Deja New is the second novel in MaryJanice Davidson’s Insighters series, and if you haven’t read the first one, you might as well give this one a miss. While the main character of this one, Angela, is a new protagonist, the main character from the first novel, Leah Nazir, is in this plenty. Her backstory is revisited enough for us to get a general idea of what might have happened in the first book, but the problem is that the world-building the reader needs to understand what Insighters are and how their world works is pretty much skimmed over entirely.
This isn’t like the Queen Betsy series (Undead and Unwed etc.) where the reader knows what vampires and shapeshifters are. This is a whole new universe and Insighters have powers that aren’t really explained clearly - they appear to be like mediums on steroids, but there are a bunch of other things that are really not explained and left me completely bemused.
As a consequence, I struggled to warm to Angela - particularly when she pulled a horrible move on her love interest and basically said ‘wham bam thank you man’. It’s a foul move when a man does it and it’s no better from a woman; I was thoroughly turned off her at that moment. Reasons behind her behaviour or not, it was still a move that made me dislike her, which made me disinterested in the rest of the story.
If you read the first one, you might like this. I haven’t read the first one and I just couldn’t get into it. Three stars.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book for review through NetGalley.