The Dark Divine by Bree Despain

I loved this book. The Dark Divine was pure enjoyment for me from start to finish and I hated to put it down.  This was a pleasant surprise because usually, when I'm dying to read a book as much as I was with this one it ends up being slightly disappointing.


I was shocked with where the story went because I had no idea that I was getting into a paranormal romance. It threw me at first and I wasn't crazy about the idea of the story, but I got over it really quickly.

I loved every.single.character in this book and that includes the ever annoying best friend. Really... April didn't bother me, which says a lot because I NEVER like the best friend. I loved Jude's perfection and Don's Hagrid like personality and I even liked the parents in this one who don't seem totally clueless as to what's going on in their children's lives (although I guess they kind of are.... it's just not so glaringly "we're the oblivious parents" that so drives me crazy).

I loved the relationship between Grace and Jude, and Grace and Daniel separately. I felt so torn for her. One of my favorite parts of this book is that Grace doesn't give in to Daniel right away. She's not immediately willing to throw her life and other relationships away for the bad boy. She fights it, she tries to do what's right and she tries to be strong.

I easily bought into Grace’s feelings for Daniel because of their history. He wasn’t a stranger, they didn't just meet. They knew each other and grew-up together. It made it more believable for me.

There were several parts of this book that gave me goose bumps (e.g.: up in the tree, out of the roof) and I didn't feel like it was the same old story. Sure, there are some similarities to other books in this genre, but in my head it didn't follow the same predictable path. I'm really looking forward to the sequel to revisit these characters.