You All Everybody

Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Boy, looking at other reviews this one is divisive, either you loved it or hated it. I, for the most part, very much enjoyed it. Anna Pace is stuck going to the annual family reunion in Montespero, a tiny village in Italy. In many ways the scariest part of the book is her family (and for those who didn't think the Paces were realistic, I'm glad you haven't been exposed to families like this. I have. They're real) Anna is the black sheep, the one they don't think is enough. She's recently broken up with a long term boyfriend, she didn't go to college like her rich parents wanted to (and they are the type to pay for everything and then hold it over your heads) that she's using her art to do advertising versus trying to get in a gallery etc. Her twin, Benny, who she thought was at least a bit supportive isn't really and his boyfriend, Christopher, whoo boy I was hoping diavola got him, he's such a snob and know it all.

Nicole, her older sister, controls everything and everyone (has planned everyone's movements to the last second, including excluding Anna from some things with parental approval), including her husband (who she thinks Anna wants) and her two young daughters (about Anna's only cheerleaders). Almost immediately, the villa they've rented feels off and people are asking Anna is she sure she wants to be there even as they drive her up to the door. Christopher, Benny's boyfriend, makes things weird by a) acting like he's in competition with Anna for Benny's attention (this has ramifications later that made me very disappointed in her brother) and b) is absolutely irate and demanding that the locked tower must be the best room in the house and it should be his.

The haunting starts small, bad dreams, noises, slamming doors. Before long, Anna is seeing, and drawing, this yellow-haired Florentine woman everywhere. Dreams become waking nightmares. Time is lost. And as Anna digs into the place's history things only become more dire and her family shifts more and more blame onto her. I particularly liked the epilogue which seemed fitting. I liked that Anna definitely took the fight to Diavola eventually (on the down side, she is so used to submitting to her family, she tends to avoid rather than confront).

What didn't work for me? I wish we had known more about the haunt which okay might not have been possible but still. Without spoilers, there is a point in time where Anna thinks she's free of the monster but we know that's unlikely since you know, horror tropes. Anyhow this part goes on way too long. In her preparing to free herself, Anna does some research including Stregheria which 'is too niche for the book to be in print.' Um, yeah, no. Go do an Amazon search. There is plenty in print books including the ones by Raven Grimassi who popularized it in the states (even if I don't agree with his conclusions and oh, right, I'm a follower of Italian & Italian/American magical practices). That threw me out of the book.

Overall, I did enjoy this. It felt like it had the ending it should have.



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