Review: Demon by Rob J. Hayes
Blurb:
Dien Hostain was never meant to lead. She wasn't meant to survive.
Kind of heart and quick in temper, Dien expects to lead a simple life, learning her father's trade. But unbeknown to her, he was not always a carpenter. He's an exile, a traitor once known as the Peace Breaker.
When nightmarish demons attack the village of Berrywhistle, her father is murdered. Dien and the survivors are taken as thralls to live out the rest of their days in squaller and back-breaking labour. But Dien's blood boils with the need to escape and take her revenge.
They try to break her body. They try to break her spirit.
Will Dien take up her father's hammer and unite her people?
On wings of vengeance, a Saint shall rise.
Review:
This was the last Book 1 of the God Eater Saga that I read. Now I can officially say that Rob J Haye’s trilogy of trilogies is off to a power-packed start. Every single entry had lived up to the hype, each one unique in its own way.
Demon follows Dien Hostain, an ordinary village woman who is destined to become Saint Dien. Her legacy is the Sant Dien empire, which is the setting for the other two trilogies. Set 3000 years before Herald, Demon’s world is almost alien, its treatment unflinchingly brutal, and its ending deeply satisfying, with a bittersweet taste.
I am glad I ended my run of book 1s with this story. After the epic classic adventure of Herald, and the intriguing political thriller of Deathless, Demon was the perfect tale of perseverance to end on.
WHAT I LIKED:
Unlike Herald and Deathless, Demon was a straightforward story of survival. We once again start off in a quaint village. But something is quite off. This isn’t your regular village, it’s a village where lighting fires is forbidden, where they make bug-bread and subsist on whatever they can forage from the forest, because the village is not secure. Unlike the other two books, this one is set in a world where demons still ruled. Humanity is not the apex species, and it becomes clear in a bloody, gut-wrenching episode of demons raiding the village.
What follows is a deeply personal tale of Dien Hostain as she struggles against all odds to survive, fights to within an inch of her life just to maintain her humanity, never letting go of that faint sliver of hope. Her trials and tribulations are just as difficult to swallow as the stringy broth that the demons force their human slaves to eat. And Hayes does not hold back from the brutality. The few times that there seems to be some hope of escape, Hayes in true sadistic fashion twists the narrative, and crushes our will to keep going. For almost 70-75% of the book, I was left wondering if this is going to be a tragedy.
Dien’s perseverance is impressive to say the least. Despite all odds, despite the crushing failures, she keeps going. She is an inspiration, and it completely makes sense why she ended up as the Saint of all humanity. Seeing the first part of her origin story was just the perfect way to end the first set of God Eater books.
I’ll admit, there were moments throughout the novel when I was starting to get bogged down. Reading this novel reminded me of Hearts of Darkness, Apocalypse Now, and other tales where I could mentally feel the struggle and torment of the protagonist, with little to no hope in sight. But, that is the point of the novel. It takes you to the extremes of human limits but refuses to give up no matter what.
And then the final sequence. In case you’ve read my Herald review, you know how brilliantly that sequence was handled. With Demon, Hayes does the same, albeit with a relatively smaller build-up and almost equal stakes. The finale was as satisfying as it was fascinating.
After trudging through 150 pages of torture-porn, fever-dream-level suffering, Hayes weaves a finale that will leave you on the edge of your seat, screaming for victory as our heroes finally stand up to their demon oppressors.
WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE:
My only issue—similar to my Herald review—was the lack of Angels. We mostly see the world through the eyes of slaves. Although we got a glimpse of demon culture, with name drops and hints at lore, we don’t see the Angels in all their glory like I would have expected. Also, the limited exploration of the world. I was really excited to see what the world would look like 3000 years ago, but we don’t get as much of the world.
Again, Demon is just book 1, so I assume this was done by design. Yet, like Herald, I felt a little disappointed at the limited interactions with the divine.
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All in all, this book is yet again a 5-star read for me. Having read Herald and Deathless first made Demon a satisfying conclusion to the book 1s.
TL;DR:
WHAT I LIKED: brutal tale of perseverance, Dien Hostain, satisfying conclusion
WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE: fewer scenes featuring Angels, not enough world-exploration
