This is a good book and a compelling read, but very dark.

In this day and age, many will like it or even love it. The other reviews prove this out.

But I found yet another unrelenting tale of darkness and horror redeemed by the Lord barely in time—in spite of the so-called good guys. It was like the Lord was determined to do good even though the good guys seemed to be fighting Him tooth and nail. Yes, I’m tired of the constant and relentless danger, trials, and evil. Yes, evil is defeated eventually, but what a rough ride!

I think I gave this a decent rating, but maybe it deserves a 3.5 because I felt so beat up emotionally at the end of it. Plus, the three hero/heroines were all very childish and distinctly unlikeable. I wanted to take those kids over my knee and spank them—or worse.

It’s hard to like a book with nasty good guys

By definition, good guys aren’t nasty. They may start out that way, but they grow and change. In a Christian book, the assumption is that they gradually allow the Lord to transform them. In Toxic, that eventually happens, to a small degree—but it was far too late and too little for my taste. It wasn’t uplifting, but barely enough to allow the Lord to do what He was going to do with or without them.

I didn’t find the bad guy particularly evil either. He was almost comic in his badness. He was so over the top it was hard to take him seriously. My guess is that I didn’t see him with any humanity. But that’s common in stories like this and I’m just not sure why it didn’t work for me here.

In spite of all my kvetching, it is a good, well-written book. Many of the younger set will like it a lot. Given the popularity of ridiculousness like vampires, zombies and the like, I should be more kind as I didn’t find their presence overwheming. Well, not really [I just blocked it out]. There are a whole lot of zombie-like people. I can understand the good reviews. But I just didn’t enjoy it.

Spiritually, it was stretched to the limit

It was obviously written by a Christian, but the world just didn’t feel redeemed. Whatever the heck that means!

I feel I need to apologize for such a negative review [even though I gave it 4 stars]. I guess something in it just rubbed me the wrong way.