Review: Demons Not Included by Cheyenne McCray

Title: Demons Not Included (Night Tracker #1)
Author: Cheyenne McCray
Genre: Paramormal Romance
Heat Index: No idea. But the gratuitous talk of breasts in chapter 2 has implications
Release Date: June 2nd, 2009
Word/Page Count: 352 pages
Format: Purchased

Meet Nyx. This half-human, half–Drow private eye investigates paranormal crimes by day and is an elite Tracker of demons by night. She prefers working solo—and playing rough. So when a terrifying force starts murdering innocent humans and paranorms, and leaving strange demonic symbols burned into their buildings, it’s a case Nyx takes very personally…

Meanwhile, Nyx’s fellow Trackers are being killed one by one—and a sexy new Tracker named Torin is shadowing her every move. Torin has powers Nyx can’t read, and sometimes she wonders whose side he’s on. Nyx’s instincts tell her something’s brewing in the city’s meanest supernatural streets, and that it’s ready to unleash hell on Earth. Who can she trust? Now it’s five minutes to permanent midnight…and Nyx’s last chance means risking everything—even her own life.

Arai's Review:

This is going to be a bit of a mini review because, well, I couldn’t bring myself to finish this book. I felt an immediate dislike for the heroine, the heroine’s sidekick, the romantic lead, the secondary romantic lead… needless to say, almost as soon as someone was introduced on page, they were added to the list. In addition to unlikeable and unrelatable characters, we’re treated to massive amounts of info dumping in a telling rather than showing fashion that just alienated me further.

Right off the bat, we’re informed that Nyx, the main character, is a Drow princess. Then we’re treated to what we’re supposed to interpret as “I’m so hip” language by the main character. Paranormals are now paranorms because abbreviating, or abreving (like that, huh?) is cool and, really, we just don’t have time to finish saying the rest of the word because we need to look up something on our XPhone. Oh, yes, the author must have sold her soul to Apple because ‘XPhone’ is mentioned almost ten times in the first chapter alone.

As if the repeated mentions of the character’s XPhone isn’t bad enough, we’re also treated to a detailed description of every item Nyx wears, which is all designer, of course. Yay, more name dropping. Fortunately, we are treated to a brief reprieve from Neiman Marcus and Dolce & Gabbana when Nyx describes her partner’s clothing. Unfortunately, the partner wears jeans and phrase t-shirts that are better suited to a 10 year old girl. Don’t worry, you’ll get a new phrase at least once a chapter. Be excited.

Speaking of the partner, when we’re first introduced to Olivia, we’re told she has ‘full curves.’ Ok, got an idea of the character, great, can we get to the story? Oh, sorry, wait, you wanted to talk more about that? Apparently, because that’s mentioned several times in the beginning of the second chapter, even after we’ve seen the sidekick for a whole chapter.

“What’s it been?” Olivia adjusted the bra strap that helped contain her melon-sized breasts. “Two years since you moved into this place and she put up the sign?”

Alright, have you made your point yet? No? Damn.

Olivia snapped her bra straps in place. “This place was a mess before you had the privilege of me coming to work as your partner.”

“Ha.” I looked down at my breasts, which were small in comparison to Olivia’s. I hadn’t known they grew them as big as hers until I moved here from the Drow Realm. Elves and Fae – peaches in comparison. I looked back at her. “That Sprite would have had you singing Broadway show tunes if I hadn’t arrived. Before he fed you to his buddy, the Were.”

Needless to say, the disillusionment with this book never ceases to continue. We then find out that Nyx is emotionally when it comes to men because one man, Stan, was spooked by her nighttime appearance. Oh, yes, while during the day Nyx has the appearance of a very attractive human, at night, her straight black hair turns to a “luxurious cobalt blue,” her ears become pointed, skin turns “like pale amethyst marble,” and her teeth also turn pointed, similar to those of vampires. But don’t worry, she doesn’t thirst for blood like they do. Oh. She also wanders around at night fighting in leather pants and a black leather corset. While this isn't out of the norm in your UF books, by this point in time, I was so fed up I wasn't going to give a benefit of the doubt anymore.

Despite her men issues, she has two of them that she’s keeping on the line, one Drow (and her trainer) and one is human (and a police investigator). I honestly didn’t get far enough in the book to give you more information than that. I’d already given up. And don’t ask me about a plot because I’m not sure there was one in the part that I read.

I know for sure that I won’t be pursuing this series and that it’ll be a long time before I risk another book by this author.