Book Review: 'Demon Summer' by Elaine Booth Selig
'Demon Summer' (224 pp) was published by Pocket Books in June 1979. The cover artist is uncredited.
Elaine Booth Selig wrote a number of novels during the 70s, including 'Mariner's End' (1977) and 'Scorpion Summer' (1977).
'Demon Summer' has an attention-getting cover, but alas, it's really a pretty lukewarm novel.
'Demon' is set in the late 70s, and as the novel opens, the Spencer family - John, wife Kathy, and infant son Christopher - are aboard the ferry from Bayshore to Fire Island, where John has just secured a job as pastor of the Unitarian Universalist church.
It seems like a plum assignment, but John is a soyboy - ambivalent about his decision to enter the ministry, and impatient with what he sees as the outmoded and simplistic theology and doctrines of mainline Unitarians. He anticipates conflict with the congregation, who are accustomed to a more traditional interpretation of Unitarian theology.
There also are tensions with Kathy, over John's impotence (back in '79 there was no such thing as Viagra). While John blames his service in Vietnam as the cause of his Limpness, there may be other reasons (let's wink and snap our fingers !) why he finds it difficult to have sex with his wife. Kathy does her best to be the Understanding Spouse who supports her husband through all his difficulties, but for her, the absence of physical intimacy is becoming more and more disheartening.
The residents of Fire Island are very welcoming to the Spencers, although the village eccentric, an elderly woman named Ida Leighton, speaks knowingly of the 'dangers' of witches and the ability of bells to ward off 'evil spirits'. She also imparts a troubling anecdote: the previous pastors at the Fire Island Unitarian church have a habit of dying in accidents, or going mad, soon after taking office........
As the Spencers settle into the parsonage and go about building their ministry, their first Summer on the island seems to offer the promise of a rewarding life. But when Kathy begins having erotic dreams in which she is possessed by a demonic horse (?!), it's a signal that all might not be what it seems, among the idyllic dunes fronting the Atlantic coast.....
While it's a well-written book, 'Demon' disappoints by failing to live up to the potential of its premise - modern-day Satanists living large in a resort town - and squanders much of the narrative in documenting marital melodrama. It's never a good sign when the most appealing personality in the entire novel is that of 'Punk', the Satanic Kitten, nor when the first overt appearance of any truly occult plot point doesn't happen until page 166, a good four-fifths into the novel.
The closing chapter tries to redeem the indolence of the earlier portion of the narrative by abruptly layering on some 'Rosemary's Baby' - style antics, but they seem forced, and I finished 'Demon Summer' thinking that it tried, unsuccessfully, to straddle the ground between a Gothic Romance and the modern horror story. This novel can be passed on without penalty.
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