Diavola - Jennifer Thorne's New Release is a MUST BUY!
“She kicked up her feet, looked out at the vista through her sunglasses, and tried her best to ignore the creeping thought that it wasn’t solitude if she wasn’t actually alone in the house at all.”
Anna is on vacation with her family and it’s a nightmare. Mostly the family part…but also the villa they’re staying in might be haunted. As Anna and her family continue to come to blows, and the ghosts of Monteperso appear every night, the strange tower in their villa that’s off limits becomes more and more enticing.
Diavola is the latest novel from Jennifer Thorne and is an incredible take on the haunted house trope with a kick ass main character whose one-liners will have you laughing so hard, only to turn the page and be terrified by what comes next.
“The smell hit Anna first. Stale. Dust of ages, a pharaoh’s tomb. Then she felt the weight. The air in here was active. It had intent. She felt it on her shoulders, the top of her head, pressing it on her chest.”
Here’s what I loved:
This is such an incredibly strong story. It’s going to be tough to knock this out of my top 5 reads of this year. It’s the perfect mix of horror, humor, gorgeous writing, and character development. It also has a really solid reading pace that kept me hooked through it all.
Anna is my everything. She’s in her mid-thirties and at a job she only kind of loves. I fell deeply in love with her. I love how unapologetic she is about how she wants to live her life, and how she handles her chaotic and cruel family. I would absolutely take a bullet for this woman. It’s really fun to follow her along in this story as she gathers her confidence and becomes a total bad ass by the end.
The ghosts in this book are really scary! There’s some really creepy bathroom scenes that made me a little frightened to look in the mirror when brushing my teeth after reading it. Thorne is such a master of the subtle horror that completely catches you off guard and will cover you in goosebumps. It’s also an interesting mix of hauntings and possession that we don’t see often in horror novels.
“The drop in air pressure. An absolute vacuum of hope. It was death. That was the feeling. Death so thick you could breathe it in.”
Overall, I absolutely adored this book. I highly recommend pre-ordering this because this is going to be a new favorite for a lot of you. A big thank you to Tor Nightfire for sending me a copy in exchange for an honest review. Diavola hits shelves March 26th.
