The Space Between

The Space Between by Brenna Yovanoff

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Before, when Lilith left, she’d been stony and remote. Now, she trembled, outraged that a man could refuse his son. She spit in Adam’s face and cursed the day she ever saw him. It was the day she’d been born. Then she took Obie and left, pelting away through the dark.

In the dark is where she met my father.


First of all, I’d like to take a second to admire the truly marvelous cover art, done by the amazing Spanish artist Nekro. He is responsible for some of my favorite covers, like Anna Dressed in Blood, Girl of Nightmares and Blood Rights. I love that every single one of his covers actually has something to do with the story, and that is especially true for The Space Between. His art made it so much easier for me to picture Hell the way Brenna Yovanoff described it: a huge city entirely made of metal, built above a Pit full of suffering souls and hungry Pain Demons.

The world Yovanoff created is both frightening and beautiful. She writes in exquisite detail, with clarity and completeness, and she does it effortlessly – you can tell that she isn’t even trying, that it comes naturally to her, like laughing or walking. That said, Maggie Stiefvater’s influence is clearly discernible, which isn’t all that surprising considering their friendship and collaboration.

From outside comes the sound of the furnace door slamming open. The sky glows red again and my tears begin to thaw. When I blink, they slip solid from my eyelashes. The sound when they land is like pebbles scattered on the tile, but the floor of the museum is already growing hot, burning my feet through my slippers. The tears melt and sizzle where they fall.

Daphne is the youngest daughter of Lilith and Lucifer, born right around the time when her parents stopped loving each other. Her many stepsisters, the Lilim, are wicked seductresses who walk the Earth taking knowledge and experience from their all-too-willing victims, but Daphne is nothing like them. Her half-brother Obie, Lilith’s first son and the son of Adam, is the only good person in Daphne’s life and Daphne adores him, but she’s nothing like him either. She seems to be stuck in Hell, spending eternity without purpose, until one day Obie disappears on Earth. Lilith, who only tolerates Daphne, despises the Lilim, but worships Obie, can do absolutely nothing to help him as she is unable to leave Hell. It’s up to Daphne to go to Earth for the first time and find her brother, despite the danger of being brutally killed by archangel Azrael and his faithful soldier, Dark Dreadful. The only person who can help her is a broken boy, Obie’s charge Truman, who was once sent back from the very entrance to Hell by Beelzebub himself.

Yovanoff’s talent for bringing horrible creatures to life was obvious to me even in The Replacement, but it was much more pronounced here. If you thought the Morrigan’s ladies were scary, the Lilim will likely give you nightmares that won’t easily go away. It was so easy to picture Lilith sitting on her filigree bench, her skin startlingly white, her head moving in a distinctly non-human way.

I had almost forgotten how her voice has the power to cut through me. She looks over, looks right through me with grim, silvery eyes and I see a black hollow in her, like seeing the future. Like looking down the barrel of a gun.

If you’re in the mood for a dark, eerily beautiful and haunting story, The Space Between is what you should read. Brenna Yovanoff just made it on my very short list of authors whose books I preorder without a second thought.