Spooktastic Buddy Read & Review: “Lair of Dreams” (Diviners #2) by Libba Bray

“Lair of Dreams (The Diviners #2)” by Libba Bray (2015)

Genre: YA, Historical, Mystery, Fantasy, Paranormal

Page Length: 613 pages (hardcover edition)

Synopsis:

After a supernatural showdown with a serial killer, Evie O’Neill has outed herself as a Diviner. With her uncanny ability to read people’s secrets, she’s become a media darling, earning the title “America’s Sweetheart Seer.” Everyone’s in love with the city’s newest It Girl…everyone except the other Diviners.

Piano-playing Henry DuBois and Chinatown resident Ling Chan are two Diviners struggling to keep their powers a secret—for they can walk in dreams. And while Evie is living the high life, victims of a mysterious sleeping sickness are turning up across New York City.

As Henry searches for a lost love and Ling strives to succeed in a world that shuns her, a malevolent force infects their dreams. And at the edges of it all lurks a man in a stovepipe hat who has plans that extend farther than anyone can guess…As the sickness spreads, can the Diviners descend into the dreamworld to save the city? (description from Goodreads)

Review:

*To read a review of Book One click here*

*This was a part of a buddy read I did in October with fellow book blogger Zezee With Books! Click here to see her thoughts on the book and to check out her amazing blog!

Lair of Dreams takes it’s readers back to 1920s New York for a new and suspenseful adventure in this sequel. Reacquainted with our Diviners and introducing some new characters in this sequel, an ominous aura sets over the city as the “sleeping sickeness” takes its victims slowly one by one. Evie and the rest of the Diviners are still reeling from defeating a serial killer all while trying to figure out the meaning behind “Project Buffalo” and testing the limits of their powers.

Like the first novel, the plot moves very slowly taking it’s time as we see small glimpses of the villain of the story as the victims encounter their fates. One by one, the victims fall prey to the terror in their dreams and there is an overall unsettling feeling as our main characters and the readers try to solve the case. I liked seeing the development of the Diviners as they grow and understand what their abilities really are. Ling and Henry, were the spotlight characters of the novel as they are dream walkers and try to help solve the case by trekking through the dream realm every night. It puts the readers on edge because you know something evil is lurking in the dream realm, but you never know when it will strike.

This book is lengthy at 600 plus pages, but the story is so immersive that it moves at a steady pace. I really appreciate all the details that places readers not only in the universe, but the series “world”. Reading about the scientific advances, transportation, and society of the 1920s is fascinating. It also delves somewhat into LGBT culture and the terrifying horrors such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Chinese Exclusion Act. I did enjoy the exploration of the dream realm and it’s tie in with the Carl Jung’s collective unconscious.

I enjoyed this novel from beginning to end! Though the ending was climatic I still have so many questions! Who is Blind Bill? What is the true meanings behind Project Buffalo? Who is the mysterious man in the tall hat? I can’t wait to find out in the next installment!

*Trigger Warnings: Violence, Death, Racism

Final Verdict: