The Demon Lover - Review

Title: The Demon Lover
Author: Juliet Dark (Carol Goodman)
Source: Library

Goodreads summary:

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 her having written the bestselling book The Sex Lives of Demon Lovers. Callie’s lifelong passion is the intersection of lurid fairy tales and Gothic literature—which is why she’s found 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: Her incubus is 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 demon, Callie must accomplish something infinitely more difficult—banishing this supernatural lover from her heart.

My thoughts:

Carol Goodman is one of my favorite authors.  She writes these stories that are historical, literary, and usually involve adademia and folklore/fairy tales.  I love them. I knew this book was going to be a departure from her norm and it was; The Demon Lover is the first in Goodman's paranormal romance series.   

The main character, Callie, has made a career of studying the Byronic Hero.  I had to look this up- I have a minor in literature but for some reason we never discussed what a Byronic Hero is.  I guess that it had to do with Byron, obviously, but I had to look up the details.  A Byronic Hero is a bit of a bad boy, and is not a traditional hero.  He is usually isolated from the rest of the world in some way; he is moody and passionate. A few examples are Mr. Rochester, whom I love, and Erik, the Phantom from Phantom of the Opera, whom I also love.  These qualities pretty much sum up any "hero" I have liked in a book. My friends are always like, "He is a jerk, so of course you like him!" Now I can sound smart and say that I don't call them jerks, they are Byronic heroes. Lol.

Anyway, Callie's career has been built upon studying the Demon Lover in literature - including Mr. Rochester and newer modern Byronic Heroes, such as the Vampire Lestat and Edward from Twilight. All of this was extremely interesting. 

But then there was another aspect to the book - the paranormal romance parts.  Now, I happen to like paranormal romances and all supernatural type books.  It was just hard for me to connect it with the rest of this book and Carol Goodman.  My mind warred with this; sometimes I felt I was reading two different books. By the middle of the book I let go of my expectations and read it strictly as a supernatural romance, and it was better.  

I want you all to be warned - there is a lot of sex in this book, physically real, sometimes a little mystical.  Callie falls in love (?) with an incubus. It's hard to say if it was real love - you learn that an incubus causes their victims to feel like they really love them, allowing the incubus to do its thing until the person is dead! All of this I wasn't sure about. It might have been to out there for me.  

The rest of the supernatural characters were really cool, as were the parts of the mystery that surrounded everything  - the illness, the incubus sometimes, Callie's boyfriend, how things intertwined - I really enjoyed all of that.  There were just some parts that I wasn't too sure about.  

The second book in this series is out - The Water Witch.  I know I am going to read it.  I just hope that incubus doesn't show up again, but I am sure he will!!  If you like paranormal romance and don't mind lots of sexy time scenes, then you won't mind this book.  If these two things are not your thing, don't read it.