"All the scary things that go bump in the night are real and you should pray you never come into contact with them in their true forms. They exist and are all around us. From the butcher and baker on St. Anne, to the little old doll maker on Royal, to the captain of my football team who happens to be a werewolf. In fact, your favorite restaurant could very well be run by an entire family of shape-shifting bears."
"But you know what? I strangely think I like it. And it is a whole lot of fun."
This is the story of Nick Gautier a character from the Dark-Hunter series years before he appears in Seize the Night. In this series, he becomes aware of the other world of demons, daimons, dark-hunters, shape shifters, zombies and everything else weird. Helping him in this journey is his...cynical bodyguard, Caleb and even better the gorgeous, kind, and mysterious Nekoda.
This series contains examples of:
- Aloof Ally: Nick has quite a few of these. Special mention should go to Caleb who says many times he would leave Nick if he wasn't his slave. This changes in fourth book. He realizes that everything he and Nick have went through has made them True Companions.
- Author Filibuster: From the first books onwards, Sherrilyn Kenyons messages become longer and longer.
- Badass Crew: The Ušumgallu. Aeron, one of the newest members, is someone Thorn said he'd run away from in a heartbeat. Then there is Caleb and Xev, two of the most powerful beings in an Ancient war between many extremely powerful beings. Dagon, who created the Were-Hunters, etc.
- Heroic Bastard: Many examples throughout the series.
- Bullying a Dragon: Grim, Laguerre, Principal Head, Stone. Even the primary dark god and goddess Noir and freaking Azura can be counted among those who bully Nick.
- Darker and Edgier: The series gets darker and darker as it progresses. In Book 1 Nick is a troubled teen, but seems to be coping with life. Now in Book 7 he is having full-out panic attacks, is suffering from nightmares and is slowly being driven insane by The Eye of Ananke.
- Deadpan Snarker: Nick.
- Eldritch Location: A lot of places in this series, and a lot of them are very easy to wander into. Nick will enter one if he ever loses conscious (as in get knocked out artificially. Not falling asleep). That means he can never drink, do drugs, or be put under by doctors.
- Jerkass: Too many to count and almost all of them pick on Nick. His first principal tried to get him kicked out and his second one isn't much better. He's bullied relentlessly and almost no one who picks on him gets in trouble because the teachers don't much care for him either. His father hates him (though that's not saying much). His new mentor in the second book Grim berates him, plays on his insecurities, wants to kill him bad, and at the end of the third book reveals to Nick that his girlfriend was sent to kill him. And these are just the top contenders for the Jerkass title.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: It's discovered that Adarian Malachai really does love Cherise when he dies saving her.
- Heroic BSoD: Parodied hilariously in the fourth book: In the middle of an apocalyptic event that is only pilling on top of days of stress, worry, and exhaustion it is only Bubba asking Nick to date his mom that makes him stop breathing and stare out in space for a full minute.
- Honor Among Thieves: Completely subverted. Nick is upset because his friends aren't this. It also leads to his resolve to put his old crimes behind him and start a new more honest life.
- How Do I Shot Web?: One of the main plots in the series is Nick learning how to control his powers.
- Noble Demon: Caleb and Nick.
- Our Vampires Are Different: The Dark-Hunters.
- Punny Name: In universe. Grim subs at Nick's school. He introduces himself as Mr. Graves.
- Ragin' Cajun: Nick is very proud of his Cajun heritage. It's justified since he adores his mother and his father's heritage is the demonic sum of all evil in the universe.
- Suicide is Shameful: Nekoda gives a long speech in order to dissuade Nick about how suicide is for cowards. He doesn't when he realizes what it would do to his mother.
- The Chew Toy: Nick cannot catch a break. At all. Even after 6 books of near endless suffering, where he finally manages to change the future to one where he doesn't go evil and end the world, he ends up with a future where his son turns evil instead. A son who, to make matters worse, has come back in time to destroy his father. Yah...
- The Dreaded: Nick is an example of this. It is stated numerous times that he is the most powerful demon ever spawned and he tends to frighten entire ARMIES of demons. Unfortunately in the Dark-Hunter/Chronicles of Nick-verse, demons are defiant in nature and tend to attack when scared. Another example would be Aeron being nervous around him after he stole some of Nick's blood to become corporeal and to save Nick's life.
- Trauma Conga Line: The third book is this.
- True Companions: Nick lampshades this in the third book. Looking back at the relationships he's made, he states that he sees all his supernatural allies and friends as family.
