Review: "On Fire for God" by Josiah Hesse

On Fire for God by Josiah Hesse
Published January 2026 via Pantheon
★★★★

Growing up without a lot of resources in an unassuming town in the Midwest, Hesse was on fire for God. His parents had fallen into conservative Christianity before he was born, and in it they saw promise—but for Hesse, his church's conservative, fire-and-brimstone beliefs were less a promise than a threat; his faith did not so much bring him peace or stability as it convinced him that he was worthless and never farther than half a step away from an eternity in hell. Home was chaotic. School was...not a refuge. And as an adult, Hesse gradually started to realize that the bill he'd been sold—among other things, the promise that the world would end before he had to worry about the future—was not grounded in reality.

This is a book about religion, to an extent, but it's just as much about childhood lost, and family dysfunction, and power, and the way religion so often isn't actually about religion. As he grew up and left school and started working, Hesse's world started to open up, but...I suppose that gaining good things often comes at the loss of something else. Not an easy course to take.

It makes for a complicated story and a complicated book. In On Fire for God, Hesse is both processing the trauma of his youth and digging into how all this came about—what competing forces were invested in children's souls, invested in keeping children scared, invested in profit and power. It's not a new story. I've read many exvangelical books at this point and expect to read many more. But it's a powerful and timely voice in the chorus of writers and speakers and survivors saying, Enough. No more.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.