ARC review Jenn Bennett – Banishing the Dark

The fourth book in the Arcadia Bell series, to be published May 27, 2014.
Genre: urban fantasy
Cover: nice, but not as good as the others in this series.



In this new instalment in a beloved urban fantasy series, gutsy renegade mage and tiki bar owner Arcadia Bell faces the last danger standing between her old identity and a new future she desperately wants: herself. After surviving a supernatural battle with Hellfire Club leader Ambrose Dare, Cady and her demon boyfriend, Lon Butler, journey across California to find the source of her mysterious Moonchild origins. But the further they travel, the stranger the revelations about her parents' past occult lives. Can Cady keep what's rightfully hers, or will she have to make the ultimate sacrifice to stop her murderous mother from crossing the planes?


When Cady finally wakes up from her coma, she doesn’t remember everything that happened right away. It takes some time from Lon and his son Jupe to tell her everything and explain what happened in the past month. She won’t be prosecuted for killing Dare in self defense, that problem was taken care of. Only a few people know what really happened. And Kar Yee has been visiting her in the hospital often, so she is no longer mad at Cady for hiding her past from her.

As long as Cady’s mother thinks she is still in a coma, she will be safe from being taken over. But they will have to find the Moonchild spell her parents used when conceiving her, and try to reverse it, or she will never be free of her mother’s manipulations. Her mother has killed one of the more powerful demon Lords in the Aether, and now she is looking for a way to get back to earth, for good.

And what will happen when her mother finds out that Cady is pregnant, it can only mean disaster and danger for their unborn child. So there is only one solution: Cady must forget she is pregnant herself, so her mother cannot find that out from her mind. But putting the memory spell on Cady, makes her forget even more things: her love for Lon and the live they shared for the past six months. And so she tries to act like they are friends/polite strangers which is very hard on both of them. She doesn’t understand the attraction she feels for Lon, or the jealousy when some waitress is flirting with him.

Going on a roadtrip together to find out the truth, is not easy. Cady will have to sleep during the day, so she is awake when the moon shines and her mother’s powers are the strongest. Her own powers are erratic and she discovers new ones every day.

In the meanwhile, with some poking from Priya, Cady’s messenger, Jupe tries to find out things on his own while Lon and Cady are away from home. And he might just have found the missing pieces...

But will it all be enough to fight of Cady’s mother when she is determined to take over Cady’s body and more importantly, her powers?


After the evil cliffhanger ending of book three, I had to read this book as soon as the ARC became available (in January). I just had to find out what would happen.

I have to admit, after the action of the previous book, this one started out very tame. I kept waiting for the danger to start again, the action to make me sit on the edge of my seat. And well, it just didn’t happen until the very last few chapters of the book. So yes, I am a bit disappointed as I was expecting more.

Not that the story was not intriguing or bad, I really enjoyed it. Finding out what horrible things her parents had done in the past, how they used people and Cady provided a worthwhile background. But I just wanted more. Like, what demon did they use? Was that not the purpose of the pictures Lon took? And I still do not know what Mother of Ahriman means.

I truly loved Jupe in this book. Falling all over this girl he met, and trying to impress her. That was fun, and brave of him. I hope for a spin off book about Jupe some time, when he is grown up and finding his way in the world.

Yes, the end of a series can be a sad thing for a reader who has fallen in love with a world and the characters that live in it.

8 stars.

© 2014 Reviews by Aurian