Seven Black Diamonds Review: A Beautiful Mess of Faeries

Lilywhite Abernathy is a criminal. Her father’s “unconventional” business has meant a life of tightly held secrets, concealed weaponry, and a strict code. But Lily’s crime isn’t being the daughter of a powerful mob boss. Her guilt lies in the other half of her DNA—the part that can 

coax ancient rumors from stones and summon fire with a thought. Lily is part fae, which is a crime in her world.

From the time before she was born, a war has been raging between humanity and fae. The Queen of Blood and Rage, ruler of both the Seelie and Unseelie courts, wants to avenge the tragic death of her heir—a death that was the fault of reckless humans.

Lily’s father has shielded her from the repercussions of her ancestry…until she is sent to the prestigious St. Columba’s school, straight into the arms of the Black Diamonds.

Mysterious, glamorous, and bound together in their mission but constantly at odds, Zephyr, Creed, Will, Roan, Violet, and Alkamy are a Sleeper cell of fae, planted in the human world to help destroy it from within. With covers as rock stars and celebrity children, the Black Diamonds carry out the queen’s war against humanity. And unbeknownst to Lilywhite, she’s been chosen to join them.

Now more than ever, Lily’s heritage puts her in peril, and even the romantic attention of the fae singer Creed Morrison isn’t enough to keep Lily from wanting to run back to the safer world of organized crime.

“I see humanity’s flaws, but I see the goodness too.” 

Melissa Marr’s Wicked Lovely series was the series that first introduced me to faeries (move aside SJM) and I will always treasure those books ❤ Seven Black Diamonds was definitely similar, but also definitely not as good 😦 But, like I still liked it a lot? I’m kind of incapable of disliking anything with faeries I think.

Seven Black Diamonds takes place in a future world, where humans have (of course) screwed everything up and consequently, the faeries have decided that they lost their chance and now it’s time faery’s time to control the world. Of course, the fact that the Queen of Blood and Rage, the Unseelie Queen, lost her daughter, the heir to both the Seelie and Unseelie Courts who would unite all the faeries under the Hidden Throne, played into the anger and, well, rage against the humans! And so who gets caught in the middle of all this conflict? The Sleepers, a group of half-human half-faeries forced to murder or be murdered by the Queen.

When I started this book, I thought (especially based off the synopsis) that it would be entirely from the point of view of Lilywhite Abernathy. However, it was actually from a lot of perspectives. (Maybe like 5? 6? I’m not actually sure). I’m glad that it was told from third person POV because it was easier to keep them straight; however, I didn’t really like having so many narrators. Especially in the beginning before all of their stories converged, it could get confusing jumping from one scenario to another. Also, there were times where I got really into one person’s story, and then they disappeared and weren’t heard from for another 100 pages, which was super frustrating!!

So this book is called Seven Black Diamonds for a reason: the main characters are the Seven Black Diamonds! It was a bit hard to keep track of the seven of them, especially since we had another narrator and set of main characters! First we have Lilywhite, daughter of a crime lord an a faery! I loved how determined she was to stick to her values and what she cared about! She was daring, toeing the line between brave and foolish, and I just loved it!

Then we had Creed, who was…eh. Creed was probably my least favorite of the main characters, and that was mostly because he and Lilywhite were thrown into a romance and I was like…why? As in, it was completely instalove and after knowing each other for less than a week, Creed is, like, declaring his love and devotion, and betraying the Unseelie Queen who could easily slaughter them all for his love of Lilywhite? I also just felt like they had no chemistry–it was just like they met and then they were in love and that was that?

I really liked Zephyr! I loved how he was so conflicted, being the leader of the group and carrying around burdens of knowledge that none of the others had, and trying so furiously to protect everyone even if this meant sacrificing his own happiness. Alkamy was so amazing too! She was so fierce and bold, and I just love how she acted in the beginning, scaring away her roommate. I don’t really remember much about the last three, Violet, Will, and Roan, and that’s too bad because I really really want to know more about them!

But, honestly, I was probably most interested in Eilidh, the current faery heir, daughter of the King and Queen of the Seelie and Unseelie courts. She’s scarred, and she somehow knows Creed and Lilywhite before the novel even starts, and I lowkey wish that we could have gotten much more of her perspective instead of that of the seven black diamonds.

In the beginning, I found the plot to be really boring, especially since it seemed that it was just setting up the stories of all of the way too many characters. However, it definitely drew me in as I read more and more! It really started getting interesting later on in the book when more of the fae elements came in to play, and the ending/climax was definitely the best part of the book!

3.5 out of 5 diamond stars