Review: The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff

The Replacement
By Brenna Yovanoff
Publisher: Razorbill

To Sum It Up:

Malcolm “Mackie” Doyle knows that he’s not like everyone else in the town of Gentry. Blood, stainless steel, and consecrated ground all make him sick, lately even more so than they have in the past. Mackie isn’t human, and the world where he really comes from is stranger than anything he could have imagined. It’s a world in which two supernatural sisters rule rival houses, and blood sacrifices are required to keep Gentry thriving. The sisters urge Mackie to return to his real home if he wants to survive, but it’s not a place he sees himself belonging to, either.

Review:

It’s official: Brenna Yovanoff is one of my favorite paranormal authors. Her worlds have this assuredness to them that makes them seem 100% possible. No matter what the premise of the book is, she makes it work completely.

I read Yovanoff’s novels in reverse order of publication, and of the three, I thought The Replacement had the oddest story. The protagonist, Mackie Doyle, learns that he’s a changeling and was left in the place of the real, and human, Malcolm Doyle as a baby. The more Mackie found out about the paranormal world he really came from, the more bizarre the story became. And I loved how creepy it was. There’s a whole population of strange, supernatural beings living underneath the town of Gentry, and they’re strange beings, indeed. I was a little freaked out by both the Morrigan and the Lady, sisters who head up rival factions called the House of Mayhem and the House of Misery, respectively. I was completely freaked out by the Cutter, a gentleman in the employ of the House of Misery who delights in using his lethal claws (hence his name). Imagine what must have gone through Mackie’s mind upon discovering that these are the types of folks he should feel at home amongst. Yeah—awkward, to say the least.

Two things that I really love about Yovanoff’s books, besides her brilliant prose, are how complex her main characters are and her portrayal of strong sibling bonds. Mackie has never truly fit in with the humans of Gentry, but he’s attached enough to them to be appalled by what his “kind” do with the human babies they take. Mackie is an oddity even among changelings because it’s the sickly ones who are swapped with the humans, and Mackie has survived longer than most. But then, he’s grown up loved by his human sister, Emma, who’s always known what he is and has loved him anyway. Mackie loves Emma, too, and their relationship reminded me a lot of Daphne and Obie from Yovanoff’s The Space Between, as well as Hannah and Ariel from Paper Valentine.

This is one of the weirdest books I’ve read, and I mean that in the most complimentary way possible. The Replacement is unique, imaginative, and, like Yovanoff’s other two novels, a standalone. Finding YA paranormal titles that aren’t rehashes of the same old subjects can sometimes pose a challenge, so if you’re seeking a read that’s quite different, I highly recommend trying The Replacement. Or The Space Between. Or Paper Valentine. Oh, just read all of them.

All in All:

Although there are elements of faerie lore here, like changelings, The Replacement is more its own special type of book, which made it all the more interesting to read. There’s no simple categorization for characters like the Cutter, whom I’m still severely creeped out by.

Review: Paper Valentine by Brenna Yovanoff

Paper Valentine
By Brenna Yovanoff
Publisher: Razorbill

To Sum It Up:

Since the death of her best friend Lillian, Hannah Wagner has been haunted by Lillian’s ghost. As Hannah struggles to cope with the daily reminder of how her friend died, a string of murders throws the community of Ludlow into a panic. The victims are all young girls, and the killer leaves a paper valentine at each crime scene. Hannah’s ability to see ghosts becomes key to stopping whoever’s responsible, but it’s not going to be easy to explain how she knows what she does.

Review:

Paper Valentine makes me think of a string quartet. Individually, each instrument produces a beautiful sound; put them together, though, and the music is even more powerful. That is this book. Each story thread draws you in, but taken as a whole, you have one knockout novel.

Hannah Wagner sees the ghost of her dead best friend, Lillian Wald. Never able to please her mother, Lillian essentially starved herself to death. Its impact has affected Hannah in several ways. Of course there’s the fact that Lillian is haunting her, and Lillian can be quite the disruptive ghost. Under her outward appearance of calm that is underscored by her cheery outfits, Hannah is wrestling with the guilt she feels over just looking on as Lillian wasted away. Lillian was also the leader of their circle of friends, and without her, Hannah begins to realize that she shares nothing in common with the remaining members of the group.

Watching Hannah deal with the loss of Lillian made for a compelling story on its own. While she seems to be carrying on with her life, she’s not okay. It’s subtle, but it’s there. This book is full of nuances that are slowly built up; it’s when you view the assembled picture that you feel the full weight of what’s happened throughout the novel. It takes Hannah some time to become aware of how much she’s holding in, and adding to that burden are her conflicted feelings toward Finnegan “Finny” Boone.

Hannah has known Finny since childhood, and he is most decidedly trouble. Yet there’s a gentleness to him that belies his sharp edges. Finny is the type of boy whom Lillian and the rest of their clique never would have allowed Hannah to be seen with. What they think isn’t really an issue anymore, though. The tension and uncertainty about what exists between these two are riveting, and again, here’s a fraction of the story that stands strongly by itself.

And now for where the title comes in. A serial killer is targeting young girls in Hannah’s community and leaving paper valentines at the crime scenes. The book takes its darkest turn yet with this part of the story. The paranormal plays a significant role in catching the killer, and it’s cleverly worked into the murder mystery aspect of the novel. I did, however, find the big reveal of the killer’s identity somewhat wanting. For all of the meticulous plotting that led up to this moment, I felt like it went by too quickly, as if there were fifteen minutes left in a movie and all the loose ends needed to be tied up.

Ending aside, Paper Valentine was a fantastic read. Brenna Yovanoff is a brilliant storyteller, and I’m just in awe of her literal and figurative uses of ghosts in this. It’s a paranormal read like this one that reminds me why I love the genre so much.

All in All:

Reading Paper Valentine late at night gave me the chills. The dark tone and build-up of suspense are so well done, as is its incorporation of the supernatural.

Review: The Space Between by Brenna Yovanoff

The Space Between
By Brenna Yovanoff
Publisher: Razorbill

To Sum It Up:

The daughter of Lilith and Lucifer, Daphne has never ventured outside of Pandemonium, a city in Hell. That changes when her brother, Obie, goes missing, and Daphne must go to Earth to find him. In a world that is new and strange to her, she seeks out Truman Flynn, a troubled mortal boy and the last person known to have seen Obie. Daphne may have set out on a mission to help her brother, but it may be two lives that she ends up saving.

Review:

First, I’d like to ooh and aah over the cover for a bit. The design is just beautiful, even more so when you see it in person, and it certainly caught my eye when Goodreads recommended The Space Between to me over a year ago. And the cover art is actually relevant to the book for a change. Daphne, the protagonist, is the half-demon/half-fallen angel daughter of Lilith and Lucifer and lives in Pandemonium, a city in Hell where everything is made of metal (Pandemonium does have its own furnace, after all.). I think that the cover is an imaginative, accurate visualization of Pandemonium.

This book seriously blew my mind, and in a good way. It’s such a creative take on angels and demons and heaven and hell (mostly the demons and hell parts). I loved how some of the conventional notions involved in this type of story were maintained, like Hell being hot, while others were completely reversed. Daphne doesn’t want to be like her numerous sisters, the Lilim, who go to Earth for “a fix;” they prey on human men and take their dreams and memories from them. Whereas half-demon Daphne demonstrates a conscience, Azrael, the Angel of Death whose duty is to destroy demons on Earth, is portrayed as quite merciless. He calls upon his vicious monster, Dark Dreadful, to dispense with the demons who dare invade his turf. Dark Dreadful is every bit as scary as she sounds.

This novel had some creepy moments and some bizarre moments in it, yet I was 100% sold on the world. When Daphne first arrives on Earth, she’s rather overwhelmed. Her knowledge is limited to what her brother, Obie, whose job entails spending most of his time there, has told her. Daphne is pretty naïve to the ways of the human world, like when she thinks the guy behind the deli counter has said “Salome” because she doesn’t know what “salami” is. But this scene and others like it totally work and don’t make Daphne look silly because Brenna Yovanoff has written them in such a way that you couldn’t expect anything else from a character who’s lived in Hell all of her life.

The characterizations in The Space Between are incredible. Here’s a statement that I don’t think I could have gotten away with during my thirteen years of Catholic school: I really liked Beelzebub! He heads up Hell’s Collections Department; i.e. he’s in charge of reaping souls. He’s just cool and is the person whom Daphne turns to for help and advice. I also liked Obie and how strong his sibling bond was with his sister. The two look out for one another and are very much alike in the compassion that they both have for others.

I loved Daphne. I loved how she strove to be better than the Lilim and how big her heart was despite her doubts that she’d ever know what it meant to love. I just wanted to tell her, “But you already know, Daphne! You already know!” Even though her search for Obie takes her to a place that is alien to her and she’s nearly mugged soon after setting foot on Earth, Daphne keeps her wits about her. As she begins running out of time to help her brother, some cracks start to show in her poise, but it’s then that she finds support from an unlikely source: Truman Flynn.

Daphne first sees Truman when he makes a brief appearance in Hell following a suicide attempt. He’s sent back to Earth with Obie, who’d been looking after him and whose job it is to help the Lost Ones, the half-human offspring of fallen angels. Truman is Daphne’s only clue to Obie’s whereabouts, and when she encounters Truman again, he’s in really bad shape, passed out on a bathroom floor from too much drinking. Since his mother’s death, he’s set himself on a path to self-destruction that is heartbreaking to behold. Daphne, who so wrongly believes that she’s incapable of human empathy, has felt exactly that for Truman from the moment she met him. Truman, who so wrongly believes that he has nothing to live for, very slowly comes around to helping Daphne with her task. The relationship that gradually builds between these two is exquisitely crafted. My shabby description of it can’t even begin to properly capture it.

I was all set to unequivocally give The Space Between five stars until the novel started winding down toward its conclusion. It’s not that I didn’t like the ending itself; I just didn’t like the way events leading up to the ending unfolded. In fact, I was like, “WTF?!” I think this is just a case of me being me, though. Every single other aspect of this stellar novel deserves five stars, and that’s what I’m rating the book overall.

All in All:

There’s so much to love here: the writing, the story, the characters, the world, the spin on demons and angels. I love paranormal reads that make the impossible seem plausible, and this one fully succeeds in doing so.