Customer Reviews

Private Demon: A Novel of the Darkyn

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Private Demon
by Lynn Viehl (S.L. Viehl)
Book 2 of the Darkyn series

Grade: B

Lynn Viehl has created another excellent dark fantasy novel in her Darkyn series. However, as a romance, once again, it does very poorly, for reasons I'll mention in a moment.

Jema Shaw works at her father's museum doing, and also consults with the police department. She's exposed to a murder of a man and, at the same time, to Thierry Durand, a Darkyn seeking members of the evil Brethren to atone for wrongs he's done. Thierry is somewhat mad, after being betrayed by his wife of a few hundred years, and being tortured by the Brethren. However, he becomes obsessed with Jema and begins entering her dreams. Jema, on the other hand, is sickly and slowly dying of diabetes and living at home with her hypochondriac, scheming mother.

Viehl has done an excellent job layering her plot in Private Demon. It follows a story arc from the first book, If Angels Burn, and will surely continue to the next book, due out in June 2006. I found myself totally fascinated by the mystery and the characters -- particularly the secondary characters like Jamys, Thierry's son, Valentin Jaus, and John Keller. Probably more so than the main characters. However, Viehl gives equal time to each piece of the story and all the characters, so the book feels less about Thierry and Jema, and more about the Darkyn and Alexandra's brother, John. There are some interesting issues of race brought into this book, and a lot of emotional intensity formed from the love triangle.

Viehl cannot do romance, however. While she does excellent dark fantasy, her idea of romance is creepy and scary. IMO, Jema ended up with the wrong guy. I don't understand how stalker dude (SCARY, murdering stalker dude, at that) can end up being her main love interest. We leave poor deeply caring Jaus out in the cold. He, IMO, would have made a much better love interest, and maybe he'll have his own book. But I didn't buy into the romance (what little there was) between Jema and Thierry. I never bought that Thierry's madness went away.

Again, I'd recommend this book and series to those who enjoy urban fantasy or dark fantasy. But if you're reading for a romance, go look up J.R. Ward or Sherrilyn Kenyon.

Jema, a sickly bluestocking heiress in modern day Chicago, dreams of darkly brooding Thierry each night in her sleep.Only Theirry is knowingly diving into her dreams. As a vampire, or "Darkyn", influencing mortals dreams is his specialty. And after his own tortured capture in Viehl's previous book (If Angels Burn) Thierry is on the lamb from the rest of the darkyn. He's determind to find out what happened to a brutalized young woman who was formerly Alexandria's patient. Alexandria gave him back the use of his twisted body in the last book & Thierry feels he owes her since, you know, he drained her body dry after she helped him.

Thierry feels that Jema holds the key to this mystery but easily becomes distracted by the odd intrigues of Jema's life as she begins to heal him from the betrayel of his wife.

The best characters in this book, besides Alex & Michael our returning darkyn couple who rule the USA, are Jamys- Thierry's mute & permanently teenaged son and Valentin Jaus. Jaus is the somberly mysterious vampire ruler of Chicago. He loves Jema too & has since she was a baby. Can Alex help him sway Jema to his side for all eternity?Or will Thierry's dreams of love with Jema come true?

Bring on more of the series!

I just finished {If Angels Burn} which was just okay but it was wayyyyy better than this one. I haven't decided yet what the authors intentions were in this book. The plot is ALL over the place there is so many sub-plots going on it is almost ridiculous for such a small book (only 287 pages in the book) so at first you read the back cover and think the book is about Jemma and Thierry well.... it is but there is so much of the book that involves these "dream" sequences that she has with him which your like.. "but I thought Thierry was using Jemma to find out the 4 thugs that got to Luissa???" so I am 100 pages from the end and I realize Thierry has yet to even BROACH that subject with Jemma in her dreams in fact! you barely read any REAL interactions with Theirry at that point. The other sub-plots consist of John Keller still under the watchful eye of the Brethren, Alex and Mike, Jaus and the Jardin, Jemma's deceased Father involvement in a dig over in Europe, Jemma Mother's shady dealings with the museum, Jamy and his attempts to locate his father and some neo-nazi movement in Chicago GOOD GRIEF!!! There are some HOT sex scenes with Alex and Mike not full details but enough to float your boat. Oh and why is it that again we are throwing in the Templars to the story plots like these vampires were originally priest but Thierry was married with children how could he be a priest/monk and have been married with a child?

I can't figure out either if the author is trying to tell you that Alex and John are African American and White or not she eludes to it several times in the first book as well as in this one (not that this makes a difference to me) I'm like why is that mentioned so often if it is not A PART of the tale???

So bottom line is that I do not recommend this book it is what we call a "wallbanger" maybe other readers read it and could totally get the various plots going on and didn't get frustrated that Thierry was supposed to be going into Jemma's dreams to find out about the guys that harmed Luissa yet seem (at least over 100 pages in) to have gone off to some dream like fantasy thing with her. This genre is getting such a flood of new authors there are so many to choose from and authors seem to be doing the automatic series thing right now that at some point I think readers are going to start to feel like this is the Millenium versions of the {Vikings} or {Indians} books.

Respectfully Reviewed

I must confess that after reading the debut novel in this series, "If Angels Burn," I was more intrigued by the plot summary for the next book ("Dark Need") than for this one. I knew I would snap up a copy of "Private Demon", but I admit I didn't think I would enjoy this installment nearly as much as I did. Lynn Viehl has single-handedly created the most exciting new paranormal series I've read in the last couple years with the Darkyn novels.

"Private Demon", I think, is a much more character-based installment than "If Angels Burn" -- opening the door wide on people we'd only previously been given a glimpse of, as well as deepening the already rich detail on players central to the story in the first book. The Darkyn universe is a fascinating place with multiple layers of conflict and intrigue and emotion and struggle. The various relationships are vividly drawn and incredibly compelling. Damaged as they are, Thierry Durand and Jema Shaw manage to find each other in this story, and their connection as it evolves under Viehl's skillful guidance is both moving and romantic -- and intensely erotic to boot.

Interestingly, PD also managed to resolve many of the issues I'd had with the debut novel, by bringing back Michael and Alexandra from IAB and carrying them forward, while also clarifying some of the more convoluted twists surrounding the Durand family's connection with the evil Darkyn-hunting Brethren.

Anyway...the Darkyn series is shaping up into a fantastic storyline. Better and more sophisticated and timely than a lot of other current offerings in the genre. The "Dark Need" excerpt at the end only makes the waiting worse. I absolutely cannot wait to read more. Here's hoping that Lynn Viehl has many more novels planned for this excellent series.

A vampire with a death wish; a human who longs to live beyond thirty. Lynn Viehl continues her Darkyn series with the story of Thierry Durand, the vampire who was captured and tortured by the Brethren. At the end of the first book, we were told how Thierry swiped the medical report on one of Alexandra Keller's patients. We finally find out the reason for his interest as Thierry makes his way to Chicago. In his search for vengeance and redemption, he comes across Jema Shaw, an antiquities expert who also moonlights as a forensic consultant. Is it madness that compels him to her side, or is Fate finally making amends for all the afflictions he had to endure?

If you picked up this book expecting a paranormal romance, you will find yourself disappointed as romance is the last thing you'll find in this novel despite what the back cover says. There is no chemistry, no development whatsoever of the relationship and when they finally came together, it was so unconvincing that it felt as if the author decided to include the scenes for the sake of justifying that this is a paranormal romance. The various sub-plots also make this novel so convoluted. There are far too many characters introduced in the first seventy or so pages that one wonders where the story is heading. Not only did I find myself reading about the Brethren, Darkyn and the supposed romance between the central characters, I was also following a story about a group of Neo-Nazi, a pregnant teen and a mysterious archaeological dig. All told in less than 300 pages with less than 100 pages spent on Thierry and Jema.

You're supposed to think that they will all tie up in the end. Indeed, they do. However, the journey to get to the end was, quite bluntly, arduous. We could have done without a few of the subplots as I didn't really think that they made the story any more compelling. The ending was interesting enough with some twists to surprise you, but I would have preferred if the relationship between Thierry, Jema and Jamys had been fleshed out. I would have loved to know more about Thierry and his family's life in the Dark Ages and how his wife eventually betrayed them to the Brethren.

While I am not that keen on jumping on to the next book right away, I am still interested on reading what's in store for the Darkyn (in particular, Valentin) but I am going to wait until I can buy the books cheap.

I thoroughly enjoyed her first book but this second one left me cold. 150 pages in and I still didn't really know what the plot was. Too many characters (Did we really need Beanie and her fecal artwork?) and too much wandering around with scenes that didn't build up to anything at all. It was as if the author couldn't decide who or what the book was supposed to be about so she just hopped around hoping something interesting would come out of the mix. It didn't.

I finally got so bored that I turned to the end just to see where it all settled, something I NEVER do. I usually have to read every word of a book, but that would have just been more torture than even the Brethren can dole out.

I like her ideas so I'm still hoping for more from the third installment.

Truly an original vampire concept! This book was much better than the first. Very fast paced novel which kept you guessing and wanting more. This book also answered a lot of unanswered questions leftover from the first book.

For all of you critics that complained about the first book being listed in the Romance section, this book is surely more your style. I will have to admit that the first book lacked romance (which didn't bother me one bit since I bought it online and didn't even check what "section" it was listed in). This book however was mostly romance based, which should make the romance fans happy.

I still favor the Anita Blake series more than this one, but I would gladly recommend this highly original and unique series to anyone that asks. It has a strong plot filled with subplots and surprises, strong willed characters overflowing with great 3D personalities, and the story is actually believable and "plausible". There is no real "good" vs. "evil", just many different shades of grey which is actually fairly realistic, along with a wonderful idea of a scientific explanation for "vampirism".

A MUST read for vampire fans.

Private Demon (2005) is the second Fantasy novel in the Darkyn series, following If Angels Burn. In the previous volume, Alex reconstructed Michael's face and was bitten by him. Their blood mingled and she caught the disease, but she didn't die from it.

Alex also operated on the Durand family, including Thierry. Yet she could not restore the tongue of Jamys. Then Alex decapitated Angelica and Michael's Darkyn defeated Stoss and the Brethren. Michael had the bodies removed and hidden away.

In this novel, Alexandra Keller is a reconstructive surgeon. Then she was abducted by the Darkyn and now cannot return to her practice. Yet she has fallen in love with Michael.

Michael Cyprien is a Darkyn and is over seven centuries old. Now he is the seigneur of all American jardins.

Thierry Durand is a Darken and is centuries old. He was caught by the Brethren, was tortured and went mad. Then he escaped from La Fountaine and went looking for the men who tortured Luisa Lopez, Alex's former patient.

Valentin Jaus is a Darkyn from the same era as Cyprien. He is suzerain of the Chicago jardin. Alex calls him Val.

Richard Tremayne is the Master of the Darkyn. His headquarters are in Dundellan Castle in Ireland.

John Keller is Alex's older brother. He was a Catholic priest and a fledgling member of the Brethren of Light, the Darkyn's old enemies. Now he has quit the Church as well as the Brethren and is roaming around thinking.

August Hightower is an archbishop of the Holy Roman Catholic Church. He is also highly placed within the Brethren of Light.

Jema Shaw was diagnosed as having juvenile -- Type I -- diabetes as a child and has been taking insulin ever since. Now she is a forensic anthropologist, working for the Shaw Museum during the day and for the coroner at night. Jema is also a friend of Luisa Lopez, who also worked at the museum.

In this story, Michael's hunters locate Thierry in Memphis, but lose him within the city. Apparently Thierry is going to Chicago. Michael and Alex fly there to find him.

Jamys is not sure how Michael views his father. He is afraid that his father will be hunted down and killed. So he also heads for Chicago, catching rides along the way.

John Keller is also in Chicago. He has told Hightower about his encounter with the Darkyn, but the archbishop denies everything that John learned from the Darkyn. John refuses to believe him and refuses to return to the Church. But he does take a job offer from Hightower at the Haven, a shelter for teenage addicts and petty thieves.

After reaching Chicago, Michael ad Alex first visit Jaus and explain the situation. Valentin provides some additional information on Alex's brother. Then Richard Tremayne tells them to kill John Keller within three days.

Thierry is searching for Jema to learn more about the torture of her friend Luisa. Then he accidentally meets her in an alley and becomes her demon lover. Entering her dreams, he becomes anyone that she wishes. But he finds himself becoming attracted to the woman.

This tale involves the Darkyn with a Chicago street gang. The gang is also trying to kill Jema. Then Alex makes a startling discovery.

This plot is full of surprises, but most are properly foreshadowed. The next volume in this series is Dark Need. Read and enjoy!

Highly recommended for Viehl fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of medical practice, medieval customs, and true romance.

-Arthur W. Jordin

In the first of Lynn Viehl's Darkyn series, If Angels Burn Thierry Marchand and his family had been held prisoner and tortured by the Brethren.

Rescued by the Darkyn King's pet assassin, Lucan, Thierry is broken in both body and spirit. He is, in fact, criminally insane. Dr. Alex Keller repairs his body but is almost killed by Thierry in one of his insane rages. But Thierry is shocked into lucidity when he learns that his wife Angelica (whom he had believed to be skinned alive before his eyes and the reason he had retreated into insanity ) had actually been in collusion with the Brethren for years and had delivered many Darkyn to them for torture and murder. Horrified and in despair, Thierry disappears and goes deep underground to stay away from the Darkyn. Believing Thierry is too dangerous to live, Michael Cyprien, second in command over all the Darkyn and Alex's lover, sends out an order for Thierry's death.

As this book begins Thierry is living as a homeless man in Chicago and hunting the men who had attacked one of Alex's former patients as a way to make amends for his own attack on Alex. He comes across Jema Shaw, an heiress who works in her family's museum. Jema lives at home with her wheelchair bound, over controlling mother.

Thierry's special talent is that he is a dreamwalker. He enters Jema's dreams and the two begin a nocturnal romance.

Meanwhile in the waking world, Valentin Jaus, the Darkyn leader of the Chicago territory lives in the mansion next door to Jema and has loved her from afar for years. However he is a correct, courtly old-fashioned gentleman and isn't quite sure how to let her know his feelings. Instead her very correctly sends her a bouquet of camellias (his Darkyn scent) each year on her birthday. He is also in despair because Jema has lived all her life with juvenile diabetes and her life expectancy isn't very high.

Alex and Michael visit the Chicago Jardin to help with the hunt for Thierry. Alex quickly sizes up the situation between Valentin and Jema and gives her unsolicited romantic advice. To his surprise, Valentin finds himself reluctantly bonding with the unpredictable American doctor. Jamys, Thierry's son (his tongue had been ripped out by the Brethren at the request of his evil mother Angelica), is also in town unbeknownst to anyone also looking for his father and runs into John Keller who is now working in a half-way house for runaways.

Things come to a head at a grand masque ball at Valentin's estate during Halloween where our principle players learn a few surprising things. And one guys gets the girl and another is heartbroken.

Of the six books in the series I've read so far, this is by far my least favorite. But before I get to what I didn't like about it, I'll talk about what did work for me.

First, even though this is Jema and Theirry's book, Alex and Michael are a very welcome presence. This book continues with the progress of their relationship. They are deeply in love, but Alex is still not content being Darkyn and is trying to find a cure. Michael, otoh, is walking a very fine line. Richard, the Darkyn King, is displeased that John exposed the New Orleans Jardin and has decreed he should die. Alex, otoh, doesn't want her brother dead. Michael is trying to placate the both of them, with dangerous results. Michael and Alex's relationship are a work in progress and they are one of the reasons I really enjoy this series. This wrinkle in what Michael is doing and Alex's unquiet about how deeply she feels for him would not have had the same impact had this all been resolved in the last book.

And Alex is still her snarky, irreverent self. I especially liked her calling one of the stuffy Darkyn women "Princess Buttercup."

Second, Valentin is such an awesome character. I loved the part where he tells Alex about his feelings for Jema and Alex sighs dreamily at his poetic words and assures him that she is now in love with him. When I first read the book, I felt gypped that Valentin would not end up with the girl because I thought he was so much more worthy for her than Thierry. But then upon re-read, I realized that I was glad that Valentin didn't end up with Jema. In some ways she was a little too drippy for him. Valentin's book comes out in July 08, so I can't wait to see who he does end up with!

Third, again Viehl packs a LOT of plot into what deceptively looks like a small book. So much goes on and what is also cool is that some of the littlest seeds she'd sown in the first book start to bud in this one. Again, a hallmark of good planning and some nice world building.

But then comes the not so great stuff.

I couldn't really get into Thierry and Jema. First I really dislike the convention of using dreams as a stand in for the real world. It is something that some paranormal authors use and it is something that just doesn't work for me in any way.

And then there was the whole neo-Nazi subplot with John Keller. Again, John's storyline brings me right out of the story. But I have to live with it. There is obviously something going on with John and Alex's background that explains why John is so wanted by the Brethren and why Alex is the only human, and one of the very few women, in hundreds of years who has been able to rise and walk as a Darkyn.

So while I will characterize this as a solid entry in the ongoing series, as a stand alone it loses a bit of it's lustre.

Diabetic Jema Shaw knows that death is imminent as only the treatments by family friend Dr. Daniel Bradford and her will to live life to the fullest keeps her breathing. During the day Jema works as an antiquities expert at the family owned Shaw Museum while at night she is a crime scene technician for the Chicago Police Department.

His wife Angelica betrayed the Darkyn Thierry Durand to the Brethen. They tortured him and though he was rescued and Dr. Keller healed his body, he is insane. The American head of the Darkyn Michael Cyprien orders Chicago Seneschal Falco Erhart to bring Thierry in.

Thierry sees Jema at a homicide crime scene and finds she provides a mental anchor for him. He creates in her dreams a fantasy world where they are together forever. However reality in terms of Falco and his minion and the Brethen collide with Jema forcing a willing Thierry to risk his existence to keep the mortal he loves safe.

The strong second Darkyn vampire romantic suspense (see IF ANGELS BURN) is a tense multifaceted thriller that plays out on two major levels. First there is the superb confrontation between the Darkyn and the Brethen with Jema as bait; the outcome is in doubt throughout. Secondly there is the romantic triangle between the two Darkyn rivals as both desires Jema; readers will wonder which one she will choose, if any. Fans of Lori Handeland's "Moon" novels will want to read Lynn Viehl's delightful tale.

Harriet Klausner