A review by verlkonig
Jovienne by Linda Robertson
2.0
Jovienne is nothing if not an ass-kicker of a book. The eponymous lead seems to be modelled on a gothic rocker from the 80's, which may or may not be your cup of tea. Add into the mix an unhealthy dose of Christian mythos, atheism, Hawaiian witchcraft, murder, and a sickeningly touchy feely demon and you may or may not have yourself a party.
The story follows Jovienne, a young woman who, after suffering the loss of her family in a car accident, is trained to slaughter demons by her tutor Andrei. Right at the beginning, her learned skills are put to the very literal test - if she kills a powerful demon, she will be rewarded with abhadon status. (An abhadon is a kind of angel specifically created to kill demons). On the other hand, if she fails, she'll be tortured in hell forever after. So there's a fair bit riding on this test. The real hard stuff comes later, when Jovienne struggles with her new status/servitude and what it means.
The story is quite convoluted. I found it difficult to follow each character's motives. Jovienne's motives were the most clear - she wanted to be free from her forced servitude. However, I couldn't understand so many of her choices! At first I thought I was missing important information so once she did something I would skip back a few chapters to check what I'd missed - but I hadn't missed anything. It was just hard to follow and Jovienne's headspace is a difficult one to get into, especially considering all the info dumps, changes of POV, and 'revelations' that meant nothing to me since I didn't understand where these revelations came from or what they meant.
The world building needs a little work, as does the plotting. Being introduced to so many characters and ideas so early on before they had any bearing on Jovienne's story made things difficult for me. Also, there were some characters who I thought were utterly expendable (looking at you, Nathan!)
Jovienne was at first a character I was lukewarm towards. I appreciated what an ass kicker she was and liked her fiery spirit (note: the sassiness, fiery spirit etc does not need to be mentioned every 10 pages. We get it.) However, her bitterness and rage get tiresome quickly, especially when I just couldn't understand her at all. In the second half of the novel I'd gone from being lukewarm to actively disliking her and her foolish, rash decisions. The only thing I didn't mind about her was her apparent interest in saving innocents, but I also HATED how she behaved around Araxiel - because she is a virgin, she allows this creep-o to tear her clothes off and be unspeakably rapey??? No thank you! I expected more of you, Jovienne!
I felt much the same apathy towards other characters - Andrei, who was kind of flat and dull; Eitan, who we barely got to know; Araxiel, whose motives were unclear; and Damsel, who was as one dimensional as possible to ensure we had no sympathy for her.
Overall, the action scenes were many and fun, but there was little word building, or character growth. Add to this a weirdly happy ending for what was a grim book and I had sincerely run out of patience for it. However, I truly believe that with a bit of editing and altering, this would be someone's perfect novel. It's dark and violent and full of cool angels wearing leather and stabbing hell spawn. Not my cup of tea, in the end, but certainly somebody's.
The story follows Jovienne, a young woman who, after suffering the loss of her family in a car accident, is trained to slaughter demons by her tutor Andrei. Right at the beginning, her learned skills are put to the very literal test - if she kills a powerful demon, she will be rewarded with abhadon status. (An abhadon is a kind of angel specifically created to kill demons). On the other hand, if she fails, she'll be tortured in hell forever after. So there's a fair bit riding on this test. The real hard stuff comes later, when Jovienne struggles with her new status/servitude and what it means.
The story is quite convoluted. I found it difficult to follow each character's motives. Jovienne's motives were the most clear - she wanted to be free from her forced servitude. However, I couldn't understand so many of her choices! At first I thought I was missing important information so once she did something I would skip back a few chapters to check what I'd missed - but I hadn't missed anything. It was just hard to follow and Jovienne's headspace is a difficult one to get into, especially considering all the info dumps, changes of POV, and 'revelations' that meant nothing to me since I didn't understand where these revelations came from or what they meant.
Spoiler
(See: the nephilim. See: Jovienne's grandma, and who she was. See: Eitan's mysterious past. See: the Cinders/Senders, and who they were. What).The world building needs a little work, as does the plotting. Being introduced to so many characters and ideas so early on before they had any bearing on Jovienne's story made things difficult for me. Also, there were some characters who I thought were utterly expendable (looking at you, Nathan!)
Jovienne was at first a character I was lukewarm towards. I appreciated what an ass kicker she was and liked her fiery spirit (note: the sassiness, fiery spirit etc does not need to be mentioned every 10 pages. We get it.) However, her bitterness and rage get tiresome quickly, especially when I just couldn't understand her at all. In the second half of the novel I'd gone from being lukewarm to actively disliking her and her foolish, rash decisions. The only thing I didn't mind about her was her apparent interest in saving innocents, but
Spoiler
SPOILER ALERT - she murders Nathan without a second thought at the end, who had done nothing but be unlucky.I felt much the same apathy towards other characters - Andrei, who was kind of flat and dull; Eitan, who we barely got to know; Araxiel, whose motives were unclear; and Damsel, who was as one dimensional as possible to ensure we had no sympathy for her.
Overall, the action scenes were many and fun, but there was little word building, or character growth. Add to this a weirdly happy ending for what was a grim book and I had sincerely run out of patience for it. However, I truly believe that with a bit of editing and altering, this would be someone's perfect novel. It's dark and violent and full of cool angels wearing leather and stabbing hell spawn. Not my cup of tea, in the end, but certainly somebody's.