Demon

by Tosca Lee

From the author of the New York Times best-selling Iscariot comes an award-winning novel that poses the question: if a demon came up to you and offered to tell his story, would you listen?

Clay's life has reached a standstill. Recently divorced, he spends his days drifting from his drab apartment to his equally lackluster job as an editor for a small Boston press and back again. His dreary routine has left him mired in a seemingly meaningless existence, until the night he meets Lucian - a demon - and everything changes. With the simple words, "I'm going to tell you my story, and you're going to write it down and publish it", Lucian catapults Clay's mundane life into turmoil.

What begins as an intriguing mystery soon spirals into a chaotic obsession as Clay struggles to piece together Lucian's dark tale of love, ambition, and grace - only to discover the demon's story is strikingly similar to his own. And the only thing that matters now is finding out how the story ends....

Genres: Christian Fiction, Fiction, Christian, Fantasy, Horror, Thriller, Supernatural

Audiobook

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

"Superior storytelling."
-Publishers Weekly starred review

Tosca Lee is the New York Times bestselling author of The Line Between, Havah: The Story of Eve, The Progeny, The Legend of Sheba, Iscariot, The Long March Home (with New York Times bestselling author Marcus Brotherton) and others. Her work has been translated into seventeen languages and been optioned for TV and film.

She is the recipient of three International Book Awards, Killer Nashville's Silver Falchion, ECPA Book of the Year, and the Nebraska Book Award, and has finaled for numerous others including the Library of Virginia People's Choice Award, the High Plains Book Award, a second Silver Falchion, a second ECPA Book of the Year, and the Christy. The Line Between was a Goodreads Choice Awards semifinalist for Best Mystery/Thriller of 2019.

You can find Tosca at ToscaLee.com, on social media, or hanging around the nearest snack table. To learn more, please visit ToscaLee.com

For book release news and giveaways, join Tosca Lee's Nocturnal Cafe.

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.0 stars. WELL IT HAD TO HAPPEN EVENTUALLY...I AM ABOUT TO GO ON MY FIRST GOODREADS RANT

This book PISSED me off...Now,before I go any further, I want to make a few things clear, not because I am overly concerned with being politically correct but because I don’t want my comments to be misconstrued or taken to mean one thing when I am trying to say another. Therefore, fellow readers, I would like the following statements entered into the record:

1. I AM NOT ANTI-CHRISTIAN. Anyone who knows me would know how silly it is for me to even have to make this statement. I was born and raised Roman Catholic, went to Catholic school my entire life and even went to the University of San Diego (which is an independent Catholic university) for both undergraduate and law school. Now, admittedly, I have been less than an active member of the Church, but certainly to not have any animosity or ill-feelings about my religious upbringing.

2. I AM NOT ANTI-CHRISTIAN FICTION. I think the marketplace has certainly shown that there is a desire for this genre and have no problem with it...EXCEPT AS SET FORTH BELOW IN FULL RANT MODE.

3. During the rest of my review, I request that anytime you begin to think that I am Anti-Christian or Anti-Christian fiction, you pause, take a deep breath and RE-READ STATEMENTS 1 AND 2 ABOVE.

Okay, now that I have gotten that out of the way so that the Vatican doesn’t declare this review the beginning of Ragnarok and try to speed my journey to the Elysian Fields or Viakuntha or, even (gulp) Avici (I like to mix and match my religious metaphors and thought you might have fun looking up the terms...and yes I had to google some of the above).

LET THE RANTING COMMENCE

RANT #1 in which Steve explains how the publisher swindled, snookered, conned, heisted $9.72 from me by not CLEARLY labeling this as Christian fiction.

Now, I know I could have spent some time researching the book and looking at all of the reviews, and I probably would have “gotten the idea” so caveat emptor certainly applies and I will accept the monetary smack on the back of the head. HOWEVER, that does not prevent me from speaking my peace about the practice of not clearly labeling books as Christian fiction.

Now, I have nothing against Christian fiction (I went ahead and said this again for those of you too lazy to stop and re-read Statement #2 above) and certainly have read a lot of books that have christian messages and themes in them that I liked (the Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis is a great example as I thought Perelandra was simply superb). That said, I DO NOT like Christian fiction whose sole reason for being is to be Christian fiction. Not putting it down, it just isn't my thing. When I start getting the “READER HEAR MY WORDS AS THIS IS THE PATH AND FAILURE TO FOLLOW SHALL PUT YOU AT IMMORTAL PERIL” vibe, I start to get cranky. When this goes on for almost 300 pages, my crankiness can blow through anger and end up in full-fledged, pot-boiling, white-knuckle “threatening to break the iPad” rage. Well this book did it...it sent me to 11 (thought a little Spinal Tap quote might ease the tension).

I will end this section with a example. Someone looking for a paranormal romance who sees and buys a book called “The Demon Inside Me” because it has a hot guy about to mount a hot girl (or vice versa) on the cover and then goes home and finds out the book is a Cyberpunk SF novel about “a self-aware AI who is engaged in battle with a new computer virus codenamed “demon” that has been uploaded into its matrix. Actually, that doesn’t sound like a bad book, but you get the picture.

RANT #2 in which Steve finally discusses the book itself and mentions the substantive parts of the book that really bothered him.

First, recap. See Statement #1 above. Okay, now despite spending my educational history in Catholic school, my own education and love of history and philosophy have created in me a natural need to question all assumptions and always keep an open mind. Thus, there are many things I will never be on the same page with the Catholic Church that I grew up with. My most glaring disagreement, and the one I get most heated about, is my absolute unwillingness to accept that only by believing certain things or following certain guidelines can someone be saved. Sorry, can't buy it.

Well, let’s talk a little about this book and some of the nifty little things it has to say. The book is basically another version of Interview With the Vampire except with Demon as the interviewee. Through a series of interviews, the Demon (named Lucian) recounts the creation of the universe, the Fall of Lucifer, the creation of Man, the story of Job, the Flood and the life and death of Jesus.

Well, despite the thick, heavy preaching that goes on through the telling of the story, the most significant point that I came away with is that according to the story, God is unforgiving, spiteful and more than a little sadistic. Basically, according to the author, God creates the angels with Lucifer the best among them. Led my Lucifer (in a somewhat interesting version of the Fall), about a third of them make ONE MISTAKE (just one mind you) and they are banished from God’s sight forever with no hope of redemption or forgiveness. Sounds a bit harsh to me, but it gets worse. God then creates man and “blesses” him. God then proceeds to allow man to do whatever he wants and no matter what will always forgive him. Remember, the fallen angels made one mistake and they are toast forever. WTF.

All I could think of while reading this was the example of the man who divorces his first wife and kids and gets married again and has children with his new wife and then pretends his first kids don’t exist and won’t give them the time of day. We call this person a SCUMBAG and that is exactly how the author portrays God’s treatment of the fallen angels. BUT it gets worse. Not only does he not give the time of day to his first kids (the fallen angels) but he actually goes out of his way to let them see how much he loves and adores his new kids. I don’t care that I am one of those new kids, that is just sadistic and yet this is the image if God the author portrays in the book.

Anyway, God continues to ignore and shun his first kids while putting his new kids through college, buying them all new cars and sending them to Europe for graduation. And guess what happens? Lo and behold, the first kids get very hurt and then they get jealous and angry at the new kids (wow, what a shocker) and decide to spend there time in an organized campaign to hurt the new kids and damage their relationship with Dad.

So, to sum it up, demons tempt us into sin because God was a pretty crappy dad to them and abandoned them after one mistake and then created us who he spoils rotten and rubs our good fortune in the demons faces. Not sure this is the exact message that the author was shooting for but it is certainly what he wrote. In the end, the only thing the author managed to accomplish is to make me feel “sympathy for the devil” (couldn’t think of a better way to end this rant than with a Rolling Stones reference).

THANKS FOR LISTENING AND LETTING ME GET THIS OFF MY CHEST.

[Laura Baugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this book quite prepared to hate it.

I had good reason. After all, it may be true that 90% of a genre is crud (Sturgeon's Law), but it is also true that in religious fiction, it's at least 99% that is crud. After all, this is a genre in which the memo about the medium being the message was wholly missed, where inferior art is justified in the name of Meaning. Personally, I regard that attitude as horrifically insulting to not only the reader but also the Author of all things, but that's another epigraph entirely. Meanwhile, at least you know why I approached Demon: A Memoir with skepticism.

I was very pleasantly surprised. In fact, not only did I want to continue the book, I found myself staying up way past bedtime, using the light of my PDA to read under the covers without waking my husband.

First, author Tosca Lee created a much more accessible protagonist for us, one who is struggling with all the typical modern-day literary baggage -- recent divorce, failed dream, worries over meaning, significance, general post-modernism malaise -- but is well apart from the nearly-perfect-but-for-the-necessary-flaw-of-doubt paper dolls often found in religious fiction. In fact, Clay does not even know at the start that he is doubting. There's nothing to doubt in his very distant obligatory middle-class Sunday School lessons, because they were never real anyway. He doesn't own a Bible -- and we're not even told that, it's just taken for granted. Subtle reality rather than preachy showmanship.

Then the story begins, and we get a tantalizing view of "the other side." Not beyond death -- the demon Lucian is certainly not dead, nor knows anything more of death than a human -- but a view into damnation. A history of the world -- the universe -- all creation, before time until now, in the eyes of one who was not only there, but watched it all with a far different mind. It treads along the tale of the anti-hero but stays clear of falling into that predictable trap; even an honest demon is not to be trusted. Even a demon who insists upon a human hearing pure truth is not one who harbors anything but unadulterated hatred. And slowly, we learn why.

Without trying to be flashy or melodramatic, the story shows an inverted view of God, of history, of religion in general. (I loved the scene where the disguised demon politely surrendered his seat to a pair of nuns.) Lee leaves aside thousands of years of titillating demon lore.

"I thought Lucifer was God's nemesis."
"Clay, for this to work, you have to let go of that. This is not your so-called classic human tale of the struggle between good and evil...."

Once, Clay and Lucian meet in a church.
"The crosses don't bother you?"
"They should bother you a great deal more. They were used to kill humans."
I had not thought of that.

A couple of times the story veered toward predictable -- frightening me with the appearance of the obligatory Christian guide -- but then steered firmly away from abusing the reader with cheap solutions. I found myself hoping that the end of the book didn't fail, that it did not dissolve into lumpy saccharine crystals of neat, politically- and religiously-correct resolution. It doesn't. I would prefer a bit more substance to the revelation of Lucian's motive, but if that's my biggest complaint with this book, it has succeeded.

I don't often give 5 stars, and in truth I'd probably award Demon: A Memoir a 4.5 if I could. But simply because it succeeds in a field of failures, it gets the extra half-star.

[Yin Chien · Rating 4 out of 5]

Demon: A Memoir is told from an interesting perspective, and I really liked how Tosca weaves everything together with her beautifully-crafted words. The concept, main theme and synopsis of the story sounds brilliant. I found it interesting sometimes, but the other times, I found it a little confusing.

I liked how Tosca portrayed the demon's hatred towards humans. It was clear that Lucian was jealous because God loved the humans, who were newly-created but imperfect, more than his kind. When Lucian first warned Clay: "the story is really about you.", I was intrigued. However, it appeared several times throughout the novel and seemed to have become a cliché. I really enjoyed reading the middle part of the novel, because that's where the "real content" is.

After reading this book, I obtained a better understanding about the happenings in the Bible, such as the creation of mankind and the garden Eden, God's reaction to man's first sin and Jesus' sacrifice. I realized that God is forgiving and is always offering a second chance. He still loves us even though we had sinned and sometimes betrayed Him. His love for us is immense and unmeasurable.

"But even the forbearance of El in his grief had limits," he said. "And there came the day that he could abide it no longer. Of course, I expected him to slam down the heavy fist, but the day came, and still he held off. Like a mother giving a child to the count of three, El gave the clay people one hundred and twenty years to change their ways."

And as for Satan, he will do anything to further the distance between God and humans. So, it is up to us to choose whether we want to be on God's side or give in to Satan's lure.

Overall, Demon: A Memoir was an enjoyable read. This novel shows us the limitless extent of God's love and the weaknesses in humans. It is a thought-provoking novel which I'm sure Christian readers would love to read.

[Christine Indorf]

The story of the Lucian, a demon who wants his memoir wrote. The man he picks is down on his luck. Newly divorced and depressed he decides to write it. Throughout the journey he learns of the history of God and his creations and why Lucian fell with Satan and if it was it. This is a reread for me and it went a lot better the 2nd time around, but still I would give it a 3.5 star rating. Not Tosca Lee best but the book more interesting this go around. I liked Lucian changed appearance everytime he is encountered. If you are into spiritual books then I would recommend it!

[J.S. Bailey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Author Tosca Lee's novel Demon: A Memoir tells the story of Clay, a recently-divorced editor who has become disillusioned with his job and life in general. One evening when he arrives at a cafe for dinner, a stranger greets him by name and welcomes him to join him at his table. In fact, this stranger seems to know more about Clay than Clay himself does:

"I know you're searching, Clay. I know you're wondering what these late, dark nights are for. You have that seasonal disease, that modern ailment, don't you? SAD, they call it. But it isn't the disorder--you should know that. It isn't even your divorce. That's not what's bothering you. Not really." (page 4)

The stranger introduces himself as Lucian. Lucian is a demon. He wants to tell Clay his story, because it is "very closely connected" to Clay's. Clay is instructed to write down everything that Lucian tells him.

Over the course of several months and various encounters in which Lucian appears in different human forms (sometimes male, sometimes female), Clay learns the story of the demons' fall from glory and how they have sought revenge on God ever since by corrupting God's favored people: human beings. The demons despise all humans because they sin constantly but God still forgives them, despite the fact that the demons were eternally damned after making a single mistake. However, Clay still cannot see how the story connects with his own life, even though it is quite obvious to the reader. He is essentially blind, and that blindness just may seal his fate in the end.

One thing I enjoyed about reading this book is the beauty of Ms. Lee's prose. Her style flows easily and creates some vivid imagery that I found moving:

"But here was the most terrible thing: El went down to Eden and laid himself out over the waters, there to brood in trembling sorrow. And it infused me, this sorrow. It saturated my being. Beside me, seraphim huddled with long faces. Some of them wept. I had never seen such tears before--dark, remorseful, bereft of joy. There was only sadness and dread, that terrible sense that had I been a god, I would have set it all back. I would have erased everything, returned it all to the way it had been."

"Why couldn't you?" I said. "For that matter, why couldn't God?"

The kid gave a jolt of laughter that sounded slightly hysterical, and then his lips curled back from his teeth, and spittle flew out with his words. "I'll tell you why: Because we were damned! Oh, not that I knew it then--how could I? There was no precedent for any of it. Wrong had never existed. Lucifer had to manufacture that first aberration himself. Until then, there had been one law dictated by the sole fact of our creation: Worship the creator. And now, as surely as Lucifer's throne had broken into a thousand splinters, we had violated that order." (page 57)

As much as one may feel sorry for the demons, Ms. Lee does not diminish the fact of their true nature: they are evil. And through the grace of God, we humans have the opportunity for the redemption to which the demons have been denied.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've often said I'm a sucker for occult fiction. After reading Tosca Lee's Demon, I feel emphasis being placed on sucker. It's all in the wording: at its heart, this book is religious fiction. Those who want their faith reinforced in a book will be pleased with Demon - as well as for its lack of, say, violence/action and language. But anyone with more than a baseline knowledge of the biblically occult or any expectation of a story greater than a simple moral tale will be underwhelmed. There are books deemed "popcorn literature": novels that are light and quick, not necessarily filling but fun to ingest. I hesitate to group Demon in with them. At least popcorn has some flavor.

If you're a member of its target audience - the modern Christian with not much grasp on their own religion - Demon can be entertaining in that it does delve into the "history" of the angelic fall and the demonic realm (which most Christians tend to be less than versed in on principle). You'll get a cozy kickback that you're doing the right thing by listening to your Amy Grant cds and going to your weekly prayer group, a light reminder of "Say, God dying for your sins is kind of a big deal", and the bizarre confirmation that, yes, demons really are hiding your keys to make you frustrated. What you're not going to get is a particularly complex work.

There's not a lot of depth to this novel. The narrator, Clay (a name that tries to make itself into a clever play-on-words and winds up being an overdone pun that wasn't funny the first time), is not notably endearing and seems to miss the whole point of his own novel. Lucian, the demon, is strangely well-behaved: he's not necessarily the done-and-done gentleman devil, but don't anticipate him doing anything outright demonic. Even at his worst moment, he barely does anything "bad" - he doesn't even curse. The phrasing in Demon becomes redundant after a while, and due to its lack of action and elaboration, it's a quick read. Here's a story that wants to be deep, dark and disturbing, but it comes across like a childhood monster crawling out of the closet to hand you a nightlight for your own convenience.

If you want to enjoy Demon, you need to be in the target audience and not know much about the subject you're reading. Otherwise, leave this novel in the Inspirational section and walk over to General Fiction for something more than dry popcorn.

[Megan McCullough · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most well written, deep books I have ever read.

I started reading this on the plane back from Realm Makers. I started crying right there on the plane. This book has SO MANY FEELS. (The poor man next to me on the plane...)

The character development is amazing. Right off the bat, I am in Clay's head. Throughout the story we witness and feel his downward spiral into (spoiler inserted here). Lucian is developed as well. I haven't thought about spiritual warfare very much, but I certainly do after reading this. I never thought about why demons are evil. (I mean, I know why they are evil, but what are their motives? Why did they never turn back to God?)

The setting, though not really a major plot element, really came alive during this story. I got a feel for the surroundings, but in a natural way that really made the story come alive. It seemed to almost play a character in the story, if that makes sense.

Overall, I highly recommend this to older teens and adults. It's a pretty heavy book and does deal with some mature elements like adultery, death (if you think this book isn't going to involve death, you are DEAD WRONG) and spiritual warfare.

Disclaimer: Since this is Biblical fiction, please read using your own discernment. Tosca Lee provides a note at the back of the book on the Biblical elements and things like that.

[David Alderman · Rating 5 out of 5]

For me, it’s hard to find compelling Christian fiction that can hold my interest. I became a fan of Tosca Lee when I met her about a year ago at a writer’s meeting and purchased a copy of Havah: The Story of Eve. Havah opened my eyes to how beautifully Christian fiction could be written without coming off preachy. In the same lines of Ted Dekker, Tosca knows how to write compelling fiction that everyone will enjoy reading, filled with themes of redemption and of good overcoming evil.

After purchasing Havah, Tosca Lee contacted me and told me she wanted to send me a copy of Demon: A Memoir, her other piece of Christian fiction. It took me about a year to get to it in my mountain of books to read...

…But boy was it worth it.

Demon: A Memoir follows Clay, a down and out editor at a small press who is approached by a demon named Lucian. Lucian tells Clay that he wants the man to listen to his story and write it all down because his story is Clay’s story. Clay has no clue what this even means and doesn’t really want anything to do with the demon at first, but he slowly becomes compelled to chronicle the story of Satan’s fall from Heaven and grace, and Lucian’s part in things.

If Tosca knows how to do one thing well, it’s write speculative fiction in regards to Biblical history or spiritual elements. She does this well in writing Demon, especially with the way she chronicles the familiar story of how pride caused Satan to rebel and take a third of Heaven’s elite with him. As with Havah, Tosca Lee’s poetic writing style is weaved through the book, giving beautiful prose to a wholly entertaining adventure.

This story kept me captivated until the very end and I happily give it five stars and recommend it to anyone, regardless if you read spiritual fiction or not.

[Jerry (Rebel With a Massive Media Library) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Much like her contemporary Ted Dekker, Tosca Lee's book is edgy and a challenge to our faith. It brings life to the oft-quoted James 2:19: "You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that--and shudder." (NIV) Fans of Dekker or similar authors, such as Frank Peretti or Bill Myers, should check this one out; it's a rough one, but it's worth it!

[Lisa Rathbun · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the author's style, but I found the plot itself uncompelling. It felt to me like it was supposed to be moving, but I was unmoved, or that insightful comments were being made but I was left uninspired. For one thing, I never like books (or plays) about people writing a book or putting on a play. It just becomes too self-conscious. *POSSIBLE SPOILER* Near the end, Clay realizes about his wife that "I had surely let her down as much as she had betrayed and abandoned me. I was a good man, but I was no better than she." Thing is though, I didn't see anything that made his coming to that conclusion convincing. I never understood why Lucien told the story; in a way, isn't he becoming a witness for God by waking Clay up to the spiritual realm? Lucien paints a vivid picture of the fall, but his angry insistence that God isn't fair to judge fallen angels without mercy but extend mercy to humans isn't really answered; Lucien makes the accusation and we're never given a satisfactory explanation. Near the end a couple characters are mentioned (like a Nathan Siles) that I didn't even recall from earlier in the story; it was probably my fault for stretching this book out for over a week, but it was annoying that this was supposed to give Clay insight about something but I couldn't even remember who it was.

It IS better written than a lot of Christian books, but it just wasn't for me.

[Xdpaul · Rating 5 out of 5]

As you know, I don't rank works of literature, however, I can name only about a score of major modern* works that really matter: Beowulf, Don Quixote, Dante's Divine Comedy, Hamlet and Henry V, Canterbury Tales if you must. In the 20th Century, I've read a few great tales - The Wasteland, the Lord of the Rings, Perelandra, The Great Divorce, The Violent Bear it Away, Ficciones, the Name of the Rose, and The Secret History.

So, there you have it. This reader's noted great works first saw print, with the exception of Tart and Eco, well before my birth. Because it has been 15 years or so since the last straggler (Donna Tart's The Secret History) made it through the arch, I had lulled myself into thinking that my personal canon of great works was closed.

I am an idiot.

One of the greatest perils of postmodern thought is postmodern ideology, which carries an inherent risk: the risk that qualities such as good and bad, important and irrelevant, will be drained of meaning. Eventually, only the "personal" matters, and, eventually, not even that. I must have fallen in line with this quiet assumption at some point, because otherwise I cannot explain the shock I experienced when Demon: A Memoir appeared in my mailbox through what I can only describe as a series of unusual circumstances.

Let me get to the point: Tosca Lee's Demon: A Memoir is great literature, and being such, will very likely be misunderstood (at best) or overlooked (at worst) for another 30 years or so.

Me and the followers of the only way worship the Word, so it has always baffled me as to why we are, generally, so incapable of writing well. Eliot, L'Engle, O'Connor and Lewis are, of course, among many examples to the contrary, but there is a lot of Christian literature that can't even get the prose right, much less the theme. Demon: A Memoir is a new exception to that general tendency.

The plot structure is that of an architect's, the characters are vivid, the writing expresses clarity, wit, realism and logophilia. The book has three extraordinary characters that I'll be able to name on my deathbed. The climax is taut and spectacular. If Tosca Lee ripped out her own heart, I think words would come pouring from the wound.

This is a brave book - one that very humbly ventures into darkness with a candle.

Let me bypass a synopsis in favor of persuasion. I'll give you three reasons to pick this book up through a scene, an artifice, and an element of pathos:

A scene: The recently divorced protagonist, Clayton, is approached by, and drawn to, a beautiful woman in a bookstore. Lee masterfully negotiates a vulnerable man's complex lusts without ever once relying on cultural myths of manhood. Clay's emotions towards her come from a good place, a desire for the comforts and companionship of a wife, and quickly distort into more complex, and less pure desires.

An artifice: I love mis en abyme, when done well. The play-within-a-play in Hamlet, the book-within-a-book in The Name of the Rose, the poet-within-a-poem of Eliot, are all flawlessly executed. I'm a sucker for them, but I also know that they can be a trap, tempting the author to pull the trick once too often (a fate that befell the great artiste of our generation, Michael Jackson, when he turned the spectacular Thriller into a movie within a dream, or vice versa, or something.) The 70s film They Might Be Giants was brilliant mis en a byme, but had to bail on the ending to avoid the myriad traps that the story-within-a-story structure. Demon: A Memoir, shamelessly goes for mis en abyme, and delivers. In spades.

Demon not only is a story-within-a-story-within-a-story, but it is also a Truth-Within-the-Lie-Within-the-Truth story. Not only that, but it makes subtle reference to the conceit with overt references to John Gardner's Grendel and even, of all things, Sesame Street's infamous "Monster at the End of This Book."


The pathos: I know demons. I've seen their handiwork (so have you). Even as a weak and vain bridge-troll, I know my charge: to wrestle against principalities and powers, spiritual wickedness in high places, and the rulers of darkness. Somehow, like the unconsolable wailing of Esau over the unfairness of the loss of his birthright to his deceptive younger brother Jacob, the demon Lucian, with craft, earnestness and emotion, quickly earns my sympathy with his account of the Cosmic Disaster, even though I know that he too abandoned his own birthright for even less than a trifle.

Lee must be crazy or brilliant to try to pull this off. Just because it works flawlessly doesn't mean she isn't crazy. Van Gogh cut his own ear off, you know.


Are you getting the impression that I liked the book yet? Go buy it, already, for God's sake. And yours, too.

Post Scriptum - I have noticed two somewhat prevalent comparisons among commentators that don't quite jive with me.

There are a few references in other places to the work as being derivative of Anne Rice's Interview with A Vampire, but this is error. Lee's novel displays an episodic structure that has greater kinship with Stoker's Dracula, and though the villain is certainly sympathetic, he is no less a villain. Why do people think Demon is like Interview? Uhm, I guess because it has an interview in it, I don't really know. Trust me, Demon has a far greater sense of creeping dread, malevolence and power than Rice's Lestat-as-Superman saga (Don't get me wrong, IwaV is a good book, but isn't similar to Demon in any important or thematic way). I guess by this logic, Les Miserables is derivative of The Music Man, because, uh, they're both plays.

Also, Screwtape Letters. C.S. Lewis' demonic parody is delightful and full of insight and encouragement. Demon: A Memoir aims at a much different target. Lucian has much more in common with one of my favorite figures in literature, Lewis's Professor Weston in Perelandra, than he does with the master's more famous work about the corporate inner workings of hell.

A better book to compare Demon: A Memoir to is Stoker's Dracula. The full story emerges through obfuscation and deceptive trails, through a variety of voices and media (where Stoker utilized telegrams and letters, Lee takes advantage of text messages, calendar reminders, e-mail, cell phones) and centers around an evil that takes most of the book to fully appear. Although Lee is a better writer than Stoker, both Demon and Dracula share the same attention to layering.

Post Post Scriptum - If none of this has encouraged you to pick up Demon: A Memoir, here's one last-ditch effort: if you liked Lois Lowry's The Giver, Rice's The Vampire Lestat, the aforementioned The Great Divorce or Perelandra, King's The Eyes of the Dragon (or, for different reasons, The Shining), Borges' The Library of Babel, Robert E. Howard's Solomon Kane stories, Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress, Dante's Inferno or Poe's Fall of the House of Usher, you are probably going to enjoy Tosca Lee's debut novel.

*You do recall my somewhat broad definition of "modern" don't you? Everything following 601 and the baptism of King Aethelbert. The brief thousand-year-or-so period before that is the Classical, and before that, the Ancient. Suck it up if you don't like it. Keep things simple, I say.

[Tiffany · Rating 4 out of 5]

stumbled upon this book while browsing in a bookstore and downloaded it to my Kindle the same day. I enjoyed this from the very first page all the way to the end.

Clay is a divorced editor in Boston who is still struggling with the reasons behind his divorce and its aftermath. On a rainy evening, he meets Lucian, a demon who is determined to tell his story and have it published. Lucian continues to appear to Clay as different human characters until his story is told. As a Christian who has studied the applicable scriptures previously, I must admit that some parts of the story seemed repetitious. However, Lee's storytelling is amazing and there are some parts (e.g. when Lucifer and his followers fall from Heaven) where I felt like I was there with Lucian and the emotion was palpable.

I agree with other reviewers who have said that Lee tells a Christian story without standing on a soapbox or beat readers over the head with a religious stick. The gospel is definitely there, but it is delivered in a beautiful, well written story that you will think about long after the book has ended.

[Linda Yezak · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm sorry the rating system goes only to five stars. This novel is far superior to any other I've given five stars to. Not only is it vividly, compellingly written, it's also stunningly feasible. "Thought-provoking" doesn't begin to cover it.

The story, at its most stripped-down, basic plot, is about a demon who takes on various human forms and appears at different times to tell his story to an editor at a publishing house. And it's about the man to whom he tells his story.

But that's not doing the novel justice. The story is about the creation, the fall, the history of mankind, the salvation offered through God's only Son. It's about the battle of principalities and powers, and hatred and love. It's about God's enduring, unfaltering love for us.

And, just as Lucian tells Clay the story is about him, ultimately it's about you. You and the decision you must make concerning your eternity.

[Brainycat · Rating 2 out of 5]

Brainycat's 5 "B"s:
blood: 0
boobs: 0
bombs: 0
bondage: 0
blasphemy: 1
Bechdel Test: FAIL
Deggan's Rule: FAIL
Gay Bechdel Test: FAIL

I'm not a christian. I'm not a big fan of organized religions at all, and I harbor more than a little scorn for all the variations of abrahamaic religions. Obviously I started this book with the expectation that I wouldn't like it, but I wanted to try something different just for the visceral reaction. I'm so jaded on horror and gore these days, I figured a treatise on the nature of divinity and the christian god's role towards humanity would get the ol' ticker racing in self-righteous indignation.

That didn't happen. What I found was Interview with a Fallen Cherubim. Following nearly the same formula as Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire, (Anne is even mentioned by name early in the book) the book is a narration of cherry-picked interpretations of parts the judo-christian tradition as a metaphor for a human writer who gets involved in a plot much older and bigger than he thinks it is and learns to think of himself as a small piece of a bigger puzzle by the end of the story. Just to put the tone of this book into perspective, our human narrator is named Clay - and Lucien (formerly of Elohim's heavenly host and lately of Lucifer's fallen legion) never passes up a chance to refer to humans as "mud people" in reference to Elohim's creation of the first person. The author set some very ambitious goals for this book, and while I don't think they were all achieved, she gives most them a good run for the money.

This book could have easily slipped down the long and steep slope into shrill proselytization, and while I think the author presented a disappointingly limited argument for her position, she did not sound preachy. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of theologians from judaism, christianity and islam all making comfortable livings out of interpreting the surviving texts of their religions. This book (thankfully) doesn't try to repeat all their work nor (disappointingly) reframe the connotations around "soul", "choice", "goodness", "evil" or "redemption". Our narrator, staged as a contemporary everyman who vaguely believes in the christian mythos simply because he never bothered to put any critical thought into his upbringing goes through the typical crisis-of-faith, is tested a la Job, goes through his "oh poor me" phase and comes out on the other side full of compassion and acceptance. Yeah, I couldn't have seen that coming either <*snerk*>.

I think Lucien was portrayed with a depth and sensitivity I did not expect from a christian author who is so forthright in her aims for the book, and that effort deserves applause. Unfortunately, while great pains are taken to explain the angelic experience as being entirely beyond humanities experience of space and time, Lucien's motivations are entirely human and petty. The anthropomorphication of the demon was so painfully obvious throughout the book that the attempts to show Clay freaking out when his worldview unravels seemed forced and unrealistic. Lucien's folk look upon humans the way humans look at mice - interesting, fragile, tiny creatures with tiny little lives spent running around in tiny little mazes and making even tinier babies. I never felt like Clay (and by extension myself) were scaled to mouse size next to Lucien. Lucifer and Lucien's motivations for interfering with humans since the first day in Eden were so pedestrian I couldn't take him seriously. As mighty as the host and legion are purported to be, I was expecting some deeper motivations to be explored - especially around the nature of time, space and free will.

I tried a few edits of this review to slide this observation in, but I'm not able to do so gracefully. So here's a whole new paragraph that covers my biggest problem with this book. While Lucien is able to recall the history of his kind, before during and after the fall, through the creation of mankind and the birth of the christian messiah and on towards contemporary times, the little incident between Gabriel and Muhammad during the seventh century CE never came up. This glaring omission from the history of the abrahamaic tradition completely ruined the book for me as any kind of thoughtful tract. There were two specific places I thought Muhammad was especially relevant, but I guess the author doesn't consider the koran to be important enough to bring into her world. Even when it would be entirely appropriate and the omission is glaring.

There's a minor subplot around Lucien and Clay being stalked by agents of both the heavenly host and the infernal legions, but that part of the plot never fully realized itself and nothing came of it. One wonders if those are the remnants left from a major culling of a whole layer of the book, or if those were artificially introduced to create more words that weren't specifically Lucien trying to explain something to Clay. Either way, I felt it didn't add to any part of the book that I was interested in. If, however, that subplot had been expanded, it could have elevated my rating from "ho-hum" to "exciting".

Make no mistake, this is not a "horror" book. This is contemporary christian fiction. If you're looking for a story about demons walking around in present-day Boston and wrecking havoc until someone comes along to save the day by banishing them back to hell you'll want to avoid this. It is, however, a better-than-most story of redemption and salvation, thoroughly wrapped inside late 20th century christian tropes. There are no points of view or ideas about humans and our role in the world that haven't been covered in detail in a million other stories, but the vocabulary, pacing and cadence are excellent and it did put me in a position to exercise my critical-thinking brain muscle.

Please note: I don't review to provide synopses, I review to share a purely visceral reaction to books and perhaps answer some of the questions I ask when I'm contemplating investing time and money into a book.

[LadyCalico · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disturbing, unsettling--loved this book of Spiritual Warfare coming to a very vulnerable lost soul in Boston. It was not only a great work of Christian Fiction, but a great work of fiction. It also skipped the cheesy perfect Christian Romance that have become de rigueur in the lamer Christian Fiction. Second, it contained much psychological drama with such realistic characters that I found myself feeling Clay's declining health and rising anxiety to the point I was becoming a wreck over the piles of paperwork growing on his desk! Pull yourself together, Man! Like the childrens' book it references, there is a sense of something terrible lurking with the turning of every page. I even felt empathy for the demon and the malignant erosion that time and alienation from God can do to anyone, even an angel, and wished he'd have made a better choice or could have a re-do. Third, I loved the gradual unfolding of the relationship between God and man as told through a demon's eyewitness, which required that the author simultaneously know her scripture yet think like a demon. Fourth I was troubled by the ending, but I felt it was the perfect way to end this story--after all, the need for an ending became the crux of the story, and really, what would be gained, except a cop-out, if the author and her demon took it easy on us. Such a dreadfully foolish error to seek salvation in anything other than The Savior, yet it is the mistake so many otherwise intelligent people make. Fifth, there are a lot of other great things I could say, but this is getting ridiculously long. Above all, I hope there is some fence-sitting reader out there who after reading this novel will also make the decision for him/herself that we are left hoping that Clay will make.

[Steven · Rating 3 out of 5]

Now here's an unexpected read from the Christian bookstore. Gotta love that title!

I enjoyed the story--good characters, an interesting story, an enigmatic ending.

But the best writing is the insight Lee provides as the demon tells his tale of watching the various acts of God ("El") throughout history. The fallen angel's description of creation is particularly moving. In fact, it is worth the price of the book. This is a story Christians know well. Too well, in fact. Creation, seven days, yada yada yada. Like so many Bible stories, it is easy to lose the sense of awe over the works of God. And that is a terrible loss.

Lee is able read such stories with imagination and a fresh eye, and her writing breathes new life into what for many have become dusty old tales. The demon here reports on being amazed by creation, amazed--even though he already knew much of the majesty of God--by creation, by life, by God's creativity. He talks about the wonder he felt at watching animals eat. Demons never eat. He was amazed at the ability of plants and animals to reproduce themselves--to create new life, as it were. Angels and demons can't do that. And then there's the Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection--the demon was amazed by each of these as well, and his reporting of them is worth the read, if only for the fresh and imaginative way Lee handles each.

I recommend this book not so much for the story it tells--about a demon who approaches a talented would-be author with a story he wants to publish (though that story is good too)--but for the story WITHIN the story. What an excellent re-telling of some of Christianity's, of History's, greatest moments.

[JL Torres · Rating 3 out of 5]

Demon: A Memoir by Tosca Lee is a well-paced supernatural thriller about a recently divorced editor stalked by a demon who wanted his story published. I find the premise quite interesting, so I was eager to start reading this after hearing about it from a friend. The story was contained and suspenseful enough that I was able to finish it quickly. Unfortunately, I was a bit disappointed in the end.

I just gave it 2.5 stars because of the following reasons: the story of Lucian at times feels like a veiled endorsement of creationism, the literariness of its interpretation of scriptures and subtle moralizing can be a bit off-putting to some modern readers. I cringe at some of its theological underpinnings (i.e. religions other than Christianity are the handiwork of fallen angels?!). I failed to sympathize with the protagonist and his struggles, I find him pathetic and ignorant, and most of the time, he acts like a 2 dimensional sounding board for Lucian to tell his story. Lucian himself failed to impress and awe since, to me, he sounds more like a modern scholar with mood issues than an aeons-old spiritual being filled with twisted wisdom and rage.

It was a good enough book to pass the time, but I’ve read other similarly themed books that are better: Anne Rice's Memnoch the Devil offers a more radical and challenging view of the fallen and CS Lewis' The Screwtape Letters contains more potent spiritual insights.

[Nay Denise · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a strong 4.5 star rating for me. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing and the world of this story. I think both Clay and Lucian are such strong, dynamic characters. Tosca's writing has blown my mind from her last three novels, so I went into this with high expectations and she delivered!

The only reason why this isn't a solid is because I wanted a bit more with the ending. It was nice, but I was expecting something drastic for some odd reason.

This was drama filled, had some in-depth moments on creation and scripture and also gave me vibes of The Screwtape Letters; which I loved.

Lucian's view of humans and how he expressed himself to Clay was absolutely intriguing to me. I felt like I learned a lot and got an even more personal understanding of God's love and forgiveness. I learned to be more grateful to be alive in this world.

Such an impeccable read and I highly recommend it.

[Angela Breidenbach · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite books of all time because it speaks to the human condition. The plot twist at the end is brilliant and stuck with me years after I read this book. I still talk about it.

My take away from reading Demon: A Memoir is that though my life is busy, I want the "busy" to be part of the plan God has for my life and not the crazy circles of the rat race around me.

I enjoyed the main character, Clay, and how he constantly is faced with a variety of personas the fallen angel takes on to pester him through his daily life. Sometimes the personas become humorous, sometimes serious, but always interrupting Clay's plans. This is a very creative story, well written, clever concept. Kept me fully engaged. I loved that Tosca Lee was able to give the fallen angel a sympathetic personality as a character. Brilliantly done!

[Debbie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first book I have read from this author. And it will not be my last.
As a Roman Catholic, I went to school all the way through college in Catholic schools, so I am fairly versed on the bible and its stories.

I loved the twist to this story. And I finished this book weeks ago and am still thinking about it. That is a sign of a great book.

Clayton works for a publishing house and gets to spend his day reading manuscripts for future best sellers (my dream job!!). One day he meets Lucian (who is a fallen angel) and insists that Clayton create his memoir and publish his (and Lucifer's) story.

To kind of summarize the Point of View, Lucien goes on rants (showing up in different people but the same person inside) telling Clayton how pissed off he is that God LOVES Humans and won't forgive the fallen angels.

He tells the story of how the angels fell from grace. It was an 'honest mistake'. (HAHA). Then he complains about all the times God forgives Man, from Adam and Eve, to the flood, to even sending his own Son down to forgive the sins of Man. And he can't forgive the fallen angels???? Really???

Clayton also has just gotten a divorce. His wife left him for someone else. He is devastated and obsessed with why she would do this and how could she do this to him.

You will see the similarities in his story and Lucien's story. It was mind blowing how the author made these parallels.

I loved it.
NOTE: There are many who will not like it ... but if you want to hear a story from Lucien's perspective, this is a must read.

[Joy Tiff · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m torn about how I feel about this book. I was uncomfortable (maybe unsettled?) in the beginning of the book, listening to this demon recount his “life” before creation, during creation, through the fall, etc… I wasn’t sure if the idea was to sympathize with him? As the story progressed, I knew I couldn’t (and shouldn’t). The message in the end was more clear and one that leaves a mark, but I’m still not sure how to feel about the book as a whole… and so my star rating lands in the middle. I didn’t hate it, but didn’t love it.

[Emiliano · Rating 3 out of 5]

“I'm going to tell you everything.” He leaned toward me, so close I could see the tiny furrows around the corners of his mouth, the creases beneath his narrowed eyes. A strange glow emanated from the edge of his irises like the halo of a solar eclipse. “I’m going to tell you my story. I’ve great hope for you, in whom I will create the repository of my tale—my memoir, if you will. I believe it will be of great interest to you. And you’re going to write it down and publish it.”

[Krisi Keley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Clay, a divorced editor whose life has become meaningless to him, thinks he has found purpose again when he becomes obsessed with the story of Lucian, a demon who tells the writer he must record the story of his fall with the other angels who followed Lucifer.

When I first started this novel and a good portion of the way through it, I was sure it was going to be one of my favorites because I found the premise fascinating, the writing beautiful and the character development and dialogue excellent. The slow reveal that the almost innocuous, often seemingly charming and human-like Lucian in fact despises humans made it a chilling, atmospheric read as well. The problem came in for me when the demon at last began to explain why he and all the other fallen angels hate human beings so profoundly. The difficulty is that to really examine the motivation of those angels who turned from God, it is necessary to have a very well-developed theology backing the speculation, even if not posited point by point in the story, and an understanding of where a too simplified explanation will lead. To give only a slightly more developed version of the “Lucifer fell because of ‘pride’ or because he wanted to supplant God, dragging a bunch of angels with him,” story runs the risk of making God look bad and, in this story, to my way of thinking anyway, that’s exactly what happened, despite any and every other good Christian message the novel tried to impart. To give an even more simplified summation of the story’s simple premise: this is that Lucifer, taken with his own celestial beauty and magnificence decided that he ought to be the true god, and so he and all those angels who so much as looked at him for a moment and saw his beauty above and beyond God’s were cast out of Heaven, forever damned and never able to be forgiven. In the meantime, human beings, tricked into sin by Lucifer so he can bring them down to his level, commit sin after sin, repeatedly turning away from the glory of God, just as those fallen angels did, but nevertheless, as God’s new favorites, they can be forgiven everything, even to the point of God becoming one of them and sacrificing Himself for their redemption.

While, on the surface, this seems like a slightly more developed version of the Christian story, expanded from a few Biblical passages and Milton’s Paradise Lost, in the end this doesn’t really help the Christian, or non-Christian for that matter, to get a sense of just how intertwined the fall of Lucifer (Satan) with the fall of man nor does it give a sense of how serious the fall of angels, the real why of it or its impact on creation, because to follow the premise through to its logical conclusion actually just makes God incomprehensible. Instead of exalting God’s goodness, love and mercy towards humans as the story wants to do and does in other ways, the underlying explanation of the fall instead makes God look fickle in His affections, impossible to understand in His motivations and arbitrary in His justice and mercy. To say that God is Love and that all creation is emanated from this Love itself, but go on to postulate that angels (who are no more infallible than humans, however closer to the divine power, since they are not God either) would render themselves unforgivable to the all-forgiving Creator for one split second of weakness while human beings, despite continual grace and revelation, can’t seem to commit a sin horrific enough to turn God’s love from them, can’t really shed much clarity on the Christian understanding of divinity’s relationship to celestial beings, why some angels turned from their Creator and what this means for human beings.

I realize that this review may seem overly picky and critical for those who are just looking for solid Christian messages about sin, redemption, obsession and weakness and who would say the story’s only fiction anyway, and about things we can’t really know to boot. And I do realize that it’s extremely challenging to get across deeper theology in a speculative fiction novel. I definitely appreciate the difficulty for any author in that regard and think there were many excellent things about this story. It’s even possible Lucian’s explanation of the fall of angels was supposed to be symbolic of a greater turning away from God that wasn’t explained, but without the full explanation, the demons in this story don’t come across so much as evil as they do hurt and abandoned children, ones who deserve more pity than fear, and they wind up actually easier to understand than God is. As someone who studied theology with the goal of working as a theologian, I admit that the theological ideas which underlie the plot and the conclusions those premises lead to have a very big impact on how much I “like” a story and this is more or less just an explanation of why I, personally, had trouble with it, something that may have no effect on another reader. That is to say, while I found it a compelling, fascinating story with beautiful writing, I was still left with a concern about the overall feeling it conveys about the nature of God and what it really means to say He is Love, as well as what it says about the nature of angels and demons and their relationship to both God and man.

[Stacy Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Could have been 4.5 if the ending was better. Such an engaging and intriguing read. I loved getting to see creation through the demons eyes. I actually used tabs to mark certain bits and I never do that. The ending fell flat though.

[Hannah Nykamp · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this book has a very specific audience it will appeal to, and I was one of them. This is Christian fiction- a bit of a mix of This Present Darkness, the Screwtape Letters, and sanctified imagination put to work, telling the story of human history from a demon’s perspective. I thought it did an incredible job of pointing out the humbling, merciful, completely undeserved love of God toward humankind without being preachy or wrapping everything up neatly. I’ll be thinking about this one for awhile.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is creepy, intriguing, and haunting from beginning to end. I am not a fan of horror per say, but this book was absolutely fantastic in a horrific kind of way. I have read Tosca Lee's other book, Havah, and I was just as impressed by Lee's style of writing in this book. Her descriptions are vivid and incredible. I can easily discern that the work she puts into the background information is both from intense study as well as a wonderful imagination.
I have read lots of fantasy, including some with the occasional "demon," but no demon has come close to the terror that Lucian evokes - both the fanatical hatred and disgust for mankind that is slowly revealed throughout the plot and the way that he takes any form, any body, to appear to Clay, the main character. At the same time, Lucian is as fascinating as any dictator, terrorist, or serial killer can be, and I am as morbidly curious with his obsession with telling Clay his story as Clay himself is. While I personally believe that Lee's portrayal of the demon is in reality not very accurate - he is too much like a human for starters, the character in the book is still the most unique "demon" that I have ever read in fiction.
Lee does an excellent job of keeping the story of Creation as close to the Biblical text as possible, while filling it with all the imagery of first-hand experience. As many times as I have read the Biblical account, Lucian's retelling of it, interspersed with Clay's false memories, made the story come alive for me in a whole new way. Lee covers topics using this story-telling that have often sparked my curiosity when reading the scriptures, such as the angels being with God before the creation of man or even the existence of time, exactly what triggered the fall, or even what it was like to do nothing but the purpose the angels were created for. I often had to put the book down just to contemplate some of these things that she addresses with the plot.
Even though there were no loose ends to speak of, I was still a bit disappointed when the book ended. I wanted Lee to draw out Clay's fate and describe it in all its excruciating detail to the very end, instead of the implications of what happens to him with Lucian's parting words and the letter in the epilogue. But the message I gathered from this ending is like a warning to the reader - to beware that Clay's fate is not the same as that of the reader's.

[Lori Twichell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tosca Lee’s book is astoundingly beautiful. I was completely mesmerized as I read, unable, in a lot of instances, to put the book down. Though the stories were ones that I knew by heart, the new spin and way that she brought the characters to life was amazing. Everything she included in this book was absolutely realistic. It’s entirely possible that this is exactly what the demons and Satan feel for us – the clay people. In some areas, it was hard for me to remember that this was fiction.

The writing was absolute excellence. Descriptions were amazing, detailed, and gorgeous. There were entire passages of this book that I needed to go back and read several times. Usually when this happens it’s because the writing is too dense and difficult for me to follow easily. With Tosca Lee’s work, it was because the writing was so beautiful it deserved to be read, re-read, and many times, read out loud. (And yes, reading it out loud made it that much more beautiful.) I was, without any reservation, absolutely blown away by the exceptional story, characters and descriptions in this book.

It would be harder for me to be a bigger fan of this book and more than that, this author. I cannot wait to get my hands on any and everything that Tosca Lee has to offer in the future. I love the way her mind works, the ideas that she embraces and the beauty with which she shares these thoughts with her audience.

This book ended with a shocker. The whole time I was reading I understood completely what Lucian was saying. I ended up stunned on more than one occasion with the main character’s complete refusal to see or understand. I was more than pleased with the ending. Anything else would have felt out of character.

Reminiscent of the Darkness series from Frank Peretti, Demon: A Memoir will leave you haunted, astounded, and if you’re lucky, with a renewed respect and devotion to God.

[Kerry Nietz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Demon: A Memoir was a lost treasure on my computer for a while. I downloaded it as part of a giveaway before I even had an eReader. I just figured since I enjoyed Tosca’s other book, Havah, I would enjoy this too…someday…when I finally got an eReader. Then I bought an eReader but forgot I had the book. Many months passed. Then I just happened to search by file type one day...

Anyway, now I’ve found it, and I’ve read it. Enjoyed it. I found the writing great, the story well thought out, and the characters memorable. There were some touching scenes and some chilling moments.

As in Havah, Tosca did a superb job of presenting ancient events (events that have been told countless times before) in an interesting and unique way. I love how she paints things. I loved the glimpses of a writer and editor’s life she integrated into the story. Loved how she illustrated the demon’s perspective.

That said, the book didn’t have quite the same pull for me as Havah did. Part of that, I’m sure, is because I was more distracted reading this time. Another part, I think, is because the demon’s history, while depicted uniquely, is still a review of things I’d heard or read before. (In Screwtape Letters, and the like.)

Overall, though, it is a really good book. A great one to loan to those on the fringes of belief. I recommend it.

[Jasmine · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.8⭐ Ending wasn't what I expected. But there are some good lessons in this book. This book led me on and I was expecting something....better. Then the ending was kinda disappointing.

[Maureen · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading Havah, I found it irresistible for me to rummage through thriftbooks.com to find Tosca's first novel, and it hasn't disappointed. Despite the fact that I read it with many days in between readings due to some tumultuous days of traveling and play, the momentum from previous bits was enough for me to want to continue reading, and the detail was piercing enough where I found very little need to reread any of the previous parts.

This novel takes many things that we often take for granted as Christians and uses a fallen angel's perspective to help us understand just how valuable and ridiculous God's grace, love, forgiveness, and incarnation truly is and just how much our cheapening attitude towards those things can be seen as insulting and offensive to a group that was damned after a single, fleeting but failing moment. Again, just as emotional for me as Havah was and a book I'd probably reread. So I'm glad I bought it.