Title The Neon God Series --- Author Ben D'Alessio Cover Art --- Publisher BookBaby - 2019 First Printing BookBaby - 2019 Category Urban Fantasy Warnings Sex, alcohol, cannibalism Main Characters Dionysus, Zibby Main Elements Gods

In the suffocating bosom of August, Dionysus arrives in New Orleans. For too long, the Greek God of Revelry and Wine has endured the incessant bickering atop Mt. Olympus, and so he descends to be with the mortals and indulge himself in the city's reputed decadence and vice. When Dionysus is parched and aching for even a drop of the vine, he mistakenly stumbles into a bookstore and begs an employee who reminds him of the last pharaoh of Egypt—Cleopatra—to point him in the direction of wine. Zibby Dufossat, on the cusp of her first year of law school and desperate for a distraction, sets aside her anxieties to peel back the layers of the esoteric, anachronistic, and often offensive beautiful stranger, only to find heartache and pain. But before she can decipher this enigma, he disappears into the French Quarter fray of sweaty, gyrating lovers. With grapevines sprouting from the path he walks and an unexplainable, addictive libido placing the city under his spell, the god deflects his retinue of Olympians and fantastical creatures attempting to deliver him back home. But it soon becomes clear that Dionysus alone can determine his fate, and the fates of Zibby and New Orleans with it.

Though I'd spent the whole year reading Greek Myth, Dionysus doesn't show up much. He appeared in the novel Ariadne, because he was her husband, and a few other tales along the way. So I was eager to see what a modern author would do with this young god who, for what it's worth, seems more human than most, or at least tries to be.

The problem I found was that there were two storylines. One about a young woman studying to be a lawyer, yes her tale crosses that of the Greek god, but for the most part she's just going to school, working in a bookstore, and drinking with friends. Her story didn't interest me too much though it wasn't boring, it was well written enough to avoid that. But I wanted to read something about mythology, not the intricacies of Lousiana law.

Dionysus' tale started off well, he appears in New Orleans but has no clue about what's going on around him (really? cars aren't new, unless he had his head under a rock up on Olympus how did he not notice what was happening around the world? but ok, let's assume he's been away for a while). He spends his time drinking and calling every black person he meets a Nubian, and when the gay quarter discovers this most beautiful boy, he basically becomes a prostitute and the rest of the book is him having sex in exchange for payment in wine. I don't mind gay sex scenes, but this was just sex, there wasn't anything remotely resembling love except when Adonis appears to tell Dionysus that he prefers Apollo and crushes the poor god of the vine's heart.

It all wraps up with Dionysus' followers going crazy, the women turning into Maenads and ripping every man they come across into pieces, and then the other gods trying to get this weird apocalypse to stop by wiping Louisiana off the map through a Zeus generated hurricane.

And yet, I found the book well written enough that I still enjoyed reading it, even if it made no sense whatsoever. I looked forward to the occasional meeting with another of the gods who pop by from time to time to get Dionysus to come home. And the girl in law school felt like it had something of a plot going on, but the rest was just a lot of sex and alcohol and making New Orleans come off as even more decadent and debauched that it probably is.

For what it's worth, I nabbed it when it was free on Amazon, so for a free read, it was pretty decent.