Our New Gods

by Thomas Vowles

Ash has recently arrived in Melbourne and fallen in love with his charismatic friend James. After witnessing a disturbing altercation at a party, Ash suspects that James' s mysterious boyfriend is hiding a sinister side. Is he dangerous? Or is Ash' s jealousy fuelling paranoid delusions? A compulsive novel that offers no easy answers, Our New Gods marks the electrifying debut of a major talent. It has an assuredness that reflects Thomas Vowles' s success as a the dialogue is sharp, the plot twists are dizzying, and the story will haunt readers long after the final page.

Genres: Queer, LGBT, Contemporary, Fiction, Audiobook, Book Club, Crime

288 pages, Paperback

First published June 3, 2025

Reviews

[Alright Hey (Matt) · Rating 4 out of 5]

wowwwww love hate relationship with this psychological thriller.

there’s one word to sum it up: bizarre.
like soooooo bizarre.
long story short: gay boy is found dead, other gay boy blames his gay bestfriends boyfriend (also a gay boy).

I was hooked from the get go and confused and edged and confused again for the rest of the book. I LOVED IT. I’ve left with a very strange feeling. I don’t know if I liked any of the characters. I don’t know if I liked the story. I don’t know if I enjoyed myself. but all this means it clearly had an impact on me in some type of way, so for that.. I love it.

I have a real issue with authors who don’t write with any punctuation, and it was unsettling after 3-4 chapters to realise the entire book was going to play out that way. I don’t find it interesting, I don’t find it quirky or intriguing. it just pisses me off. but that’s a me problem xx
I can only assume it could have a correlation to Greek gods / Ancient Greece? etc etc. using the ‘scriptio continua’ as they say, is only confusing to a dumb reader (me) and so perhaps this was written for intelligent people, which I’m happy to admit I am not.
It can also convey rushed stream of concious type writing. the point is, the intention is unclear. and that’s annoying.

I also felt this book lifts the lid on the gay community a lil too thoroughly and I wouldn’t want my straight friends reading this LMAOOOOO but if you’re queer it’s a stunnin lil recommendation from me.

this being a debut excites me and I will definitely read more from this author. with all this said it was still gripping and I finished it in just over a day.

[Bert · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is exactly what gays from Melbourne are like. 😳

[Jackson Young · Rating 1 out of 5]

Don't think I've ever loathed a pair of protagonists as much as these two twinks. Thank fuck they move to Sydney in the end, God knows that city deserves them. I especially love how Ash undergoes exactly zero character growth the entire book.
Also why is the author's writing style reminiscent of a first year student taking a creative writing elective?

[Melody | Spilt Wine Book Club · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ash has recently arrived in Melbourne and is doing his best to find his place, navigating his friendship with James while struggling with his growing jealousy toward James’ new boyfriend, Raf. When an unsettling altercation unfolds at a party, things begin to spiral.

This was so gripping. An exciting blend of queer literary fiction and psych thriller. Dark, full of sexual tension and complicated decision-making, I couldn’t look away.

The narrative build, pacing, and prose worked so well. Haunting, uncomfortable, and full of energy. I read this in one sitting.

Thanks UQP for the advanced copy!

[holly · Rating 1 out of 5]

every character was unlikeable, prose was terrible, zero character growth, and the plot didn't make a lot of sense. also gay men are just like That, was I supposed to be surprised?

[Colette Godfrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kind of a whodunit but also a didhedoit?/whodidwhattowho?/whatthehellishappeningnow?!
Plenty of f#@%ing and even more mindf#@%ing.
For a book with a not overly huge..... wordcount, it packs a lot in (sorry, it's hard, erm, difficult to think/write without innuendo after just finishing this book). Anyway - I actually found this to be quite thought provoking and much more than a simple crime noir or psychological thriller.

[Lizzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

A literary and hypersexual version of bathhaus by pj vernon. There's a really disgusting sex scene at 80% that kinda made me want to throw up, but the book was well written and kept me entertained for the few hours it took to read. A few references to places in melbourne cbd/neighbouring areas that felt uncomfortably local considering the subject matter lol😭

[Rach A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

rather liked this one! a kind of queer noir lit fic that has you in the heady, intense daze of the club scene from my youth the whole way through

[Giselle Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

To borrow from Matt Preston ‘DISGUSTING…ly good’

[Kailyn Crabbe · Rating 4 out of 5]

A juicy read for Melbourne summer and not just because I'm a sucker for any piece literature that references street names and suburbs near my house. Beautiful prose with lots of dark twists and turns throughout that kept me gripped from start to finish.

[Ben Nielsen · Rating 1 out of 5]

This story was so far fetched. It seemed even sillier when I later verbalised the narrative to a friend. The prose was undeveloped; in particular, the protagonist’s inconsistent turns of phrase were jarring and honestly quite annoying. Every character was unlikeable. I’m surprised by some of the book reviews I have seen. I would have stopped reading if I hadn’t been on a plane without another book.

[Sam Forrest · Rating 4 out of 5]

All the tropes of the noir genre are here, boldly portrayed within the contemporary Melbourne queer community. The pace of the novel makes it a deeply satisfying piece with a few delightfully disconnected threads left hanging. The most captivating part of the prose is how poetically erotic the descriptions of the relationships between men are. Excited for Thomas Vowles' next work.

[Ashleigh Phillips · Rating 5 out of 5]

The way I couldn’t stop thinking about this book! I love a good crime mystery/thriller, but adding the narrative driven by queer love was a cherry on top. The writing style is fast paced and really drives the plot. There are a few plot twists throughout and I loved the honest depiction of the narrator. The descriptions of interactions and settings were jarringly honest, but added to the complexities of the story. Read this book!

[Blake Grainger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you UQP for the ARC.

This book follows the story of Ash after recently moving to Melbourne and his struggles with finding connections, love and friendship. There is a very big queer influence in this book which, unlike other books, felt real and not like a caricature.

I did feel the ending left a bit to be desired which is upsetting because I really did enjoy this book otherwise. A perfect pick up for pride month if you're looking for some MLM romance within a thriller.

[Emily Forbes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ooof I was really gripped by this, despite some very heavy and confronting themes. I haven’t read anything quite like this before! Not surprised the author is a screenwriter as the whole time I thought this would translate so well to screen. I thought the ending left a bit to be desired but at the same time it kept so well in theme with the rest of the book.

[James Lilley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Had fun reading this book, hearing Fitzroy pools described so romantically made me laugh out loud.

Gay thriller set in Melbourne is a fun concept and delivered on most accounts, but I was bored by the end

[Sam Maricic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good very gay I would recommend this to everyone but my mother

[Jay · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a unique story – something like literary fiction with thriller undertones, with queer characters and relationships a pivotal part of the story. The queer element was what drew me to this book in the first place, and I was happy to see that it was presented well, with meaningful and realistic explorations of modern queer relationships and culture. While that was a highlight, it wasn’t the only good thing about this book. The story and the character work were both really strong. I loved the suspense generated by Ash’s paranoia, and the questions raised as to whether he was correct about what he thought, or creating problems because of his infatuation with James. James and Raf were both fantastic characters, too, with multiple developments throughout the story making me question who they really were. My engagement in the story was strengthened a lot by the character work and the dynamic between Ash and James, but on its own, the plot stood out, too. There were some great twists in there, even if I was a little disappointed in the way things wrapped up. There was a big unanswered question in there, and it seems pretty obvious that the book is not getting a sequel, so the ending was left ambiguous. On some level, I get it, but it was also a pretty unsatisfying choice for my personal experience.


I enjoyed this book, but two big things immediately stopped it from being anything above good. Firstly, the stylistic writing choice to not have any speech marks for character dialogue annoyed the daylights out of me. If it made sense with the themes of the book, I could overlook it, but no, it just seemed to be the author’s choice. I absolutely detest this type of writing, and it was lucky that the story was good enough for me to get over it and move on. Removing the speech marks served no purpose. I know it doesn’t matter to most people, so I’m not saying that’s a reason not to read the book; I’m just saying it’s something that bothered me specifically. Secondly, there were some pretty disgusting sex scenes in there. There’s a lot of sex, which isn’t the problem, but there are some things that go a little bit too far towards the end of the book (one at page 206 in my edition, and one at the very end of the book). I guess you could argue that the characters are messed up people who do messed up things, but it was so over-the-top with its crudeness, and I honestly felt those two scenes in particular served no purpose in the book. Maybe that makes me a prude, but I couldn’t look past it.

Overall, though, this was a good read that I mostly enjoyed. I just beg the author to please, please, put speech marks for dialogue in his next book.

[Lucy Sweeney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Our New Gods by Thomas Vowles
☀️☀️☀️

A challenging debut novel that swings wide and mostly misses, but was a tangibly gripping ride nonetheless.

This is a difficult book to assign a rating to. Its ambition and scope was very interesting to me and meant that I read the entire thing in one sitting. It is fast paced despite the decidedly literary style it's written in (don't start me on the choice to forgo quotation marks...) which made for a thrilling reading experience. It is dark, gritty, and at times confronting (including one sex scene which made me gag)

In execution, the plot comes across as quite underwhelming by the end, and the total lack of character development for anyone really let the book down. Unlikeable characters are fine so long as the storyline itself holds up, or they deliver a moral message, or there is some kind of poignant point to it all. But I finished this wondering what the point of it all was, which isn't what I wanted to be left with.

This novel is contentious by design and I admire what Vowles attempted to achieve here, but for me there were too many weak points letting down the solidly intriguing concept to be more than an okay book.


"One day I learned that a macabrely high percentage of household dust is composed of human skin cells, and the next time I saw my father sweeping I thought of all of the remnants of our bodies collecting in the black under the house. I began to imagine our dead shavings slowly re-forming into empty sacks of skin. They were identical to our living selves, except they were light as air and almost as translucent, with gaping mouths and awful cavities where their eyes should be."

[Dani Ringrose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this for a university assignment to practice pitching at an acquisitions meeting. I don't think this would've made my reading list for a while, but I really enjoyed it. Darkly atmospheric, and felt myself being completely sucked into its vortex. Totally wanted to grab Ash and tell him to restart his friendship group journey in Melbourne. I have never wanted to go to a gay bathhouse so much in my life, haha. Not for the open hookup culture or to spy on someone, but Vowles wrote the place so lushly. A bonus bush doof scene as well!

"I lay on top of my sleeping bag, my mind turning over and over, electronic cubes shifting, a game with no meaning, no end."

"The hall to the bathroom was lined with life-sized photos of beefy men clad in fetish gear. I sat on the toilet and buried my face in my hands, these images gnashing towards me, cut-outs lifted from the queer culture we purportedly shared, emblems of the society we swore by. But I was unconvinced. If the community even existed, then it was too flimsy to be of any use. [Character] had died alone. It was no-one's fault; that was just how things were: each of us was alone."

"The dream begam as it had in real life - my attention drawn to his feet nudging through black glass, the lake. But when I pull him into my arms, he rises not from water but from blood. Then it's not [Character] that I'm holding'; somehow it's the bloody lake, pulsating; I'm holding it all at once as at the same time it's rising from the bellowing earth and crashing over me and then I've been banished to a forest. I'm alone except for something nameless I can feel watching from the shadows, biding its time. In my hands is a hunk of sinewy tissue, an organ dripping blood onto my toes. The something makes a clicking sound in the trees behind me and this is how I know that the only way to escape the forest is to eat the organ."

"Desire was a language, the language of an intelligence that had known that this was what I needed. [Character was what I needed."

"He ended up dying in hospital. I made myself sit by his sunken and sallow corpse, gingerly picking up one of his beefy hands, callused with the labour of his freshly extinguished life. Then, I left the beside and went into the adjacent bathroom and lay on the floor, the tiles cool against my cheek. I spread my fingers and pushed against the tiles, half expecting them to yield under the pressure. I was powerful because I was free."

"When I'd felt [Character's] hand, I'd recognised the maliciousness of this something, and it terrified me, and worse than that was the terror of what lay over the edge, though what that was I didn't know."

"But still: I couldn't deny that snarling below all this was what felt to be the true thing, and it was waiting for me."

"I didn't need to hurry. What was the rush? I had a secret that I had no ownership over. Slow down, enjoy that feeling. What was the secret? I didn't know, but the fact of it was prying open my mind, endowing me with a power, though this force was also inherently me."

[James Whitmore · Rating 4 out of 5]

Menace prowls the streets of Melbourne's inner north in this rather naughty and impressively strange novel. Our New Gods begins, as so much early-20s life does, with a house party. Attending is 21-year-old Aries, recently arrived from smalltown Western Australia, invited by James, with whom he had a failed dalliance that became a friendship, although Ash's feelings still seem to run deep. Beautiful, privileged, propertied James ("I think we're ready for aliens ... like, psychologically") is unfortunately now seeing Raf, a Brazilian DJ who looks like "Jesus in an old oil painting" (like, perhaps, a Raphael?). "I dared not wonder what Raf had that I didn't," Ash wonders pathetically. But then he witnesses Raf, a Leo, doing something despicable to a Piscean in the gutter outside the house. Was this a consensual act of submission and domination, or something more ominous? When said Piscean later turns up dead in a lake, Ash begins to put things together. Read more on my blog.

[Dion · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wetwork on Wellington.

Boy meets boy. Did boy commit a terrible violent crime?

Some predictable but thoroughly enjoyable twists in this knowing, compulsive, treacherous little homosexual noir. Had me thinking of Hitchcock’s murderous homosexuals, the small but excellent cadre of grungy urban queer literary noirs set in contemporary Australian cities (Porter, Polites), and the coming-of-age gay social comedy of manners, especially when told through the eyes of an outsider/interloper who senses both the dangers and pleasures of a social scene, and when set across one long, idle summer (although I suspect this novel’s timeline is actually longer than that).

Kept recalling that line from The Picture of Dorian Gray (and perhaps also contemporary 19th C reviews of it?) about ‘that poisonous little book’—in a good way. Would def seek out further poisoning from this Vowles character. I look forward to more from him.

[Shablam · Rating 1 out of 5]

I thought this would be similar to 'Swimming in the Dark' by Tomasz Jedrowski, which is a beautifully poignant period piece, forbidden romance novel that deserves a re-read, but instead, I got a sour taste in my mouth and disturbed feeling throughout my being while reading this.

There were so many aspects that didn't work for me with this book but the lack of quotation marks has to be the most egregious. Authors can have their creative autonomy to do whatever they want with their craft, but that doesn't mean I'll connect with their decisions.

I don't think this book was ever winning me with the characters, they're all incredibly unlikable and unrelateable - I found myself caring for the roommate Sam who has like 5 tiny appearances and just constantly catching strays from the insufferable protagonist's internal hyper-critical monologues.

Also, way too many disturbing scenes involving bodily waste...

[chloe · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 but i’m hesitant to round up 🥸 i did quite enjoy this. narrative wise, i found it pretty gripping—would kill for more queer australian psych thrillers personally so it satisfied that need in a sense. it felt reasonably well paced and i did like the writing, however i found there was a lot of jumping around, specifically towards the end, which threw me off a bit. also was not a fan of the lack of quotation marks in relation to the dialogue—usually that doesn’t annoy me but here it kind of did. not sure about the ending but all that being said i would say this is worth reading!

[Mother Mercer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of thoughts on this one. It's is a dark story, filled with twists and confronting realisations.

I wanted to like it...but ultimatly found if fairly average, struggling to get across the harrowing emotions of the protagonist without shock factor.

I found myself skimming through the last third, it really laboured on some points and was at times repetitive. I found stream of consciousness writing tiresome.

Its a strong debut, however, it could have done with further editing to sharpen the narrative and depth of some characters. I probably would not have finished if I wasn’t in bed with the flu.

[Anne Y · Rating 5 out of 5]

A surprising book that has opened up a new genre (it's marketed as psychological thriller) for me.
It's taut, disturbing in parts and carries an undercurrent of tension... and the prose is divine. Vowles has wonderful turns of phrase that capture the physical and emotional.
I was particularly impressed with his creation of the protagonist, Ash's, mindset and attitudes: not only what he thinks but how. I was deeply immersed in his world and his viewpoint. Emerging at intervals from the book, the outside world of a straight, older-than-early-twenties woman seemed odd.
Huge congratulations on this debut. I look forward to the next book.

[Josh Gardiner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this so fast.
It’s gritty and dark and dirty. I loved it so much, the characters are frustrating and complex but at the same time so relatable.
It was such a unique experience to read, I felt anxious the whole time but for some reason it felt good. You’re tackling the main themes of obsession, lust and love and questioning the line we always toe on moving on our impulses or letting life guide us to the correct destination.
I’m obsessed with this book, it’s nothing like I’ve ever read. I feel like I need a shower and I’ll be thinking about this forever.

[Gavan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Breathtaking. A combination love triangle story and literary crime thriller set in the inner north Melbourne gay scene. I loved the hesitant voice of the narrator (Ash) as he navigates moving to Melbourne and falling in "love" (which could be more obsession than love?). None of the three primary characters (Ash, James and Raf) come out well - all are incredibly insecure, self-centred, unaware and unimpressive. And add narcissism to the list for Raf. The explicit sex scenes were largely unnecessary other than to sometimes develop the theme of domination and supplication. Perfect ending.

[atlas · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 20%. I normally never give star reviews but broke my own rules just to give this book 1 star, which is generous. The most pretentious writing style i’ve ever read and the author comes off as ‘i got high once and discovered the secrets of the universe so i wrote a book about it’. The characters have no personality and the conversations and thoughts discussed are so one dimensional that it gives no insight into the characters. I just couldn’t keep reading after they had a ‘deep’ conversation about how small we are compared to space and how life could just be a simulation…

[Mark Ludmon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A murky cross between a murder mystery thriller and a story of a young man breaking free of his past to forge his own path. It is narrated by 21-year-old Ash who is in love with his best friend, James, after escaping a troubled childhood to live in Melbourne. The mysterious death of another young man, Boothe, triggers a mental meltdown for Ash who becomes convinced it was murder at the hands of James’s new Brazilian boyfriend, Raf. Gripping and psychological, the book is run through with ambiguity to the end although the reader can infer more than what the unreliable Ash tells us.