Verdant, Vee for short, is a fairy living in hiding in a repressive anti-fae society. She works at a bar with Sol, who has always treated her as an equal. One night she hears one too many anti-fairy boasts from a group of drunken bigots and she gets angry and outs herself. Talon, another Fae, takes advantage of the situation to have his group fight the police and then help Vee escape the aftermath of the fight.
There are big things going on in the world and, after Vee experiences a few moments of freedom to be herself, she realizes how repressed and afraid everyone is. She finds out Sol has been hiding his own secrets and pain. The government is dealing with the “fairy problem” by offering “naturalization” a way to become human with an injection. Mass injections are scheduled for just a few days after the bar fight.
Demon Hero, as the start of a new series, focuses on the conflict and Vee’s exploration of the choices available to her and the philosophy and considerations about freedom, inter-species relations, government’s role and “human nature”. There is a lot of philosophizing in this book and at times it bogs down the story. There are great action scenes and the bones of an exciting world, but this is for the more thoughtful reader.
Demon Hero is book 1 in the Dark Fae Hollow series.