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A review by justabean_reads
Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross
2.5
This is one of those books where I'm not sure I enjoyed the first one, and I already have a library hold on the second one because I really want to see what happens. So, those are my life choices. How are you?
This is basically secondary world WWI, but both sides are influenced/controlled by actual gods, and there's demons and shit on the battlefield. A pair of rival reporters are covering the conflict, trading insults, and falling in love. Also, there's a You've Got Mail-style plot which is moderately tedious, and why do I keep thinking I'll like YA? (Good God, why was she apologising to him for her being mad that he was lying to her?)
There was some really fun ideas with the world building around buried gods and a world saturated with their lingering magic, plus early 20-century tech. Though I did find some of the details weren't super consistent, and making one of the gods evil maybe kind of a little bit undermined the moral ambiguity one usually finds around WWI stories. I liked the details of life near the front, and the combat scenes were really well done. Another highlight: the book was just running with equality on the gender and sexual orientation fronts, with female soldiers and openly queer characters. And as mentioned, the plot really grabbed me! I do really want to know what the deal is with the MC's brother.
But, Lord, two twenty-year-olds helplessly in love constantly writing sappy letters about how great each other is... not my thing. And worse, once the romance plot kicked off, we lost most of the war reporting details that I was enjoying in favour of torrid romance. (The book sort of forgot that the characters had a passionate belief in getting the truth about the war out, as the reporters are never neutral and grow less so, and don't seem to do much in the way of reporting.)
This is basically secondary world WWI, but both sides are influenced/controlled by actual gods, and there's demons and shit on the battlefield. A pair of rival reporters are covering the conflict, trading insults, and falling in love. Also, there's a You've Got Mail-style plot which is moderately tedious, and why do I keep thinking I'll like YA? (Good God, why was she apologising to him for her being mad that he was lying to her?)
There was some really fun ideas with the world building around buried gods and a world saturated with their lingering magic, plus early 20-century tech. Though I did find some of the details weren't super consistent, and making one of the gods evil maybe kind of a little bit undermined the moral ambiguity one usually finds around WWI stories. I liked the details of life near the front, and the combat scenes were really well done. Another highlight: the book was just running with equality on the gender and sexual orientation fronts, with female soldiers and openly queer characters. And as mentioned, the plot really grabbed me! I do really want to know what the deal is with the MC's brother.
But, Lord, two twenty-year-olds helplessly in love constantly writing sappy letters about how great each other is... not my thing. And worse, once the romance plot kicked off, we lost most of the war reporting details that I was enjoying in favour of torrid romance. (The book sort of forgot that the characters had a passionate belief in getting the truth about the war out, as the reporters are never neutral and grow less so, and don't seem to do much in the way of reporting.)