The Diviners

The Diviners Libba Bray

At a party gone boring, restless flappers unknowingly raise a once-buried evil. In Ohio, a careless Evie reveals something she shouldn't and is sent to live with her Uncle Will in New York City until the scandal dies down. In New York, Memphis runs numbers by day and writes poetry by night. He used to be a healer, but lost the ability when it mattered most of all. Theta is a glamourous Ziegfried girl just trying to forget. Mabel's parents are communist organizers but all she wants is to catch the eye of Jericho, Uncle Will's assistant at the Museum of American Folklore, Superstition and the Occult, aka the Museum of the Creepy Crawlies.

It's 1926 and their stories collide as a gruesome serial murder strikes the city. Uncle Will is called in to aid the investigation as the murders are steeped in the occult. Evie knows her supernatural powers can help, but she'd rather drink and party to forget that she even has them. The investigation leads them to the Great Awakening, WWI, and beyond our world as commets and dreams are portents of things to come...

Sprawling and epic, this is paranormal/horror/historical fiction. It lacks the zany humor of Going Bovine or Beauty Queens but that's ok, because it would be really out of place here! The action and focus frequently shifts between characters and storylines, interspersed with set and mood pieces to paint a picture of the city, the country, and the time period. It's dark and atmospheric. I love how even though it's historical fiction, it's also haunted (literally and metaphorially) by history, especially Sprititualism and the Great Awakening movements, both of which appear in US history classes but can be hard to make sense of in a broad survey class setting. I loved the miltary mesting aspect. We tend to see army conspiracies and top secret projects taking place in WWII, but not WWI.*

Now the immediate storyline wraps up by the end of the book, but it's also very very very much the first in a series. Lots of smaller plots become larger questions that are no where near answered by the end. In the hands of a less skilled author, this entire project would be a hot mess, but Libba Bray makes it brilliant and spooky.

*This makes sens because WWII saw things like the Holocaust, Unit 731, Enigma, and the Manhattan Project. Also, the post-WWII era saw the space age and TV and was such a period of massive change that military secrets in the recent war made more sense, storytelling wise. It was tapping into a different psyche.)

ARC Provided by... the publisher, at ALA.

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Going Bovine

Going Bovine Libba Bray

I wasn't expecting to like this one. I wasn't a huge fan of A Great and Terrible Beauty, which is the other Bray I've read. Some people I know loved Going Bovine, and some didn't. Most of the criticisms were things where I thought "ok, that's also stuff that bugs me in a book." So, I figured this one wasn't for me. And then it won the Printz, so I felt obligated to read it.

And! Yay! I was pleasantly surprised. I enjoyed it!

For those who don't know, Cam is an apathetic teen who gets mad cow disease. He embarks on a road trip with his friend Gonzo and a yard gnome who's really a Norse God. Along the way he's helped by a punk rock angel. Cam is not the most likable of characters, but that doesn't mean he's not believable as a character. He's selfish before he finds out he's dying, and when he gets sick, he doesn't see it as an experience to turn his life around. Instead, he gets pissed off. Which, while not likable and not what we tend to see in books, is frankly, the same thing I would do.

I didn't like Cam in the beginning, but I loved his voice, so I didn't mind that I didn't like him. I really liked Cam by the end.

I most loved the happiness cult and what the snow globe company does to protect people. (Yeah, that's vague, but I don't want to spoil it.)

This draws a lot of inspiration from Don Quixote, which I haven't read (but I have read a few plot summaries, and seen the Animaniacs version). Bray's not shy about the Don Quixote connections (Cam's reading it for school) and c'mon! The angel is named Dulcie!

My one complaint is that much of the tension comes from wondering if Cam's adventures real or a hallucination brought on by his brain's disintegration. The truth is too obvious too early. I wanted her to stretch that out further. While I knew what was what, I didn't want my feelings to be confirmed that early...

The other was the end, which I'll talk about here, because MAJOR SPOILAGE.

But overall? A really great book that's really enjoyable on the surface, but underneath lurks an homage to great literature and lots of other little things that make it secretly amazing.

Book Provided by... my local library

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More Books for the Beast

Because it's finally nice and cold and I'm actually wearing a sweater today, today's song is Ten Degrees and Getting Colder performed by Nanci Griffith.

A Great and Terrible Beauty Libba Bray

After the murder of her mother, Gemma Doyle is shipped from India to a stuffy finishing school in England. There she deals with the regular issues of popularity and clique-dom, as well ominious visions that have a bad habit of coming true. All she knows is that Circe is coming, but what that means besides growing shadows, she can't say.

Part historic fiction, part supernatural thriller, Bray attempts to explore the gilded cages Victorian women were forced to live in. In doing so, she's created a cast of thoroughly modern characters who never feel guilty for going against society's, and their mothers', expectations of them. It works much better on a supernatural-thriller level than the historical fiction level. The modernity of the characters in action and attitude didn't sit right.

I'm looking forward to reading Rebel Angels.

Raven's Gate (The Gatekeepers) Anthony Horowitz

Matt was given one chance to stay out of jail. He can go live in a remote village with a creepy, old lady, or go to jail. Once there, things are horribly worng. Anyone who tries to help him dies. When he tries to escape, all roads lead back to the same intersection...

I'll have to admit I haven't read it since I was in 4th grade, but it vaguely reminded me of The Dark Is Rising Sequence, but I can't put my finger on why.

Overall, a little underwhelming-- I expected more from Horowitz.