The Darkest Star
When seventeen-year-old Evie Dasher is caught up in a raid at a notorious club known as one of the few places where humans and the surviving Luxen can mingle freely, she meets Luc, an unnaturally beautiful guy she initially assumes is a Luxen...but he is in fact something much more powerful. Her growing attraction for Luc will lead her deeper and deeper into a world she'd only heard about, a world where everything she thought she knew will be turned on its head...
#1 New York Times, USA Today, and internationally bestselling author Jennifer L. Armentrout returns to the universe of the Lux in this brand new series, featuring beloved characters both new and old.
Genre: Young Adult / Paranormal Fantasy
Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout
Hardcover, 368 pages
Published: October 30th 2018
Publishing House: Tor Teen
My Review
In a paranormal time, the human race has experienced invasions and conflicts with other lifeforms, who in term have their own conflicts among their worlds. Raids, cover-ups and underground operations to capture illegal lifeforms take place every day, but a lot of it is hush, hush to not frighten the public.
Eve Dasher is a regular girl, in a regular school, with regular friends. She is a normal adolescent, busy with her life and friends at High School and pretty sure everything is the way it should be. After the death of her father, she is moving on the best she can with her always working mother by her side. That is until she finds out the truth about her parents and who she really is!
Without her mother knowing, Eve is going to a club with some friends that is a prime spot where Luxen can be found. Smitten with the intoxicating atmosphere and the perfect bods of the Luxen all around, they enjoy their evening carefree flirting and mingling…until the raid!
Trapped in a tiny side room, Eve finds herself inches from Luc, a handsome Lux. This is entirely too uncomfortable for her and Luc has this way of shall we say, being very persuasive and persistent. Is this a flutter in her chest or just pure anger boiling at his cockiness?
News gets out in town about more raids in the neighborhood, and in Eve’s circle of friends, a person is found dead. With heightened tension all around, Eve isn’t taking some of the warnings signs seriously as a stranger keeps bumping into her here and there and is beginning to threaten her. He could potentially be the killer.
As Luc shows up at Eve’s house and rats her out in front of her mom about sneaking into the club with a fake i.d., Eve’s world is suddenly turned upside down about her parents' identity and the memories she has lost of her childhood.
Coming to grips with the bizarre turn of events, she is catapulted deeper into the world of the Luxen and becomes a pawn played in a deadly battle between factions. Will Eve’s new reality destroy her?
***
This was my first book by this author and I now realize that the concept of the ‘Luxen’ has had its own book series prior. I went into this book blindly not even knowing what it was about. My life at the moment is so busy, that I just needed something light to read. Considering that I read this without prior knowledge, rest assured, it is a free-standing novel on its own and no prior info is needed.
As for my enjoyment of this YA novel, I was content. It wasn’t exceedingly great or the opposite. The middle range for me. I do not read a lot of books in paranormal settings, so the concept was new and engaging. I had my inclinations about the outcome of this novel but kept reading because it was still engaging.
This novel is a slow-burn, character-driven read. As it is for YA readers and I am a bit beyond that (admittedly…waaay beyond), I thought the insecurity of the main character and the questioning of everything incl. romance, just became long. There wasn’t a huge climax of action, but it stayed steadily sprinkled throughout.
The writing was done well. You can tell, the author is experienced. I would recommend this book to young adults and those that may have read the other Armentrout novels. With that, I hope you enjoy :)
