Ellora’s Cave, $5.20, ISBN 1-84360-229-6
Fantasy Erotica, 2002

Cady Swann is the resident demon slayer of Lula, Georgia. No one knows that she’s the person who goes on a rampage every night, ripping out demonic hearts from these demons with her hands and then setting these hearts ablaze, but then again, no one knows that these demons exist. Personally, I think Cady Swann is too cool for words… until she decides not to switch on the lights at home and gets ambushed by a stranger. Okay, maybe she’s exhausted and… oh please. Really, that’s pretty embarrassing for a kick-ass demon slayer.

This stranger, Obsidian, comes straight out of a Dara Joy novel oozing pure cheese and babbling about the Shikar Alliance wanting to stomp the demonic behinds of the Demon Horde in the galaxy. He doesn’t believe that Cady is really a demon slayer even if he has heard rumors of her because women are supposed to faint in terror at the sight of demons like the delicate flowers they are.

Of course, Cady soon proves him wrong and he begins to show Cady the far-reaching war on the Demon Horde beyond Lula, Georgia. As he and she work together, naturally they feel this attraction between them and proceed to shag every time they don’t have to bust some demons.

I have no problems with Cady despite her sometimes doing something foolish that seems out of character. She’s generally smart and tough. She can back up her talk with actions and that’s fine with me. However, Obsidian is more problematic a character as he starts out as this huge chunk of cheese, speaking like Fabio impersonating Tarzan, but later he morphs without explanation into someone more… human, with the occasional spontaneous wit to boot. It is hard to reconcile these two extremes of Obsidian.

Nonetheless, Ravenous is a most enjoyable short little excursion into a most erotic kind of urban fantasy. I really wish the author has made up her mind how she wants to depict Obsidian in this story but other than that, this is a fun read from start to finish. I’m rather, dare I say it, ravenous for more.