Dream Warrior by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Cratus is a Greek God, the son of Warcraft and the Goddess of Hate. He had a horrible childhood, but became a protector of Olympus along with his sister, Nike, working for Zeus, the head of the Pantheon. But when he was ordered to kill a small baby, Cratus couldn't find it in him to do such a thing. He refused, and was punished by the gods, and Zeus himself, with exile, being stripped of his powers and mutilation for going against the Gods.

He was also punished in another way. Every time he went to sleep, the Oneroi, the Gods of sleep, would kill him in cruel, savage and inventive ways during the night, drawing out the agony until he was dead. And with every morning, he would be resurrected to begin again. He wasn't allowed to amass money or possessions; every time he did so, disaster would befall him. So he allowed himself not to care, and he did the lowest jobs imagineable, drank himself to sleep and dragged himself on through another hellish day.

But now the Gods need him once again. The power of the void resides within the God Noir and the Goddess Azusa, and they have turned on the Greek Pantheon and aim to slaughter the Gods and bring about Armageddon. The first powers they fought against were the Oneroi, and Delphine, who has been an Oneroi since she turned 14, is assigned to Cratos to seduce him to her side.

All this is a shock for Delphine, who happens to be a virgin. She was never an erotic Oneroi, so she has no idea how to go about seducing a man. But if she needs to do so to save herself, her friends and the ones she loves, then so be it. But when Cratus is turned by Azusa, Delphine is captured by Noir and Azusa's men and given to Cratus to be his slave. Cratus, who prefers to be called Jericho, wants revenge on the Gods, but doesn't want any slaves. Not even beautiful female Oneroi who turn him inside out with wanting.

With her powers constrained by Azusa and her mortal emotions restored as well, Delphine picks at Cratus' defenses, but finds herself sympathizing with him, and even, perhaps, falling in love with him? But when Jericho finds out that Delphine is the baby he once saved, he is astonished, and falls for her even harder. But can he save the Greek Gods from the very pissed-off Azusa and Noir? And can he save Delphine from those among the Gods who would kill her? But who could have anything against the innocent Delphine? And could those attacks bring about the very future the malevolent deity is trying to prevent?

Is there any way for Delphine and Jericho to be together forever? And can she and the other Oneroi deal with getting their emotions back so suddenly. Can Cratus and Delphine prevent the death of the world?

Lately, it seems that Sherrilyn Kenyon has given up on normal humans being part of her stories. With the exception of Tori, Acheron's wife, all her current books seem to involve immortals on both sides of the romance. And, another thing that is getting old very quickly is immortal men who have had the absolute worst life growing up that can possibly be imagined. It's as if the male characters were stamped out, cookie-cutter style. Not a single one of them had anything approaching a happy life, and all the men are completely damaged by it to the point where they have a hard time trusting anyone.

It's not necessarily a bad device for male character development, but Ms. Kenyon has fallen into a rut where this is concerned. All four of the last four stories of hers I read had nearly identical plots where the male character's childhood were concerned. Of course, Acheron Parthenopaus wins hands down in any sort of "My childhood was worse than yours" contest, but it's gotten to the point where it seems like a lazy way to generate conflict in the romance for Ms. Kenyon. Just make the male character have an ultra-shitty childhood and your work is half done!

Well, maybe, but that option is getting so old its eligible for medicare, social security, and a pension. Can't she come up with something else? Anything else? How about changing it up so it's the woman who has the horrible childhood and won't trust anyone? Something to change it and mix it up. Please!

Otherwise, it's not a bad story, but the overused plot device got on my nerves so that I didn't enjoy the story as much as I could have. I liked the idea of a war to unseat Zeus, who acts in a completely underhanded way in the story, but while the idea that Armageddon could happen if the Oneroi were destroyed or subverted by Azusa and Noir was undercut by the fact that no human characters appear in the story or are affected by all the fighting... which makes the threat not quite so immediate to me.

This book is a mixed bag, and I still recommend Sherrilyn Kenyon's books and the entire universe to readers, but be warned that you won't want to read these latest books in quick succession, as they are too much alike and can lead to feeling bored with reading the same plot for the male character over and over and over and over again. Mix it up and read all over the place so that you'll enjoy the stories more.