The Space Between by Brenna Yovanoff | eBook

Publishers Weekly

This powerful and decidedly uncomfortable dark fantasy concerns Daphne, a serious and introspective young woman who just happens to live in Hell, being the youngest daughter of Lucifer and Lilith. Pandemonium isn’t a bad place to live—“the city shines silver, as highly polished as a wish. The streets sprawl out in complicated spirals, winding between glossy buildings”—but Daphne feels like something is missing. She could go to Earth and seduce young men like her older half-sisters (the hunt made more delicious by the danger represented by Azrael, the sadistic angel of death, and his monstrous companion, Dark Dreadful), but she feels like such sexual goings-on are beneath her. Then, her brother Obie, Hell’s most notorious do-gooder, saves Truman Flynn, a teenage suicide, from death. Witnessing the boy’s brief, painful materialization in Hell, Daphne is taken with him; when Obie disappears on Earth, she enlists Truman to help find him. Yovanoff (The Replacement) once again develops complex, believable characters as well as a supernatural milieu that feels both original and lived in. This confident tale contains moments of beauty, terror, and significant wisdom. Ages 14–up. (Nov.)

VOYA - Donna L Phillips

Daphne is the daughter of fallen angel Lucifer and Lilith, Biblical Adam's "other woman." She has one brother, Obie, a gentle soul who plans to live on earth with the woman he loves. Daphne also has many succubae half-sisters whom she despises for the pleasure they take from visiting Earth to seduce the souls of men. Her devotion and disdain are tested when she travels to Earth to rescue Obie from Azrael, the Angel of Death, and his minion, Dark Dreadful. In the process, she encounters Truman Flynn, half-mortal and half-demon, whom Obie saved once from suicide and whom Daphne rescues from a nearly successful second attempt. The two share a nail-biting quest for Obie and much angst over their feelings for each other, revealed with immediacy in Daphne's first-person present tense chapters, and with more emotionally distant third-person past tense chapters from Truman's point of view. The "space between" applies not only to Daphne's exploration of Earth, but also to her typically teen effort to come to grips with psychological and social spaces. Minor characters and recurring images will lure curious teens to explore the rich mythological back-story. Like Yovanoff's first novel, The Replacement (Razorbill 2010/VOYA December 2010), some readers may be confused by sophisticated stylistic devices and shifting points of view. Nevertheless, Yovanoff will satisfy teens looking for page-turning, deliciously grisly suspense—coupled with plenty of surprises—and pique the interests of perceptive teens willing to grapple with complexities of style and theme. Reviewer: Donna L Phillips

Children's Literature - Sarah Maury Swan

Before Eve, Adam had a wife, Lilith, not made from his body. She was a demon and bore him a son named Ohbrin. But Adam rejected the boy, as Lilith had rejected him. Her second mate was the Fallen Angel, Lucifer, with whom she had the heroine of this story, the youngest of seven. Daphne has lived her entire life in Pandemonium, where her parents were sent for disobeying God. Daphne's six older sisters all have some special power, but she does not think she shares this bond with them. Her siblings—fathered by various lesser demons—like sucking the souls out of dying humans. Daphne's favorite sibling is Ohbrin, whom most call Obie, and she is devastated when he decides to stay on Earth to be with the woman he loves. Daphne comes across the scene of Obie saving a suicidal teenage boy and feels a connection she cannot explain. She jumps at the chance to go to Earth to find Obie after he disappears, not just to find her brother, but to find the boy also. After much blood and mayhem and with the boy's help, Daphne does find her brother and Obie's baby son. That is where the disconnect comes. The baby, being half demon, can already talk and survive for months without sustenance. Or even need of a diaper change. Obie and baby are saved, but the teen boy dies and Daphne feels she must be with him in Heaven to make him whole again. (Your basic star-crossed lovers story with a there is-good-in-even-supposedly-evil-people twist.) Daphne does begin to understand herself and her family more by the end of the story, but you might not care. Reviewer: Sarah Maury Swan

School Library Journal

Gr 9 Up—Daphne's home life is Hell. Literally. The daughter of Lilith and Lucifer, the sensitive teen feels out of place. When her adored older brother, Obie, abandons Hell to be with a girl he met on Earth, Daphne does what she has never done before. In order to find him and warn him of imminent danger, she leaves Hell, too. Once on Earth, Daphne seeks help from Truman, a self-destructive teenage boy whose incessant nightmares spur him to dangerous excesses in order to stay awake. As they work together to find Obie, besting a demon or two along the way, Daphne learns to appreciate and cultivate her humanity, the very thing that alienates her from her family. This bildungsroman features a sympathetic, believable protagonist who learns, changes, and grows. Daphne shrinks from the future planned for her, that of being like her ravenous older sisters, the Lilim, who live off the pain of weak men. Yovanoff's writing distinguishes itself with its inlay of eloquent and imaginative passages about life in Pandemonium (the sleek, metallic capital city of Hell), Daphne's sometimes-comic acclimations to life on Earth, Truman's tragic story arc, and the tender romance that develops between them.—Jennifer Prince, Buncombe County Public Library, NC

Kirkus Reviews

A dark love story between a girl from Hell and a boy from Earth, both with heavenly heritage. Daphne is royalty in Hell's city Pandemonium because she's the daughter of Lilith--Adam's first wife--and the fallen angel Lucifer. She's disconnected from her succubae sisters fathered by lesser demons and is closest to her eldest brother, Adam's son Obie. Instead of collecting souls for Hell, Obie's job is to save the Lost Ones, the half-human children of angels. But when Obie leaves Pandemonium for good only to go missing, Daphne's single lead is one of his last cases--Truman, a self-destructive, alcoholic teenager. The narration switches between Daphne's first person and Truman's close third, providing characterization through each other's eyes while affirming the yin-yang quality of the pair: a girl who wants to feel and a boy who feels too much. The race to stay ahead of the angelic demon hunter Azrael and his beast, Dark Dreadful, along with solving the mystery behind Obie's disappearance, balance out the introspective elements of the story. Although the lush descriptions occasionally edge into gothic purple prose, they create beauty in both gritty locations and violent gore alike. The pace accelerates in the last act as the characterizations converge with the plot. A dreamy, atmospheric take on Judeo-Christian mythology that prioritizes character. (Paranormal romance. 13 & up)

The Space Between

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