Customer Reviews

Demon

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Selby is just about the best author I have ever read. His books speak to me and make me believe what each page says more than any other author. There is a fundamental, and somewhat un-nerving, realism to his books that makes them highly uncomfortable reading, but it is this discomfort which makes me come back to his books again and again. Last Exit To Brooklyn blew me away, with it's picture perfect description of desperate, (an perhaps a little extreme) cases of inner-city slum-type living, and the psychological effects it can have upon it's street dwellers. Requiem For A Dream carried on a nasty, horrid-tasting tale of drug-related woe that Trainspotting could only begin to thinly paint. And now I've read The Demon, and this is another gut-wrencher, ready to pull you under life and show you how it REALLY works.

The Demon focuses on Harry White, a young, high-flying office worker in a successful Manhattan firm, who basically spends his days working hard, travelling hard (he has to journey from his parents' place out of town to work and back every single day), and seducing hard, because Harry's favourite hobby is to pick up strange women (especially if they're married - it adds to the excitement), and then basically dump them right after he's had his fun. The book goes on to show how Harry derives an almost narcotic-like craving for women, and begins to pick up just about anyone on his lunch hour, take them to a motel, and then try to get back to work on time. The futility of his carnal desperation soon takes it's toll on his work-load, and he finds himself getting torn between 'Broads' and potential promotion.

As time goes by, it seems that Harry grows up somewhat. He gets married to a lovely girl he knows called Linda, who mentally captured him by not sleeping with him 'til they were married, thus becoming a sort-of 'chase' for Harry to find irresistable. But even through the wonders and beauty of this marriage, Harry finds himself uneasy at work, on his lunch break, and even at home. So, he wanders the streets of New York and the deep, dark depths of his psychological make-up to find new and exciting ways to fulfill his constant craving for elation, excitement, adrenaline and even terror.

The way in which the story is paced, and the way that Selby has set the story out so that it can swing from one scene of absolute horror to a beautifl, emotional journey is immense. The writing is so bafflingly simple that this, itself, provides the most starkly human quality of all. There is no complex meaning to the way Harry feels, and even if there is, trying to figure it out is futile. The mind of the character is set. No pacing, no adjustment brought on by psychological help. He is what he is, and this will shock you for being to frank. It's like looking through someone's eyes, and that's why it's so good.

I highly recommend this book. No, I dare you to read this book. How does that sound?

I am a huge fan of Selby and of all of his books, this one has to be my personal fav. Some will not like it for it is too dark, too personal, too true. If you are like me, and you look at a person as shallow in most cases, your mind goes off into deeper things, you are always tormented morally for some reason, the demon will rock your soul. As I was finishing the last few pages I looked down at my chest...it was going up and down as if I was gasping for air. The end is that intense. I have never had such a reaction from a film as I did from this book.

I also felt like throwing up that night after finishing it. Not because it was gross, but because I was feeling that sickness that the main character was feeling. It was as Selby told my gut how to feel, and it felt.

This is my fav book of all time, and if you see things differently than others, or you think you do, read this, it will change you.

Usually when fiction writers tackle the subject of men driven by the compulsion to kill, they drag out the same worn Freudian cliches; typically, in showing what made a character turn into a serial killer, an author will treat the reader to scenes from the character's childhood in which they were anally raped by their grandmother or some such nonsense, and this is assumed to be reason enough for the character to become a killer. This is utter bull, and Selby's neatly sidesteps silly psychological explanations to demonstrate more realistic motives behind compulsive, motiveless slaughter. If you study the lives of many serial killers, you'll find that they began killing after having committed less serious offenses. At first, they may be inclined to simply peep in windows or steal. Soon the excitement of these acts diminish with repetition, and more extreme activities must be engaged in to cause excitement, such as rape. And if that ceases to satisfy their jaded sensibilities, they will then engage in murder. Selby illustrates this progression through the character of Harry White, an outwardly successful businessman driven by the compulsion to screw just about any presentable woman who crosses his path. Sounds like most men, but unlike most men Harry begins to find sex too easy, and not exciting enough. To fill this void within himself, he takes up petty theft. And from then on, his crimes become darker, and his soul more tainted with sin. However, Harry is trapped by his own need for excitement, and because of this he is the perfect illustration of the mindset of a serial murderer; the man who kills to fill the hollowness deep within, and who with each crime finds the hole growing bigger, yawning to be filled with more and more blood and gore after each crime. The best book you'll ever read on the subject of compulsive murder.

I read this book and handed it over to my wife as soon as I was done. We both agreed on two points. One, it is the best written novel we have ever read, two, it would be a long time until we read it again.
The best written novel? Well, the way Selby jr wrote the caracter Harry, you actually feel the way he is feeling in the book, long after you put the book down. If Harry was having a bad day, and I put the book down to go to work after a chapter, I was having a bad day. Selby jr writes so well, you feel the pain and desperation of Harry.
I gave the book to my Father-in-Law, who devoures books two a day. He gave me the book back saying he couldnt finish it. It was too disturbing for him. You be the judge, highly recomended.

Unlike Last Exit to Brooklyn which is in your face and pounding your gut with every page, this book sneaks up on you. At first you think that someone goofed with the title, since it's just about a man who can go to any club, any dance hall and pick up a chick. For the first third of the book you think that it's just about a lady's man and a jerk.

But at a certain point it shifts, and the title becomes very appropriate as the protagonist suddenly stops channeling his energy into scoring. Since he's no longer engaging in societally normative conquests, you start to slowly understand what you've known all along, ie. that this is a book about a man without a conscience looking for the next big thrill.

After reading this book, you'll understand why people ignore the warning signs for serial killers and child molestors and swear that "he seemed like such a normal man" since really, sociopaths don't always act out and the few times they do, it's always easy to explain away their actions.

Every book that I have read written by Selby, has affected me in too many ways to mention. Those people who have read The Demon, and any other books by this man know, that he tells it like it is. Anyone who cannot handle his writing, or thinks that it is too "disturbing" is turning their head from reality. His fictional characters and scenarios may be coming from his head, but they are completely real, and are totally part of our society. His subjects are things that everyday people do not see; what society deems as "deviant"; and what parents tell their children to avoid. To ignore these things is to be ignorant and naive, and to pass them of as a fallacy, is to live a life of fantasy; in a world of peace, love, and perfection. But that is not how the world is outside of the comfort zone of suburban America. Some can relate to Selby and his characters; Being a victim of anxiety and depression, having that feeling of something churning and knotting up inside of you. Read these books to understand, not to entertain and critique. There is a bitter and ugly underworld developing under our noses, and we must understand it to ever begin to accept it.

This book is truly a magnificent piece of fiction. Harry White, the main character in this book is a successfull young man with a lot of potential in his job. But something dark lives within him. Something that eats his soul one day a time and swiftly destroys his identity. Or is it? Has Harry been always this disturbed and sinful, or is it a grand transformation? In fact Harry, everything he does in this book, everything which is morally unacceptable, excites him, gets him going. But one thing leads to another and another and he finds himself in an intricate web of lies and deceptions which drive him to more madness and sin and new daring experiences which cannot seem to quench his thrist as he goes along.

Selby wrote this book extremely well. His charcters are deep, but Harry White is as deep as he is devoid. The way Selby describes Harry's emotions, his pain, his anguish, his battle with the thing, the demon, eating his flesh is unbelievable. You can feel Harry's despair, his emotions, his reactions, everything; reminds me a little bit, or a whole a lot of, "Le Horla" which was the best short story ever written by Guy de Maupassant.

The mood of this book is very dark, especially after the first 100 pages and everything in this book that needs to be is described to perfection. It tells the story of this man who craves for sin and who couples with his unconcious guilt which is eating him apart. The allusion to redemption ,or sin and guilt and the catholic dogma is incredibly accentuated in the climax at the end. I was left gasping at some things Harry was doing on and on, and for him they seemed all too natural or at least accepted. Everyone can find a little of themselves in Harry White : our darkest thoughts, our battle with our own demons, our supressed feelings and thoughts as well as our everyday actions and words and our own little words that we say to ourselves to console ourselves : that everything is all right and that we are doing nothing wrong when we know that is not the case.

I strongly recommend this book! Worth your money and especially your time! Wow!

Harry had it all, and couldn't stand it. It makes you want to forget about living the good life and extremely content with the one you have. How can a man who has it all fall so low? Harry is a greatly developed character, and Hubert Selby Jr. is a literary mastermind. I have read almost all of his books, and I think I like this one the most. You actually see the demons that ride inside some peoples heads, through Harry. You wonder why America is so warped and all you see on television is voilence and chaos. Well Hubert Selby gets you one step closer to seeing why this is. Not a book for the faint of heart or the couple in a rough relationship, but I highly recommend this book.

Thats what i said as i closed the book, i will never touch again. This was the most disturbing book ive ever read, it gave me a bad "feeling" after i set it down, it probably sounds like a clique but this book got under my skin and made me think. i believe any person could at some level relate to Harry. The way we lie to ourself and say we will do something or finish it but we end up blowing it off. A brutally honest book and the way Selby describes Harrys emotion is what truly disturbs us. Ive read over 30 books over the past year and by far this one is the best, the best book i have ever read period.Nothing will ever truly make you feel like The Demon.

This book, simply put, leveled me.
Hubert Selby's writing is one of the oddest mixes of style and theme that I have ever incountered. His stark visions of the human psyche are shocking at the same time that they are totally engrossing. To top this off, this book is on the level of the greatest work of Dostoyevsky and Faulkner in relaying the inherent incongruities and paradox's of the nature of modern man. This is a character as broken apart as Raskolnikov, as self decieving and personally unaware as the unnamed narrators of Fight Club and Survivor, and as full of disturbingly commonplace violence as the side characters of Less Than Zero.
These quialities are combined with a writing ability that rivals Joyce in his ability to make the minor details of life not only omniscient in but endemic to the inner nature of man. If the devil is in the details, then the demon is there as well, and even more frightening in the utter ordinariness of it. Harry White is all the more terrifying because of the all too ordinary and commonplace roots of his madness. And the pace with which this madness unfolds, and the suspense created without anything resembling the standard march of horror and thriller literature, is incredible and maddening in and of itself. If Selby has a weakness as a writter, it may be his lack of well defined and structured plots (a problem inhernet in literature that focuses more on the inner workings of a person's mind). But in this work he manages to drive the reader along anyway, with the desperation of his character and the ever present question of how far will he go, who in his life will he hurt, and in the end, how much of himself will he betray in his futile attempt to quench the thirst that he cannot admit will never leave him.
It's no surprise to me that literature this disturbing and confrontational has never become a huge financial success, and without the easy translation to movies of Ellis or the sheer hilarity of Palahniuk, his chances of being a commercial hit are slim, but I think that time will tell on this author. He seems like the type that will be universally praised only after his own death. Expect this book to be on the syllabus regularly in college literature courses by 2030.
-blair-