This was the third Library Thing book that had a Canadian locale, in recent reads. I have spent a lot of time on Montreal and recognized many of the street names, in fact I got engaged there for my last marriage. "The Demon of Montreal" was a creepy, yet entertaining book, with great characters and a great climax! I enjoyed it and highly recommend it..

I was give this book in exchange for an honest review.

Do you have a taste for the dark side? If so this is for you. This is not in my normal genre and was nervous I wouldn't like it - but was wrong. This is not for the faint of heart and it is gory, but very well written. I couldn't put it down until I was finished. Look forward to reading more from this author. ( )

After struggling through this book, I re-read all the reviews that have been written about the book, and still do not understand what these reviewers saw in this book. This is a dark story, though I really did not find much of a story there. Abby Winston is depressed and does not want to die. She ends up in a church one night wanting to die, and meets up with a strange character, who leads her into an even stranger tale/life. I really did not understand a lot of what the author was trying to say, though I read all the words, and I found myself even re-reading parts to see what I had missed. There is death, torture, memories of a crazy insane asylum/jail, and some sort of monster that Abby and this strange creature she meets in the church spend a lot of time feeding. I guess the biggest plus is to say that the author is very descriptive of the events and actions. However, I found very little plot or story and no real message. If you enjoy reading about dark, dark events, persona and happenings, then, this is a good book for you. Otherwise, frankly, I am not sure what to make of this book. I am also not sure I would recommend it to my friends who read voraciously as I do. I received this from Library Thing to read and review. ( )

I won an e-book copy of this one recently through LT's Member's Giveaway program. Horror-genre is outside of my usual reading comfort zone but the idea of a demonic being lurking in - or under - modern day Montreal intrigued me. That and the fact that I figured I could make it through this novella, even if I did find myself getting out of my comfort zone. The story does contain its bit of cringe worthy and disturbingly gory details, so if you are the squeamish type, like me, consider yourself forewarned.

The story has a wonderfully enticing start shrouded in gloomy mystery with refined elements that made me think of The Phantom of the Opera and the film adaptation of V for Vendetta. I wasn't prepared for the shift the story took to go back in time or the Merlin of Schwarz' imagination - a rather jarring shift to the senses, to say the least - but a shift I can appreciate as being key to story being told. Again, you need to have the stomach for the grim horror and rather vivid descriptions that Schwarz imbues his story with. I found our mysterious collector to be a complex,fascinating character and the shining star in this otherwise rather gloomy read. Abby was a 'take it or leave it' kind of character and as for the demon..... well.... that thing still gives me the creeps just thinking about it.

Parts of the story worked amazingly well for me. Some parts were just okay and others seemed to be a bit of a forced fit with the story. At the end I was left with some unanswered questions and I don't know if I just missed the meaning while reading or if something was missing in the story itself. I loved the idea of a complex clock that appears to count down to humanity's doomsday - a unique stopwatch with a winding down momentum mechanism if you will - which I found to be a very nice touch to include in this story.

Overall, I see quality in this story that is hard for me to quantify as I don't as a general rule read books of this genre, so my rating of this story should be viewed as a "one of" and not based on the viewpoint of a seasoned reader of the genre. ( )