Brenna Yovanoff is the author of Paper Valentine, Smoulder, and The Replacement, which was her debut novel. She is also one third of the Merry Sisters of Fate along with Maggie Stiefvater and Tessa Gratton. Brenna lives in Denver, Colorado.
This powerful and decidedly uncomfortable dark fantasy concerns Daphne, a serious and introspective young woman who just happens to live in Hell, being the youngest daughter of Lucifer and Lilith. Pandemonium isn't a bad place to live-"the city shines silver, as highly polished as a wish. The streets sprawl out in complicated spirals, winding between glossy buildings"-but Daphne feels like something is missing. She could go to Earth and seduce young men like her older half-sisters (the hunt made more delicious by the danger represented by Azrael, the sadistic angel of death, and his monstrous companion, Dark Dreadful), but she feels like such sexual goings-on are beneath her. Then, her brother Obie, Hell's most notorious do-gooder, saves Truman Flynn, a teenage suicide, from death. Witnessing the boy's brief, painful materialization in Hell, Daphne is taken with him; when Obie disappears on Earth, she enlists Truman to help find him. Yovanoff (The Replacement) once again develops complex, believable characters as well as a supernatural milieu that feels both original and lived in. This confident tale contains moments of beauty, terror, and significant wisdom. Ages 14-up. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
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Gr 9 Up-Daphne's home life is Hell. Literally. The daughter of Lilith and Lucifer, the sensitive teen feels out of place. When her adored older brother, Obie, abandons Hell to be with a girl he met on Earth, Daphne does what she has never done before. In order to find him and warn him of imminent danger, she leaves Hell, too. Once on Earth, Daphne seeks help from Truman, a self-destructive teenage boy whose incessant nightmares spur him to dangerous excesses in order to stay awake. As they work together to find Obie, besting a demon or two along the way, Daphne learns to appreciate and cultivate her humanity, the very thing that alienates her from her family. This bildungsroman features a sympathetic, believable protagonist who learns, changes, and grows. Daphne shrinks from the future planned for her, that of being like her ravenous older sisters, the Lilim, who live off the pain of weak men. Yovanoff's writing distinguishes itself with its inlay of eloquent and imaginative passages about life in Pandemonium (the sleek, metallic capital city of Hell), Daphne's sometimes-comic acclimations to life on Earth, Truman's tragic story arc, and the tender romance that develops between them.-Jennifer Prince, Buncombe County Public Library, NC (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
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