Krista Reviews: Jillian Larkins' - "Diva" (Flappers #3)

If you love The Great Gatsby, you’ll want to read the Flappers series.

Joy and tragedy collide in DIVA, the riveting conclusion to the Flappers series, set in the dazzling Roaring Twenties. Parties, bad boys, speakeasies—life in Manhattan has become a woozy blur for Clara Knowles. If Marcus Eastman truly loved her, how could he have fallen for another girl so quickly? Their romance mustn’t have been as magical as Clara thought. And if she has to be unhappy, she’s going to drag everyone else down to the depths of despair right along with her.

Being a Barnard girl is the stuff of Lorraine Dyer’s dreams. Finding out that Marcus is marrying a gold digger who may or may not be named Anastasia? A nightmare. The old Lorraine would have sat by and let the chips fall where they may, but she’s grown up a lot these past few months. She can’t bear to see Marcus lose a chance for true love. But will anyone listen to her?

Now that the charges against her have been dropped, Gloria Carmody is spending the last dizzying days of summer on Long Island, yachting on the sound and palling around with socialites at Forrest Hamilton’s swanky villa. Beneath her smile, though, Gloria’s keeping a secret. One that could have deadly consequences . . .

Hardcover, 320 pages  Published July 10th 2012 by Delacorte Books for Young Readers

ISBN  0385740417 (ISBN13: 9780385740418)

Clara, Lorraine, Gloria.  We have followed these three girls as they encounter love and loss through their pursuits of happiness. Throughout the series the main focus is on Gloria, a singer who has fallen head over hills for Jerome. Interracial couples in the 1920’s America is frowned upon and their relationship has more downs than ups. Gloria and Jerome share a love for music and it’s music that brings them together. They struggle to overcome the negativity of their friends and families as they strive for happiness together for as long as possible. When trouble knocks on their door, they flee the city. 

Clara and Lorraine are getting mixed up with the wrong guys, alcohol, and the wrong type of business, and they compete with each other over how high up the ladder they can climb. 

Now in the third and final book of the Flappers series we find each of the girls’ in separate living situations, but soon they are all brought together again. There is one last battle to keep Marcus from marrying a girl who is not who she claims to be, although Gloria is involved in more pressing matters with the police and trying to stay out of jail. Clara and Lorraine work closely to learn more about Anastasia and convince Marcus that he’s making the worst decision of his life.

The Flappers series is a hands down entertaining series. It has jaw dropping, shocking moments that you will never see coming. Readers will develop love/hate relationships with the each of the girls, finding them stubborn or selfish to completely relate-able.  You’ll get sucked in and your hearts will ache right along with theirs. I loved the ending, it was so fitting for this series. 

Not all stories can end in Happily Ever After but these girls are willing to fight, to the death to make theirs as close to perfect as they can.