Larissa Ione’s Lords of Deliverance series is a spinoff of her fairly popular Demonica series, which was uneven but I found enjoyable as a whole. As in that series, LoD’s strengths lie in very interesting worldbuilding and a strong over-arching plotline that ties the standalone novels together. The romances, however, are derivative, with the characters so similar to each other, and the love scenes are also all written so very similarly, that they all become a sweaty, thrusty, moany, roaring blur. Also, this series had A REALLY AWFUL THING, which I will get to in the individual summaries.
Lords of Deliverance #1: Eternal Rider is the story of Ares, also known as War, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Yes, that’s right, this is a romance series about the Horsemen and their loves.
In this first book, we learn that there are two prophesies regarding the Horsemen: the human Bible prophesy, and the underworld/supernatural Demonica prophesy. The difference lies in that the Horsemen have these things called Seals, and each different seal requires a different trigger to break it, and then once broken, the Horsemen assumes his (or her! there is a female Horseman!) more deadly alter ego (War, Famine, Pestilence, Death.) The Bible prophesy says that when the Biblical apocalypse comes, if the Seals break, the Horsemen will fight on the side of good; the Demonica prophesy says that if prematurely broken, the Horsemen will trigger their own Apocalypse and become evil.
So to start the first book, Reseph, also known as Pestilence, has his Seal broken based on an ongoing disease epidemic among werewolves (a tie-in from the original Demonica series, if anyone was following so religiously.) He turns eeeeeeeevil, and that sets up the story of how the other three Horsemen must battle against him and the other forces he’s gathering, all the while trying to protect their own Seals from breaking.
Cara, a human with an extraordinary gift for animal healing, gets dragged into this mess when she unknowingly heals a hellhound puppy, and the puppy bonds with her. Ares meets her while tracking a demon-tracking organization that tracks the hellhound to her place (a verifiable matryoshka of tracking!) , and finds that her bond with the hellhound has put her in a position of potentially becoming the trigger to his Seal: if she dies, it breaks. So, Ares takes her under his protection, and what luck! He’s astoundingly attracted to her! You know where this is going. Cara, for her part, seems like a nice enough lady, but she’s got the worst case of TSTL that I’ve seen in a heroine in awhile. I mean, damn. I’d say she was trying to get killed out of some kind of sick curiosity to see what Ares would be like when he becomes War, except that she wouldn’t be around to see it, so..? Anyway, for spoilery reasons, by the end of the book, Cara’s life is no longer in danger and they live happily ever after.
Lords of Deliverance #2: Immortal Rider didn’t start off too badly, but I became ENRAGED partly though because of the B plot between the two characters that would become the focus couple in the next book. But before I get there: Immortal Rider is about Limos, aka Famine, and she’s a Horseman lady! And she is SUPER DOOPER feminine. She loves pink and sparkly things and sweet drinks and partying on the beach. But she also kicks ass. And, you know, I can’t find it in me to be mad at this characterization. PNR warrior heroines are so often “not like other girls” that I just shrug at this proud girly girl. She’s betrothed to Satan (yes, THAT Satan) and once she marries him, her Seal breaks. But in the meantime, he’s put this really bogus chastity belt on her that dismembers any dude that tries anything, and even if a guy just kisses her he gets immediately dragged to hell. (Way harsh.) Anyway, that’s what happens to Arik, another human and former demon-hunter, who now works begrudgingly with some of the “good ones” and finds this particular one way hot. A lot of angst happens to get Arik rescued, and the two of them together, and it’s all very sweet and orgasmic, and they’re fine. But that’s not what made me get stabby about this book.
IN THE BACKGROUND, the demon-tracking/slaying organization has some intel that leads them to believe that a baby by Thanatos, aka Death, will be the key to preventing the Apocalypse. Meanwhile, Thanatos himself is under the impression that his virginity is his Seal. I was enjoying the idea of a male immortal in a PNR series being a virgin until, basically, Anti-DemonOrg sends one of theirs to seduce Thanatos BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY so that she can get pregnant, and, yeah, she straight up rapes him. Like, gives him a drink that she knows will enhance his libido, and just rapes him while he’s yelling “No.” It’s awful and I can’t believe it’s written as a sexy scene (because it is, somehow?) I finished the book after this, but I couldn’t enjoy it.
Lords of Deliverance #3: Lethal Rider is about Thanatos, Rapey Reagan, and their rape baby, and I didn’t read it out of protest.
Lords of Deliverance #4: Rogue Rider is about a suddenly not eeeeeeeeevil Reseph, and yeah, it became very clear that these are standalone romances only very loosely, because I missed a LOT of information by boycotting #3. The book admirably does a lot of good summarizing so I wasn’t totally lost, but there was plenty of catching up to do. Anyway, Reseph is found by a human woman named Jillian while he is lying naked in the snow and ends up staying with her for a bit because he has no memory of anything other than his name and the fact that he enjoys sex. The story between Reseph and Jillian is pretty cute, actually, all things considered. After hearing so much about how pre-Pestilence Reseph was this goofy, funny, charming guy, we finally get to see it. But their domestic bliss can’t last for too long, because everyone finds him almost all at once and they all have their own ideas about what to do with him. Suffice it to say it all ends happily ever after, with a bit of too-convenient “I forgive you!” but I know better than to expect emotional nuance in a book like this. This could have been my favorite book of the series had I not been fatigued by the ones that came before it.
Overall, skip this series. The Apocalypse storyline could have been interesting, if cheesy, on its own, but with the quality of the romances ranging from slightly above average to YOU SHOULD BE IN JAIL, it’s not something I can recommend.