The Demon Lover

by Juliet Dark

Published by: Random House Publishing

My Rating (4.5 of 5 Stars): 

I gasped . . . or tried to. My mouth opened, but I couldn’t draw breath. . . . His lips, pearly wet, parted and he blew into my mouth. My lungs expanded beneath his weight. When I exhaled he sucked in my breath and his weight turned from cold marble into warm living flesh.

Since accepting a teaching position at remote Fairwick College in upstate New York, Callie McFay has experienced the same disturbingly erotic dream every night: A mist enters her bedroom, then takes the shape of a virile, seductive stranger who proceeds to ravish her in the most toe-curling, wholly satisfying ways possible. Perhaps these dreams are the result of writing her bestselling book, The Sex Lives of Demon Lovers. After all, Callie’s lifelong passion is the intersection of lurid fairy tales and Gothic literature—which is why she finds herself at Fairwick’s renowned folklore department, living in a once-stately Victorian house that, at first sight, seemed to call her name.

But Callie soon realizes that her dreams are alarmingly real. She has a demon lover—an incubus—and he will seduce her, pleasure her, and eventually suck the very life from her. Then Callie makes another startling discovery: He’s not the only mythical creature in Fairwick. As the tenured witches of the college and the resident fairies in the surrounding woods prepare to cast out the incubus, Callie must accomplish something infinitely more difficult—banishing this demon lover from her heart.

My Review:

The Demon Lover is very unlike other paranormal books.  The primary paranormal being is not a vampire or a shape-shifter, it is an ethereal incubus.  This incubus has a strong interest in the heroine of the story, Callie, and has followed her in her dreams from when she was a young woman.  Callie has used her dreams of her demon lover to write a novel, and direct her career.  After finishing her graduate degree, Callie accepts a teaching position in Fairwick, where study in areas of legends and fairy tales are highly valued.  Beyond that Callie discovers that the people of Fairwick, and herself are more than they seem, and her dream demon lover is more than just a dream.

The Demon Lover is a book that slowly builds.  As Callie learns more about the realities of the paranormal, so does the reader.  It takes time to uncover exactly who and what each of the paranormal entities are, and this discovery process is engaging and the characters are intriguing.  It took me awhile to like Callie, she was in serious denial about the paranormal.  For a girl who dreamed of an incubus every night, she had a very tough time accepting the supernatural.  I actually came to sympathize with the incubus in the story, he is misjudged often and even though he has a temper and he is not very honest, I still love his character.  As the paranormal world is uncovered, the political structure of the paranormal creatures becomes more evident.  There are shades of grey to every character and every side has their own story.  There is a lot to the plot, and I was completely taken in with the book and the story.

With beautiful, ethereal imagery and fairy tales made real, The Demon Lover is a spell binding story that kept me reading and burning the midnight oil.

There is a sensual nature to this book, but I would not really classify this one as a romance, per se.  Callie is a young woman starting a new career, and trying to match her dream lover with reality.  The outcome of finding the dream lover is unexpected, but it fits the story.  The book ends in a good way, the storyline is wrapped-up (for the most part), but the overall story is just beginning.  Now that the characters have been introduced, future story lines are put in place, and I for one am looking forward to seeing what comes next.

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