivered with extraordinary depth. The main character Charles is incredibly authentic, most notably in his experiences of trauma. The monstrous elements of the tale, including an evil God, a swamp crone, plague machines, monsters, and so much more, are enough to make your skin crawl. I haven't been this passionately moved by a book since reading DUNE as a teenager. This book is on a tier of excellence that even the most notable and best selling horror novels have yet to reach.
The Crooked God Machine is a book in a stratosphere of excellence that makes its general obscurity criminal. The world-building is delivered with extraordinary depth. The main character Charles is incredibly authentic, most notably in his experiences of trauma. The monstrous elements of the tale, including an evil God, a swamp crone, plague machines, monsters, and so much more, are enough to make your skin crawl. I haven't been this passionately moved by a book since reading DUNE as a teenager. This book is on a tier of excellence that even the most notable and best selling horror novels have yet to reach.
April 7, 2020
This book comes close to redefining dystopian. It presents a nightmare vision of a world dominated by a savage religion, where each day the new normal is worse than before. The most terrifying thing about the story is the way the characters accept each new indignity and brutality. And what really ratchets the horror up is how similar this bizarre place is to our own world. The book was a bleak yet rewarding experience. My only complaint was that often the narrative appears to be running in absence of any plot with one weird incident after another. It all comes around in the end, and ultimately the weird incidents were worth the time, so this is an extremely minor complaint. Definitely not like anything you’ve read before.
October 7, 2014
This book is a bleak, sad story about a world ruled by a monstrous God and one man's journey to find his lost love.
It's like a acid-infused, dreamlike, dystopic reading of the Old Testament.
Charles lives in a world tormented by monsters and "plague machines" (machines that produce Bible-like plagues, like turning water into blood and sending locusts). One day, Charle's father leaves, and then is when things begin to fall apart.
His mother and sister choose to have an invasive procedure that turned them into drooling, mindless zombies. His best friend is a sociopathic prophet, and God is a mask-wearing men on television who speaks only of the damnation of mankind.
I really liked this book, it exposes the dangers of living in a world ruled literally by the God from the Old Testament. The landscapes painted by author Autumn Christian are apocalyptc wastelands and rotten towns. This is beautifully written, the scenes pop out of the page.
The ending blew my mind. I thought it was heading in a certain direction, and then it completely changed. Sensational book.
It's like a acid-infused, dreamlike, dystopic reading of the Old Testament.
Charles lives in a world tormented by monsters and "plague machines" (machines that produce Bible-like plagues, like turning water into blood and sending locusts). One day, Charle's father leaves, and then is when things begin to fall apart.
His mother and sister choose to have an invasive procedure that turned them into drooling, mindless zombies. His best friend is a sociopathic prophet, and God is a mask-wearing men on television who speaks only of the damnation of mankind.
I really liked this book, it exposes the dangers of living in a world ruled literally by the God from the Old Testament. The landscapes painted by author Autumn Christian are apocalyptc wastelands and rotten towns. This is beautifully written, the scenes pop out of the page.
The ending blew my mind. I thought it was heading in a certain direction, and then it completely changed. Sensational book.
March 13, 2013
A surrealist romp through the Old Testament that constructs a new mythology. The Crooked God Machine is at once a sermon and a cautionary tale about accepting religious propaganda without question.
To lift a quote from a Marilyn Manson tune, 'God is in the tv' and He is angry. All young Charles ever wanted was to be loved. Instead, he has a taxidermy-obsessed father, a mother who has surrendered all independant thought to a euphoric brain implant stimulated by the television and a host of girlfriends who are each tragic figures in their own right, doomed to fall away from Charles as he is unable to save them from the hell shuttles, Jolene the swamp hag and divine sentries wearing animal masks.
Autumn Christian's first novel begins with an absurdist flavor, but finds its plot a hundred pages in as it thunders along to its explosive ending.
To lift a quote from a Marilyn Manson tune, 'God is in the tv' and He is angry. All young Charles ever wanted was to be loved. Instead, he has a taxidermy-obsessed father, a mother who has surrendered all independant thought to a euphoric brain implant stimulated by the television and a host of girlfriends who are each tragic figures in their own right, doomed to fall away from Charles as he is unable to save them from the hell shuttles, Jolene the swamp hag and divine sentries wearing animal masks.
Autumn Christian's first novel begins with an absurdist flavor, but finds its plot a hundred pages in as it thunders along to its explosive ending.
April 20, 2014
After some reflection, I will do my best here to sum up my thoughts. I cannot reference or run any parallels to the old testament, as I have not read it. However, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. Autumn Christian has further cemented herself into my consciousness as a favorite author. There was a lot going on in the story, yet it never felt overwhelming. The main character constantly struggled to save those around him, through a very harsh reality. Being in love only seemed to add to his pain. He showed a huge amount of strength and determination. The book's take on religion sat well with me. There were many examples of a herd mentality dominating nearly all of the population, reflecting much of what still exists today. My only negative here is that the kindle edition I read was certainly in need of some more editing.
March 4, 2014
I've been following the work of Autumn Christian since she was posting short stories on deviantART about The Sims and broken ballerinas. Her work has captured me in a way no ore author has ever been capable of doing. The Crooked God Machine is pure Christian literature, uncomfortably real, pure spiritual darkness that you discover within yourself. Granted there are some errors in grammar (or words missing entirely or repeated, I'm guessing they were just editing errors), it can be a little awkward trying to read, but I'm telling you, no amount of minor errors are worth not reading this book. You definitely take something from this. The Crooked God Machine is an experience.
March 28, 2018
I wanted to like this book. I really did.
However, I found the metaphors and odd descriptions more of a distraction than anything. They kept taking me out of the story. I also feel that the entire book was dark for dark's sake. A roller-coaster needs balance. It needs to have ups and downs, twists and turns, fast and slow. Too much scare, and one's body can't handle it. Too much slow, and you're bored to death. This story stayed dark, depressed, and full of despair so much that it took away any impact it should've had on me. There was no attempt at balance or a chance to smile.
When it ended, I literally said, "Well, of course that's how it would go. Why wouldn't it?" Meh.
However, I found the metaphors and odd descriptions more of a distraction than anything. They kept taking me out of the story. I also feel that the entire book was dark for dark's sake. A roller-coaster needs balance. It needs to have ups and downs, twists and turns, fast and slow. Too much scare, and one's body can't handle it. Too much slow, and you're bored to death. This story stayed dark, depressed, and full of despair so much that it took away any impact it should've had on me. There was no attempt at balance or a chance to smile.
When it ended, I literally said, "Well, of course that's how it would go. Why wouldn't it?" Meh.
March 28, 2023
It's really hard to rate, as this is so unique. It zips through at a relentless pace, really adding to the feeling of unease and giving an overwhelming feeling, which goes well with the uncomprimising bleak and dark tone of the book. The storyline moves from section to section, like walking through a house with each room, something completely different, and adding a curveball each turn. Some amazing parts, really hard to categorise, dark fantasy, horror, vision of hell? Would definitely recommend it, but I would also not be surprised if people gave it 1 star or 5 star. If you like a book that gives a feel or vibe, then this is for you
July 18, 2021
I didn’t expect to love this book as much as I do. Crooked God Machine is as punishing as the plague machines. There’s no hope in this book, there’s only despair. Autumn Christian’s use of odd similes and metaphors fits this story so well, really making each statement more powerful than it would be otherwise. The book is hauntingly beautiful, something I have only seen once before in Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human. It’s nihilistic, bleak, and bizarre, but the book itself does exactly what the author wanted. It portrays what life would be life if the God from The Holy Bible was a constant presence on Earth. It portrays loss of family, and pushing through everything life could possibly throw at you so you may continue living and love another again. Christian’s messages are powerful, and this book, dripping with venom, bites the reader and does not hold back. I cannot give higher praise for Crooked God Machine.
June 18, 2023
I liked the concept of the story but I wish the characters were a little more developed. The end fell a little flat for me. Some characters came in and were out of the story to quick for me.
A love story in the center of a dying world. where people get spider implants to become deadheads. A black masked God on every TV. Monsters that roam the night. Hell shuttles that collect sinners and take them to hell and plague machines that can unleash insects and carnage on any city.
Atheists it’s a must read, Christians better stay away!
A love story in the center of a dying world. where people get spider implants to become deadheads. A black masked God on every TV. Monsters that roam the night. Hell shuttles that collect sinners and take them to hell and plague machines that can unleash insects and carnage on any city.
Atheists it’s a must read, Christians better stay away!
April 8, 2021
crooked god machine is a sort of science fiction and fantasy mix that has some interesting creative flourishes in its world building and some striking imagery that is often dwarfed by a 2003 mall goth sensibility emboldened with a kind of matthew stokoe aesthetic drive to create unpleasantness. the plot is both labyrinthine and videogame-esque but it doesn't give you characters enough to care about and the style isn't strong enough to skate by without those things. i'm being rough here, which is lame. writing reviews of stuff you don't like sucks. maybe I won't do it anymore. but this feels like a first draft or a second draft that was never read by anyone but the author before publishing.
July 11, 2025
The most bleak, depressing, vile, and grotesque Lovecraftian dystopia horror novel I have read so far. The atrocities described in this story are horrendous. That said, the plot was incredibly interesting, and it’s a great “weird horror” book.
Certainly not a book that is for someone new to the horror genre.
Certainly not a book that is for someone new to the horror genre.
July 16, 2018
I thought some things were untouchable, unable to be harmed, even after all this time. But nothing is. Not here. Not in this world.
March 10, 2022
that was crazy, literally FUCKING insane. the story and meaning is just so unique and i couldn’t stop reading. it kept reeling me in with every fucked up, constantly moving plotline
September 9, 2024
I'm not sure if brilliance or bs
August 15, 2025
Pretty cool. Very bleak. Apparently she wrote it at 19 which is very impressive!!!
July 30, 2017
A dark and surreal tale about the Black Planet, The Crooked God machine tells the story of Charles who is born into an insane world run by a God who communicates to people via television. It is a world populated by plague machines, prophets and hell shuttles. A planet where life makes no sense and people willingly undergo lobotomy type procedures in order to cope with that fact. And yet there is Charles who just wants to understand life, and to find someone to love and to love him in return.
The author Autumn Christian has one of the most unique voices I have ever encountered. To me it is all parts poetic, surreal, bleak, and beautiful. She has told a nightmarish story here, one that mirrors the old testament of the Bible in many ways. One that translates it into a modern vision. That repurposes, reimagines, rewords, and yet still has at its core the central confusion of the Bible, and of life itself. Why is God so full of anger? Why is life so confusing? What is love and why is it so fleeting? And why do humans destroy themselves?
Charles is a rebel at heart. A boy that grows into a man who has watched all those he loves give up, or run off in desperation and fear. The people around him all seem to be under the spell of this angry and jealous God. But he senses that there must be something more to life, that things are just not right. This story is really his search, his attempt to find the scattered pieces of reality and attempt to put them back together.
Sometimes I read something so powerful and so original that it shifts something within me, within my thinking and how I view the world. Philip K Dick was one who did this time and again for me. Now I can add Autumn Christian to that list.
The author Autumn Christian has one of the most unique voices I have ever encountered. To me it is all parts poetic, surreal, bleak, and beautiful. She has told a nightmarish story here, one that mirrors the old testament of the Bible in many ways. One that translates it into a modern vision. That repurposes, reimagines, rewords, and yet still has at its core the central confusion of the Bible, and of life itself. Why is God so full of anger? Why is life so confusing? What is love and why is it so fleeting? And why do humans destroy themselves?
Charles is a rebel at heart. A boy that grows into a man who has watched all those he loves give up, or run off in desperation and fear. The people around him all seem to be under the spell of this angry and jealous God. But he senses that there must be something more to life, that things are just not right. This story is really his search, his attempt to find the scattered pieces of reality and attempt to put them back together.
Sometimes I read something so powerful and so original that it shifts something within me, within my thinking and how I view the world. Philip K Dick was one who did this time and again for me. Now I can add Autumn Christian to that list.
March 2, 2018
This is the only work by Autumn Christian that I've read, but if it is indicative of her other work it's a crime that this author is not a household name among fans of literary-leaning horror and science fiction. While several of Christian's influences are put on flagrant display (the all-knowing television celebrities of "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sleep?," the mythical authoritarian tyrant of "1984," etc.) the real meat of this work is the author's singularly unique voice and fresh approach. This is 10% worship of classic dystopian tales and 90% something mind-rendingly psychedelic, heart-crushingly despair filled, and, most importantly, utterly fresh. It's impossible to imply the feel, tone, and even plot of this thing in a short review, as the real magic here is in Christian's fascinating world building, doom-ridden atmosphere, and enchanting command of language. The author has so perfected her alien approach to storytelling that she's managed to convey a mind-bending narrative in an utterly alien world riddled with strange, sometimes non-sensical metaphor without ever confusing the reader or letting her work fall into the bloated and pretentious world of willfully obtuse, intentionally difficult faux-artistry. The first few pages are an utter whirlwind, but once you settle in it's refreshingly easy to fall into Christian's groove and hold on for the ride.
Now, at this point you may be wondering why I've only given this novel 3 stars with such a glowing review. The answer has nothing to do with the writing, and everything to do with editing: the soft cover version of this thing is an utter mess. Missing words, obtuse punctuation, spelling and capitalization errors, etc abound. This was so prevalent that at first I thought it was an intentional stylistic device; however, as the mistakes piled up and offered nothing but confusion and reading difficulty to the story, I began to wonder if the wrong draft got sent to the printer (*note: I think this is likely as my fiancee read the e-book version and didn't notice any of these issues).
Despite the shoddy copy editing, this novel is nothing short of a masterpiece. If you enjoy the darker side of science fiction and the psychedelic side of horror, this is a must-read.
Now, at this point you may be wondering why I've only given this novel 3 stars with such a glowing review. The answer has nothing to do with the writing, and everything to do with editing: the soft cover version of this thing is an utter mess. Missing words, obtuse punctuation, spelling and capitalization errors, etc abound. This was so prevalent that at first I thought it was an intentional stylistic device; however, as the mistakes piled up and offered nothing but confusion and reading difficulty to the story, I began to wonder if the wrong draft got sent to the printer (*note: I think this is likely as my fiancee read the e-book version and didn't notice any of these issues).
Despite the shoddy copy editing, this novel is nothing short of a masterpiece. If you enjoy the darker side of science fiction and the psychedelic side of horror, this is a must-read.
January 16, 2018
I'm exiting this book with a paradoxical feeling of exhiliration, given the absolute, open-wound, smothered-in-black-tar darkness of the world it presents. Because it's the story threading its way through this ashen world that is so blazing hot and full of life, and the core message of humanity against the worst of all possible truths that I find liberating. Even beautiful.
Yes, the book does need a good proofreading, but that honestly doesn't matter. Rather, it is a testament to this author's ability to tell one hell of a story that the errors just kind of become part of the jarring, surreal narrative after a while. Am I making excuses? Probably, I'm not dwelling on this stuff.
As other reviewers have pointed out, this one isn't for everyone. It's not easily classified. It certainly has a lot to say, and you'll wade in bile and blood and savage sorrow on every page. But for all that, it's a magnificent book.
Yes, the book does need a good proofreading, but that honestly doesn't matter. Rather, it is a testament to this author's ability to tell one hell of a story that the errors just kind of become part of the jarring, surreal narrative after a while. Am I making excuses? Probably, I'm not dwelling on this stuff.
As other reviewers have pointed out, this one isn't for everyone. It's not easily classified. It certainly has a lot to say, and you'll wade in bile and blood and savage sorrow on every page. But for all that, it's a magnificent book.
January 1, 2023
DNF at 25%. The world was super interesting at first glance but became silly after a while. The setting just doesn't seem to make sense. In the main character's family, apparently no one has a job, yet there is no hint that they ever have money troubles. Is this a nightmarish dystopia with a livable universal basic income?
November 26, 2020
It took me way too long to review this. I tried to read it years ago but found it as inscrutable as it is beautifully written. I returned to it more recently when I bought an ebook reader, then nibbled away at it for months. It's dense, in the positive sense. Dense, rich, chocolatey cake. I think? It's difficult to say. I feel all kinds of things while reading this and still feel unsure what I could write that would capture it.
Crooked God Machine takes place in a surreal nightmare world. It's the literary equivalent of a Hieronymus Bosch painting, incorporating enough relatable close up details to be somewhat grounded in reality, but the further you pull back, the more of the big picture you see, the more unreal it becomes. Crooked God Machine invokes a great deal of religious imagery and for much of the early chapters it's unclear how much of it is really happening and how much is just a description of the main character's perception, colored by their religious upbringing.
While this makes it feel a bit as if you're drunk, brain damaged or under some kind of spell, it occurs to me that striking this balance between fantasy and reality without any visible seams is a noteworthy feat. I've seen this done incorrectly before, where it's plain to see what's really going on. It is not plain to see here. You will be kept guessing for a while.
The main character is perhaps the only sane person in the story, and an invitation to self insert to some degree. It evokes the feeling of being a sensible person in a deeply insensible world which you arrived into without your consent, unable to make sense of it, unable to right wrongs which had already been compounding and festering for centuries before you arrived on the scene. In that sense I found the plot deeply relatable.
The protagonist enjoys a brief oasis of happiness here and there as love still exists, even in such a world. But just as he settles into these warm pockets of bright color, insulated by romantic feeling from the dreary hellscape around him, he's then yanked away from it, his loves either killed or otherwise separated from him by circumstance. It is, at times, a parade of tragedies that it's hard to process just because there is no contrast with the world of tragedies it takes place in. One wonders if perhaps it was foolish to expect any other outcome.
The Titular Crooked God Machine, the alien AI responsible for the state of the world in CGM, strikes me as an allegory for the government. Abstract, remote, inhuman. Unable to understand or care about the plight of individual humans whose lives are destroyed as it reshapes the world, solving our resulting unhappiness in the way you'd expect a demented AI to: By installing electronic brain implants into the unhappy which force upon them a state of mindless bliss.
The social commentary here is not subtle, but it is insightful and welcome. However alien this nightmare world is, the broad structure of it is unfortunately familiar. It's really a reflection of our own world, seen through a scanner, darkly. I came away from The Crooked God Machine feeling hollow, uneasy and oddly wistful for a time and place I've never occupied. False nostalgia for a richly detailed, cohesive hell world and the suffering sinners who either resigned themselves to the chip and adapted to the new normal, or fought bitterly to the end against conditions they knew to be contrived and perverse.
Is this horror? It seems to be the way the genre is going. Audiences have become exhausted with gore. With haunted houses, vampires, zombies and serial killers. Jump scares are for obvious reasons even less tenable in literature than in games or films, so the trend towards cerebral, depressing horror in the latter two genres is only the latest expression of a movement away from shock and towards emotional/psychological horror in literature which has slowly grown over many decades, with early examples going back much further.
Crooked God Machine is an exemplary standard bearer for this tradition, which I would recommend to anybody who wants to see how it's done. How not to write horror, exactly, as a genre defined by a formula, but rather how to write a story which represents a cohesive and compelling fictional world...which is horrifying, seemingly without trying to be. Instead, just being what it is, thrusting us into its midst and allowing unease, misery, regret and despair to result naturally as a consequence of exposure to this world.
A strong showing I feel should be studied by aspiring authors who want to stand out from the crowd, I reluctantly give it five stars only because there's little else to compare it to, it almost exists within a category invented solely for this book, and in that category it is peerless. I'll be picking up Autumn's other books soon, though Iunderstand they're tonally very different from this one, that's arguably as it should be. Crooked God Machine is, and may remain, a wonderful anomaly..
Crooked God Machine takes place in a surreal nightmare world. It's the literary equivalent of a Hieronymus Bosch painting, incorporating enough relatable close up details to be somewhat grounded in reality, but the further you pull back, the more of the big picture you see, the more unreal it becomes. Crooked God Machine invokes a great deal of religious imagery and for much of the early chapters it's unclear how much of it is really happening and how much is just a description of the main character's perception, colored by their religious upbringing.
While this makes it feel a bit as if you're drunk, brain damaged or under some kind of spell, it occurs to me that striking this balance between fantasy and reality without any visible seams is a noteworthy feat. I've seen this done incorrectly before, where it's plain to see what's really going on. It is not plain to see here. You will be kept guessing for a while.
The main character is perhaps the only sane person in the story, and an invitation to self insert to some degree. It evokes the feeling of being a sensible person in a deeply insensible world which you arrived into without your consent, unable to make sense of it, unable to right wrongs which had already been compounding and festering for centuries before you arrived on the scene. In that sense I found the plot deeply relatable.
The protagonist enjoys a brief oasis of happiness here and there as love still exists, even in such a world. But just as he settles into these warm pockets of bright color, insulated by romantic feeling from the dreary hellscape around him, he's then yanked away from it, his loves either killed or otherwise separated from him by circumstance. It is, at times, a parade of tragedies that it's hard to process just because there is no contrast with the world of tragedies it takes place in. One wonders if perhaps it was foolish to expect any other outcome.
The Titular Crooked God Machine, the alien AI responsible for the state of the world in CGM, strikes me as an allegory for the government. Abstract, remote, inhuman. Unable to understand or care about the plight of individual humans whose lives are destroyed as it reshapes the world, solving our resulting unhappiness in the way you'd expect a demented AI to: By installing electronic brain implants into the unhappy which force upon them a state of mindless bliss.
The social commentary here is not subtle, but it is insightful and welcome. However alien this nightmare world is, the broad structure of it is unfortunately familiar. It's really a reflection of our own world, seen through a scanner, darkly. I came away from The Crooked God Machine feeling hollow, uneasy and oddly wistful for a time and place I've never occupied. False nostalgia for a richly detailed, cohesive hell world and the suffering sinners who either resigned themselves to the chip and adapted to the new normal, or fought bitterly to the end against conditions they knew to be contrived and perverse.
Is this horror? It seems to be the way the genre is going. Audiences have become exhausted with gore. With haunted houses, vampires, zombies and serial killers. Jump scares are for obvious reasons even less tenable in literature than in games or films, so the trend towards cerebral, depressing horror in the latter two genres is only the latest expression of a movement away from shock and towards emotional/psychological horror in literature which has slowly grown over many decades, with early examples going back much further.
Crooked God Machine is an exemplary standard bearer for this tradition, which I would recommend to anybody who wants to see how it's done. How not to write horror, exactly, as a genre defined by a formula, but rather how to write a story which represents a cohesive and compelling fictional world...which is horrifying, seemingly without trying to be. Instead, just being what it is, thrusting us into its midst and allowing unease, misery, regret and despair to result naturally as a consequence of exposure to this world.
A strong showing I feel should be studied by aspiring authors who want to stand out from the crowd, I reluctantly give it five stars only because there's little else to compare it to, it almost exists within a category invented solely for this book, and in that category it is peerless. I'll be picking up Autumn's other books soon, though Iunderstand they're tonally very different from this one, that's arguably as it should be. Crooked God Machine is, and may remain, a wonderful anomaly..
January 14, 2025
3.5 / 5 stars, I rounded it up to 4 because I enjoyed every second of it. (spoiler free)
I love the setting, the surreal elements, the horrors that hit a little too close to reality, the original take on a dystopian society. The writing style is very blunt, which works at times, but sometimes works against the flow in my opinion. But the moments it actually hindered reading were rare.
The worldbuilding is quite bizarre, I loved the lost history and the plague machines, they made me want to continue and discover more about the planet. In hindsight, I think it was the very thing that kept me going. The pure absurdity of the world, and especially the atmosphere.
But despite everything that I loved, and that I thoroughly enjoyed the book, it also has its flaws.
As mentioned many times, there were (still) typos. Also, I believe it could use some (heavy) sentence restructuring to improve the flow, especially in the middle/end of the book.
I personally thought the pacing was quite off. In the blurb, I was made to believe that it all starts when Leda disappears. It did, but it started 180 pages in. The first 180 pages were mainly building the setting, introducing the world and society without shying away from anything. Although I enjoyed reading it a lot, after a while I did think, "yeah I get it now, world is bad, people are evil, hope is gone. When will Leda be introduced? When will she disappear? When will the plot actually kick off?"
I do want to say, from the moment Leda gets introduced, everything got crazy really fast, and I loved it. From there on, it was impossible to put down. And that is coming from someone who (unfortunately) rarely experiences that.
I did not love the way the author described the characters. They felt kind of bland, although they're easily distinguishable (mainly because of external characteristics), I feel like I barely got to know anyone. Even Charles. I gladly followed him on his adventures, but not because I thought he was engaging. I wanted to know what happens next, what happens to God, who is God.
The story is crazy. The descriptions are crazy, the events are crazy. Sometimes, I found it a bit too crazy. I loved the surreal passages, but something inside me always screamed "even though it's cool, I don't get it. What happened, and how?"
That's completely subjective, of course, but the sheer amount of craziness made the events feel underwhelming. Perhaps that is the point, it is, after all, a broken world. Yet, it did not work for me as the author intended.
The characters get in and out of insane situations, over and over. A few too many times for me to care in the end. And the characters did not seem to react much to the events, not during, but especially not afterward.
I know it's a broken world, I know these horrific things are common, but the characters have never been in that situation before, so why should they act as if it's no more than a minor inconvenience? (this is exaggerated of course). But their reactions simply underwhelmed me. A reason why I love this genre, horror/scifi-ish stuff, is to see the characters emotionally deal with the aftermath of everything. Yet it did not happen in this book. The plot definitely was engaging enough for me to enjoy it though.
But somehow, despite all of that I cannot get this book out of my head anytime soon. It was renewing, unique, and exactly the type of vibe I was looking for at the moment. It's a "turn off your brain and enjoy the ride" type of book. And I dig it.
I love the setting, the surreal elements, the horrors that hit a little too close to reality, the original take on a dystopian society. The writing style is very blunt, which works at times, but sometimes works against the flow in my opinion. But the moments it actually hindered reading were rare.
The worldbuilding is quite bizarre, I loved the lost history and the plague machines, they made me want to continue and discover more about the planet. In hindsight, I think it was the very thing that kept me going. The pure absurdity of the world, and especially the atmosphere.
But despite everything that I loved, and that I thoroughly enjoyed the book, it also has its flaws.
As mentioned many times, there were (still) typos. Also, I believe it could use some (heavy) sentence restructuring to improve the flow, especially in the middle/end of the book.
I personally thought the pacing was quite off. In the blurb, I was made to believe that it all starts when Leda disappears. It did, but it started 180 pages in. The first 180 pages were mainly building the setting, introducing the world and society without shying away from anything. Although I enjoyed reading it a lot, after a while I did think, "yeah I get it now, world is bad, people are evil, hope is gone. When will Leda be introduced? When will she disappear? When will the plot actually kick off?"
I do want to say, from the moment Leda gets introduced, everything got crazy really fast, and I loved it. From there on, it was impossible to put down. And that is coming from someone who (unfortunately) rarely experiences that.
I did not love the way the author described the characters. They felt kind of bland, although they're easily distinguishable (mainly because of external characteristics), I feel like I barely got to know anyone. Even Charles. I gladly followed him on his adventures, but not because I thought he was engaging. I wanted to know what happens next, what happens to God, who is God.
The story is crazy. The descriptions are crazy, the events are crazy. Sometimes, I found it a bit too crazy. I loved the surreal passages, but something inside me always screamed "even though it's cool, I don't get it. What happened, and how?"
That's completely subjective, of course, but the sheer amount of craziness made the events feel underwhelming. Perhaps that is the point, it is, after all, a broken world. Yet, it did not work for me as the author intended.
The characters get in and out of insane situations, over and over. A few too many times for me to care in the end. And the characters did not seem to react much to the events, not during, but especially not afterward.
I know it's a broken world, I know these horrific things are common, but the characters have never been in that situation before, so why should they act as if it's no more than a minor inconvenience? (this is exaggerated of course). But their reactions simply underwhelmed me. A reason why I love this genre, horror/scifi-ish stuff, is to see the characters emotionally deal with the aftermath of everything. Yet it did not happen in this book. The plot definitely was engaging enough for me to enjoy it though.
But somehow, despite all of that I cannot get this book out of my head anytime soon. It was renewing, unique, and exactly the type of vibe I was looking for at the moment. It's a "turn off your brain and enjoy the ride" type of book. And I dig it.
October 22, 2019
Autumn Christian's existential-dystopian nightmare CROOKED GOD MACHINE is unflinching in its dark portrayal of a planet oppressed by an insane God. It’s as if David Lynch said no fiction could outweird ERASHERHEAD, and Christian said, hold my beer.
The result is something bizarro, something horror, something philosophical and religious. When I started reading it, I snagged on the weird elements and wondered whether my willing suspension of disbelief was up for the investment, but the story keeps turning up the weird volume until by the end it goes well beyond 11, and it wasn’t long before I was thoroughly hooked on this bleak drug.
So here’s the story. Charles is a good man hoping to love and be loved in a world ruled by a God intent on punishing his subjects and soon ending it. Monsters roam the woods, vast machines wreak Biblical havoc in scheduled plagues, Hell shuttles round up people to send below based on quotas, and God screams from the TV all day when a show isn’t on promoting implants that keep the body active while the brain passes into a decade-long sleep. As the world slowly ends all around him, Charles sets out to resist and finally confront God based on secret knowledge that this was all not what was intended by the original creators.
The story is titillating in its uncompromising weirdness and destruction of sanity, but it’s pretty bleak, though a counterpoint to nihilism is expressed as hope even if it’s undeserved. While Christian’s world is clearly insane and seemingly random, there’s a strange internal logic to the story that ties it together and infuses it with meaning. The result is a dark and titillating read that’s strangely fun. My only big criticism is the story would benefit from editing, as there are numerous typos, missing words, etc. that might distract some readers.
If you think you might dig a strong fusion of bizarro and horror, check it out.
The result is something bizarro, something horror, something philosophical and religious. When I started reading it, I snagged on the weird elements and wondered whether my willing suspension of disbelief was up for the investment, but the story keeps turning up the weird volume until by the end it goes well beyond 11, and it wasn’t long before I was thoroughly hooked on this bleak drug.
So here’s the story. Charles is a good man hoping to love and be loved in a world ruled by a God intent on punishing his subjects and soon ending it. Monsters roam the woods, vast machines wreak Biblical havoc in scheduled plagues, Hell shuttles round up people to send below based on quotas, and God screams from the TV all day when a show isn’t on promoting implants that keep the body active while the brain passes into a decade-long sleep. As the world slowly ends all around him, Charles sets out to resist and finally confront God based on secret knowledge that this was all not what was intended by the original creators.
The story is titillating in its uncompromising weirdness and destruction of sanity, but it’s pretty bleak, though a counterpoint to nihilism is expressed as hope even if it’s undeserved. While Christian’s world is clearly insane and seemingly random, there’s a strange internal logic to the story that ties it together and infuses it with meaning. The result is a dark and titillating read that’s strangely fun. My only big criticism is the story would benefit from editing, as there are numerous typos, missing words, etc. that might distract some readers.
If you think you might dig a strong fusion of bizarro and horror, check it out.
February 7, 2022
Crooked God Machine is a very dark, satirical commentary on Western religion. It's like a grimy, twisted cousin of Chiang's Hell is the Absence God.
Growing up in a religious environment, surrounded by religious people, "educated" about the world through the lens of religion, and then rejecting all of this later in life is an experience I would wish on no one, yet it's something way too many people have to go through. Books like Crooked God Machine and Hell is the Absence of God are both triggers and therapy for myself and I imagine other horror-loving, former fundamentalists. They prose a simple question: what if the batshit insane, patriarchical god of the bible were real?
Bizzaro worlds either really work for me or they don't; either I fall into the dreamlike flow of a world, or I'm constantly thrown out of the torrent. CGM worked for me. I didn't know this book was going to be the twisted religious commentary it was, but so many of the themes were landing close to home, it became easy to get immersed in the fucked up world of the book.
It is not perfect. It is a little messy (and my Kindle version had a ton of typos, though they don't bug me), it's a little too long (around the middle it kind of looped and meandered a bit), and the main character Charles can feel a little bit like a silent protagonist from an RPG. These issues weren't big, though, and this is a book where early on you will know if you're going to love it or hate it. I loved it. I devoured this book in a little over a day.
The author says in the after notes that she was 19 when she first wrote this book. This is insane. Mad fucking props. For all the messiness of the book, it's tripled in amazing prose. I loved the writing style and word choice. It's easy for bizzaro books like this to feel too absurd, too twisted, too unimmersible. It's certainly absurd and twisted, but the writing makes it so relatable and honest, sometimes even poetic.
Growing up in a religious environment, surrounded by religious people, "educated" about the world through the lens of religion, and then rejecting all of this later in life is an experience I would wish on no one, yet it's something way too many people have to go through. Books like Crooked God Machine and Hell is the Absence of God are both triggers and therapy for myself and I imagine other horror-loving, former fundamentalists. They prose a simple question: what if the batshit insane, patriarchical god of the bible were real?
Bizzaro worlds either really work for me or they don't; either I fall into the dreamlike flow of a world, or I'm constantly thrown out of the torrent. CGM worked for me. I didn't know this book was going to be the twisted religious commentary it was, but so many of the themes were landing close to home, it became easy to get immersed in the fucked up world of the book.
It is not perfect. It is a little messy (and my Kindle version had a ton of typos, though they don't bug me), it's a little too long (around the middle it kind of looped and meandered a bit), and the main character Charles can feel a little bit like a silent protagonist from an RPG. These issues weren't big, though, and this is a book where early on you will know if you're going to love it or hate it. I loved it. I devoured this book in a little over a day.
The author says in the after notes that she was 19 when she first wrote this book. This is insane. Mad fucking props. For all the messiness of the book, it's tripled in amazing prose. I loved the writing style and word choice. It's easy for bizzaro books like this to feel too absurd, too twisted, too unimmersible. It's certainly absurd and twisted, but the writing makes it so relatable and honest, sometimes even poetic.
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