 | Title: Where Demons Fear to Tread
 Sexual Content: References to orgies, rape, and prostitution. Scenes of sensuality. A graphic sex scene. Rating:
Good - A fun read with minor flaws. Maybe read an excerpt before buying. |
Description
Fledging guardian angel and yoga teacher Serena St. Clair dares enter Devil's Paradise nightclub on a mission—to retrieve the wayward Hollywood "It Boy" she's assigned to protect. But she's ambushed by the club's owner, arch demon Julian Ascher. The most powerful demonic entity in Los Angeles, Julian is handsome as sin, a master of temptation who loves nothing more than corrupting pleasure–seeking humans. He won't release the lost soul Serena is supposed to guard. Unless she accepts his dangerous wager…
After the disastrous way his human life ended, Julian vowed that no woman would get the better of him again. Yet this sexy–sweet angel, smelling of fresh ocean air and happiness, triggers centuries–old feelings. Now, their high–stakes game of seduction, where angels fall from grace and where demons fear to tread, will lead them either to an eternity in hell… or a deliciously hot heaven.
Review
Angels and demons in paranormal romance bring a different kind of grace and power to the genre than the more traditional vampires and werewolves. That’s especially true in WHERE DEMONS FEAR TO TREAD, which takes the whole opposites attract idea to extremes when a demon who has long since shed his soul falls for a young angel who refuses to believe that love won’t win. It’s a fast, fun, and well written romance that could have been great except for a couple unfortunate set backs.
My two big hang-ups with WHERE DEMONS FEAR TO TREAD were the religious overtones and the character of Serena. Like many paranormal fans, I like the influx of new mythology that angels bring, but I do always get slightly uncomfortable when the mythology in books like this start mucking around with religious dogma. My brain starts going off in different directions and a lot of the fun gets lost for me. Some books, like Nalini Singh’s Guild Hunter series, do an amazing job of leaving religion out of their angels books, but others, like WHERE DEMONS FEAR TO TREAD, don’t pull it off quite as well.
And then there was Serena. I never once understood how she could fall for Julian. Every moment she spent with him was because he gave her an ultimatum: either you do want I want or I will destroy someone you love. And he’s not kidding. Serena listens to him talk about what form of depravity he’s going to unleash on someone and in her head she’s battling her uncontrollable lust for him. What? He sends hookers and cocaine to the human she’s guarding, and seconds later she’s moaning while he gropes her. Never came close to respecting her.
Julian at least made sense. He’s a demon. He’s completely upfront with Serena about what he is, what he’s done, and what he plans on doing. I didn’t exactly buy that her ‘angelic’ presence would make him want to abandon his demonic ways, but Julian is written in such a way that as a reader, I wanted him to.
Overall, WHERE DEMONS FEAR TO TREAD pits a new angel against an old demon fighting for a human soul and falling in love in the process. The romance is hot and the story soars at a fast enough pace that the occasional religious implications and a heroine who lets her hormones drive didn’t completely ground this book. There is no info about the next book in The Company of Angels series, but presumably we can expect it sometime in 2012.
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I dunno, I could see how it wouldn't work as a love story. But there could be some interesting things in that dynamic as far as lust, control, and the power of romance go. Sort of a look into torturous love? Or am I giving the book too much credit?
ReplyDeleteJoseph - Yes and no. The lust/control aspects were interesting, but I think they happened much too quickly and without any initial indication that Julian wasn't going to destroy the people Serena loved. I couldn't get past that and didn't find it credible that Serena could either.
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