Yay for a change from vampire dramas!

In Vixen we are transported to Prohibition era Chicago: jazz, speakeasies, mobsters, debutantes, and plenty of drama. Fast read, guilty pleasure, cliche characters... yet, because the gossipy storyline and fun slang, it was pretty enjoyable. Plot builds up dramatically and the ending leaves the reader hanging. Made for a WB series. I can easily see flappers becoming the new vampires of teen lit.

This one is for older teens, not only because of subject matter, but because it will take some experience and worldliness to pick up on the Roaring Twenties slang. ( )

If I had a guilty pleasure book, this would be it.

Seriously, it has everything I adore: 20s glamour and flappers, jazz music, ridiculous YA drama, a pretty cover and a fast moving plot.

I ended up picking this book on clearance years ago. Like most books I own, it got lost somewhere in my house and I forgot it existed. Then, one day during my epic cleaning sprees to deal with my epic boredom, I found it! Since I'm trying to give myself a well rounded read shelf for 2020, I decided to pick it up. Plus, who doesn't want some goofy, YA, flapper fun?

This story follows 3 girls:
1. Gloria - engaged to some hot, not super nice, rich guy but wants to let herself fall in love with a jazz musician.
2. Clara - Gloria's cousin who is super goody goody, but clearly has a bad past she is trying to hide.
3. Lorraine - the not so nice girl who is friends with Gloria but wants to be the center of attention SO bad and can't get the guy so she's clearly gonna be a jerk. You know, the mean girl.

This book is super strange for me. It's packed full of YA drama and gossip, so this really shouldn't be my thing but I was SO DIGGING IT. It's like my lack of human interaction has made this kind of gossip gold for me. Either way, I totally loved it and needed this sort of fun in my life. It's like Gossip Girl or 90210 or other super dramatic stories.

I can easily say this book won't be for everyone. These girls in the 20s are definitely like girls from the 2010s/2020s. They have feminist life goals and want to be strong women. They don't fit into the 20s society, but totally fit into today. I didn't mind, because I just wanted a fun read and let myself sink into the drama. Buuuut, if you're looking for historical accuracy then this book is not for you. Enjoy the book for what it is!

The book is easy to read and the drama moves fast. There's constantly something going on, and since the book changes perspectives between the three girls we always see something different. There isn't as much romance as there is drama in this book. I expected some awesome love and romance plots, but love is kind of the back burner thing. There are dates and some kisses and sometimes some love confessions, but this is by no means a romance - it's a drama.

Overall, this book is fluffy and glamorous. I want to continue reading this series, mostly because it is totally a guilty pleasure. I love it for what it is - good job Jillian Larkin!

Four out of five stars! ( )

I was going to give it a 3 stars but the way Gloria treated her best friend, I hated it. I didn't believe her love for Jerome either. ( )

Somewhere in the back of my head, while reading Vixen, I learned that I'm glad I wasn't born a girl. And it's not for the patriarchal reasons that most men might come up with, but because when it comes to cruelty, you girls take the cake. Boys will physically bully the weaker one, but girls destroy you socially, emotionally, mentally - which is far worse than the bruise on your forearm.

Jillian Larkin created a world - set in the 1920s, the flapper generation (not to mention the age of the Lost Generation where expatriates roamed around other countries, each writing great novels) - that sucks you right in and leads you down the path of three lives of three rather stunning girls.

There's Gloria, a top-notch socialite whose engagement to Sebastian "Bastian" Grey only means a life of boredom for her. In a last attempt of adventure, Gloria sets off with friend Marcus Eastman to the most notorious speakeasy in Chicago - the Green Mill. There, Gloria is lured into the world of the flapper. She's seduced by their allure and their brash lifestyle. The singer on the stage sparks her most wildest dream of singing in front of a live crowd - a dream that would never be realized as long as she is engaged to marry Bastian. Most of all, she feels a sudden magnetic attraction to the piano player and jazz musician, Jerome Johnson.

Then there's Clara, Gloria's cousin from Pennsylvania, who arrives to Chicago under the assumption to help Gloria with her wedding. Truth is, Clara's running away from the life she led in New York. She plots to use Chicago as a fresh start. There she is drawn into her cousin's secrets and her inner circle. Most of all, she is drawn to Marcus Eastman. However, strange notes start arriving - first mysteriously left in her room - and a ghost from her past resurfaces. Clara is faced with her secret life unraveling while keeping up her act.

And finally, there's Lorraine, Gloria's closet friend. As she realizes those in her world are slowly drifting in several directions, she begins to scheme how to get them back. However, the more she schemes against her best friend and Clara, the deeper she digs her grave.


Jillian Larkin breathes a unique life into each of her characters, never afraid to turn the tables at a whim. Vixen is probably the best young adult novel I've read this year (that's not saying a lot considering it's the first I've read this year). Best of all, it lacks what is taken too seriously these days - you won't find cell phones, wizards or vampires in this novel. Instead, you get the sheer glamor of a lifestyle your grandparents probably enjoyed or were against. You are dropped into a world where communication between friends isn't as easy as signing onto an instant messenger or picking up your cellphone to text. No, Larkin picked the 1920s because things were difficult back than, while at the same time being much simpler. She created a love story we wouldn't think twice about these days but would have caused an uproar in scandal back then. She created a world in which girls still scheme against each other, but they did it in fashion - no joke, I really do like the 1920s which acts as the sole reason for my interest in the novel. I surely can't wait until Ingenue hits bookshelves in August of this year. ( )

I realize this is flapper dessert to indulge in, but I had too many others to read and had to put it down for now. It just was not that well written and kind of silly. I will revisit later due to reviews and my lack of patience. ( )