Book Review: The Diviners by Libba Bray

The Diviners by Libba Bray

I read this book for one of the January picks of the Reading Adventures Book Club on Goodreads. I rather enjoyed this book, which is good, though apparently the founders of the club did not, which is not so good. But whatevs, I enjoyed the book, and therefore my review is going to skew positive.

I’ll start off by saying that this book is a chunker. At 578 pages, it’s one of the longer books I’ve read in the past year or so. I was rather intimidated at first, but I was so happy to realize that this book, for me, read super fast. I could sit and read 100 or 200 pages in one shot. I hadn’t been able to do with with a book in a while – it was refreshing! So that immediately made me like it – it’s readability.

This book is supernatural historical thriller young adult fiction. It’s set during the 1920s and revolves around these people known as Diviners (duh). I suppose the simplest way to describe them is to think X-Men, only more psychicy abilities rather than physical ones. The source of the abilities is not known for certain and I hope to find out what it is in the next book or so. I’m hoping it’s something really cool. 😀

One thing I particularly liked about this book is the attention to detail Libba Bray put into the dialogue. I felt like the characters were actually from the 20s. Flappers, glitz and glamour. It was immersive. The main character for me I think grew on me as the book progressed. Towards the beginning, I really couldn’t relate to her. By the end, I wanted to be her friend – I feel like she went through a decent amount of character development wihout losing her flapper spunk. I know this character in particular has been hit-and-miss for people from what I’ve seen in other reviews, but for me, I liked her. I think it’s because I have a few friends who would fit right in with her ,but that’s besides the point, haha. I liked the subtle hints of romance throughout the book too. It didn’t seem rushed or awkward or anything like that.

Overall, I rather enjoyed this book and will be buying the next one when it comes out in July of this year.

Overall Rating: 4.5/5
Holy cow, the sass man.