Book Review: Vixen by Jillian Larkin

Title: Vixen 

Author: Jillian Larkin
Series: The Flappers, #1
Pages: 400
Publisher: Corgi
Date of Publication: 1st March 2012
Source: Publisher*
Synopsis from Goodreads: Jazz . . . Booze . . . Boys . . . It’s a dangerous combination.

Every girl wants what she can’t have. Seventeen-year-old Gloria Carmody wants the flapper lifestyle—and the bobbed hair, cigarettes, and music-filled nights that go with it. Now that she’s engaged to Sebastian Grey, scion of one of Chicago’s most powerful families, Gloria’s party days are over before they’ve even begun . . . or are they?

Clara Knowles, Gloria’s goody-two-shoes cousin, has arrived to make sure the high-society wedding comes off without a hitch—but Clara isn’t as lily-white as she appears. Seems she has some dirty little secrets of her own that she’ll do anything to keep hidden. . . .

Lorraine Dyer, Gloria’s social-climbing best friend, is tired of living in Gloria’s shadow. When Lorraine’s envy spills over into desperate spite, no one is safe. And someone’s going to be very sorry. . . .

My Thoughts:
Wow. Wow wow wow wow wow. I absolutely adored this book. Seriously, it's one of my favourite books I've read this year so far, for sure. It was full of glitz and glamour, gossip and scandal, and there wasn't a minute of it that I didn't love. Ahh it was just so awesome.

Sorry, I had to get my gushy paragraph out of the way... I haven't read a historical fiction book for ages, so I was rather excited to finally get to read one. Having never read anything about 1920s America, and knowing very little about the Flappers in general, I didn't really know what to expect. I was a bit worried I'd need some prior knowledge about the time before reading it, and while some of language I didn't quite understand at first, I felt completely at ease with Flappers and 1920s America before even reaching page 50.

I loved Gloria. I thought she was a great character - I loved how she didn't want to spend her life with a man she didn't love, so she took action against it to make sure it wouldn't happen. It was great how outgoing she was, and her determination to have fun and not let other people's opinions of her get in her way was awesome. She took risks and did what she wanted to do, and she actually had a backbone, unlike other YA heroines.

Despite how much I liked Gloria, I really loved how the book was told from multiple points of view. It was nice to learn more about Clara and her background than we would have had it just been from Gloria's point of view, and I could really see into Lorraine's mind and try and guess what she was planning to do to sabotage Clara. It was great to be able to see how all the characters developed throughout the book, and the ending set up very nicely for the second book, in terms of who's friends with who, and who's planning bad things, etc... ;)

The plot was great. Learning about all the parties and clubs that the girls went to, and finding out what being a Flapper was all about was awesome. There was lots of gossip and lots of scandals that lead to a huge turn around of the plot - there were so many times in which I thought I knew about something, and then I'd read on, only to find out that I was completely wrong, and yet again there were more buried backstories that I couldn't even have guessed at.

Vixen is an amazing debut novel - it definitely doesn't read like one (because it's SO good). It'd be perfect for any fans of YA historical fiction, whether you're new to the genre, or you just haven't read one for a while. It's definitely got me excited to read some more historical novels as I've missed reading them! I can't wait for the next book, Ingenue, as I'm sure it will be just as awesome as this one.

*Huge thanks to Random House for sending me this in exchange for an honest review. In no way has this affected my opinion of the book.