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The Demonologist

By Andrew Pyper

About The Book
**WINNER OF THE 2014 THRILLER AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL**

Fans of The Historian won’t be able to put down this spellbinding literary horror story in which a Columbia professor must use his knowledge of demonic mythology to rescue his daughter from the Underworld.

Professor David Ullman is among the world’s leading authorities on demonic literature, with special expertise in Milton’s Paradise Lost. Not that David is a believer—he sees what he teaches as a branch of the imagination and nothing more. So when the mysterious Thin Woman arrives at his office and invites him to travel to Venice and witness a “phenomenon,” he turns her down. She leaves plane tickets and an address on his desk, advising David that her employer is not often disappointed.

That evening, David’s wife announces she is leaving him. With his life suddenly in shambles, he impulsively whisks his beloved twelve-year-old daughter, Tess, off to Venice after all. The girl has recently been stricken by the same melancholy moods David knows so well, and he hopes to cheer her up and distract them both from the troubles at home.

But what happens in Venice will change everything.

First, in a tiny attic room at the address provided by the Thin Woman, David sees a man restrained in a chair, muttering, clearly insane… but could he truly be possessed? Then the man speaks clearly, in the voice of David’s dead father, repeating the last words he ever spoke to his son. Words that have left scars—and a mystery—behind.

When David rushes back to the hotel, he discovers Tess perched on the roof’s edge, high above the waters of the Grand Canal. Before she falls, she manages to utter a final plea: Find me.

What follows is an unimaginable journey for David Ullman from skeptic to true believer. In a terrifying quest guided by symbols and riddles from the pages of Paradise Lost, David must track the demon that has captured his daughter and discover its name. If he fails, he will lose Tess forever.

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A Conversation with Andrew Pyper 

Q: Your main character, David Ullman, is a literature professor who specializes in Milton’s Paradise Lost. How familiar were you with that text before you started writing The Demonologist? How did you use that poem to help shape the plot and events in your novel?  

I'd read Paradise Lost as an undergrad at university, but remembered little about it. No, not true: I remembered few details, but carried with me with the persuasive arguments and pitiable dilemma of its arguable protagonist, Satan. For the stretches when he is its speaker, I found the poem electrifying, almost dangerous in its charms. But when the devil is off-stage, I remember feeling it was a bit of a slog. At the time, I would have agreed with Dr. Johnson's assessment that "None ever wished it longer."  

Jump ahead twenty years, and I'm a novelist. (I'm also a father – this will become significant in a moment). For some time, I'd been pondering a way to create a new kind of demonic mythology in a work of fiction, one without priests or exorcisms or scalding holy water or the usual trappings of a "possession" story. I wanted to imagine a narrative that made demons seem grounded and real – a plausible explanation for why some people, some of the time, act in the irrational ways they do. To achieve this, the relationship between the human and demonic actors in the story would have to be at once mysterious and coherent, fantastical and believable. It was in devising what might be used as the foundation to this world that I recalled Paradise Lost. Again, it wasn't the poem as such that I thought of, but the feeling it left me with, the vibrancy of its anti-hero, his pain and veiled fury and terrible loneliness. In short, it was a character I thought of first. An emotional connection, not a monster.

Q: David is a scholar of demonology, but he’s firmly secular in his personal life. How much of you is there in that character?  

As with all my protagonists, there is a good part of myself in David Ullman, though there are more numerous parts I have nothing in common with. David and I are both fathers, both readers, both bookworms. And yes, neither of us are religious in any meaningful way. But where I leave a door ajar in my mind for the entry of the impossible and inexplicable and uncanny, David is (at the start of the novel anyway) a wholly committed atheist, a rationalist, the kind of man who sees faith as an inferior intellectual practice. On that score, among others – the entertainment of wild thinking – we couldn't be more different.

Q: Another trait you share with David is fatherhood. What was it like writing a novel about a father trying to rescue his daughter from not only death, but possibly a fate worse than death—demonic possession?  

It might sound strange to say that I frequently wept while writing a suspense thriller about demons, but working through The Demonologist brought a lot emotions close to the surface, many of them surprising me in their rawness and ferocity. Primary among these is the love I have for my children, and because Tess is a girl, I thought mostly about my own daughter, Maude. Never has a dedication been more deserved, as there's no way I could have found a way into this story – nor to David, nor even to the particular suffering of the Unnamed – without her. I knew that to make the novel work on an emotional level, I had to imagine the situation I fear most. To make the reader afraid, I had to be afraid. And I often was. It's all made me a more grateful parent, believe me.

Q: The Demonologist is a superb thriller in its own right, but is also crosses into the horror genre. As a writer, what do you think make for the scariest scenes? How do you put a twist on a realistic thriller to give it the qualities people look for in a horror novel?  

Horror, for me, is not defined by the thing that provokes one's fear, but the human being who has contact with it. I love scary stories and horror movies, though in my opinion they can too often fail to be fully realized aesthetic experiences because the emphasis is on the monster, the ghost, the vampire, instead of on why the uncanny has chosen to visit a particular character, how they experience it, the ways they are altered by this tear in the normal fabric of their lives. Q

: What is the scariest book you’ve ever read?  

There is no winner here, only a deeply influential shortlist. I remember my mother forbidding me from reading Stephen King's The Shining when I was halfway through it as a kid, it made me so skittish and plagued by nightmares and generally worrying to live with (though I naturally ignored her). Later, Henry James's The Turn of the Screw showed me how delicious it could be, as a reader, to walk the razor's edge between believing the ghosts (or whatever uncanny thing) in a story are "real," or the psychological projections of the character. Later still, Dennis McFarland's A Face at the Window proved – as if it needed proving – that a literary novel of character and horror are not only compatible, but potentially better partnered than any other sub-genres.  

Finally, though, I return to childhood. To a week I spent at a Christian summer camp (don't ask), reading the bible in my tent while cowering from the bullies who declared, from the moment I got off the bus, that "By the end of the week...you're dead." It was there that I came upon the Book of Revelations. It's haunted me ever since.

Q: Has writing The Demonologist changed any of your beliefs about the paranormal?  

Yes, and I think I’ll just leave it at that.

About The Author
Photograph by Heidi Pyper
Andrew Pyper

Andrew Pyper is the internationally bestselling author of ten previous novels, including The Demonologist, which won the International Thriller Writers award for Best Hardcover Novel, and The Killing Circle, which was selected a New York Times Best Crime Novel of the Year. He lives in Toronto. Visit AndrewPyper.com and follow him on Twitter @AndrewPyper.

Product Details
  • Publisher: Simon & Schuster (March 5, 2013)
  • Length: 304 pages
  • ISBN13: 9781451697537

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Raves and Reviews

“Smart, thrilling, and utterly unnerving. Pyper’s gift is that he deeply respects his readers, yet still insists on reducing them to quivering children. I like that in a writer.”

– Gillian Flynn, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Gone Girl

“Plenty of books claim to be scary, but this is genuinely terrifying, don’t-read-late-at-night stuff. Thrilling, compelling and beautifully written, The Demonologist makes Rosemary's Baby feel like a walk in the park.”

– S.J. Watson, New York Times bestselling author of Before I Go To Sleep

“It’s impossible to ignore the devils and demons who have a tangible presence in this story, but the novel’s deeper pleasure comes from the analysis Ullman applies to these horrors . . . Bring on the devils.”

– The New York Times Book Review

"In the sly, creepy and often-horrific The Demonologist, Andrew Pyper knows how to get under the skin of even the most rational reader."

– Columbus Dispatch

“A chilling novel for readers who like their horror presented with literary flair.”

– Fort Worth Star-Telegram

"Mesmerizing . . . The plot zigs and zags. Coincidences turn into horrors. Appearances deceive. This novel will haunt you relentlessly."

– Providence Journal

“The intellectual’s Stephen King, Pyper lifts a tale of the impossible to the realm of waking nightmare.”

– CurledUp.com

“A mesmerizing and melancholy narrative voice lends chilling credibility to this exceptional supernatural thriller.”

– Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"This book is going to be big, and it’s going to be popular, and it absolutely deserves to be both of these things. You should buy it, and read it, and let it scare you stupid."

– The National Post (Canada)

“A fast-paced Exorcist-meets-Da Vinci Code.”

– Maclean's (Canada)

“A complex novel about loss, anger, faith, grief, love and forgiveness . . . [The Demonologist] will frighten you out of your shoes.”

– Toronto Star

“Pyper’s novel is enthralling in its subdued intensity. There are no pyrotechnics à la William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist—more a slow burn to a pulse-pounding end.”

– Montreal Gazette

“Pyper is an intelligent writer, steeped in Miltonian symbolism, gifted with language . . . This artful literary exploration of evil’s manifestation makes for a sophisticated horror tale.”

– Kirkus Reviews

"The evil of Milton's pandemonium comes to life . . . Pyper's novel takes on "things that go bump in the brain" and delivers a stirring entry in the supernatural thriller genre."

– Booklist

“Looking at the premise . . . you could be forgiven for thinking you’re about to crack open another DaVinci Code imitator, a sensationalistic voyage of carefully placed clues, perfectly timed cliffhangers and impossible revelations. Don’t fall for it. In these pages, Pyper has done something more. . . . The Demonologist is at its heart a painfully human drama about loss, redemption and belief. . . . A surprisingly weighty page-turner.”

– BookPage

“With The Demonologist, Andrew Pyper has created a truly blood-curdling work that will have readers looking over their shoulders and on edge from beginning to end. Whereas other classics in the genre have focused on battling evil, this novel seeks to understand the very nature of evil from its origins. The fact that he is able to breathe life into the book’s plausibility creates an unsettling feeling and completely satisfying horror read without ever becoming clichéd in the process.”

– Bookreporter.com

"Part horror, part thriller, all page-turner . . . The Demonologist has all the twisting excitement of a Dan Brown novel, and all the lurid, gory violence of a Stieg Larsson."

– The Globe and Mail (Canada)

"Pyper’s a star because he writes so spectacularly. The entire story is drenched in dread, and his most terrifying scenes are so vivid, you’d best not be reading the book just before hitting the sack."

– NOW magazine (Canada)

“This is storytelling that transcends the boundaries of genre: mystery (a vanished child), thriller (evil), a page-turner. It’s beautifully written, with layer upon layer of fear, redemption and deep feelings rarely expressed in a fiction. The Demonologist should not be missed.”

– Hamilton Spectator

“Richly crafted, deliriously scary and compulsively page-turning from beginning to end. Imagine The Exorcist and The Da Vinci Code as penned by Daphne du Maurier. Don't miss this one!”

– Jeffery Deaver, New York Times bestselling author of XO

“Smart and astonishing, Andrew Pyper has created a recurring nightmare for adults. The Demonologist holds a mirror to the reader and reveals the places where our deepest darkness lurks. Like Milton’s Paradise Lost, this is the story of the human condition, the fall, and the way back. I slept with the light on for nights, too obsessed to stop reading and too terrified to dream.”

– Brunonia Barry, New York Times bestselling author of The Lace Reader and The Map of True Places

“The Demonologist is that rare thing—a novel that is both genuinely terrifying and erudite. The research is excellent and lightly worn, the pace and cleverness of the plot thrilling. One of the most exciting works of fiction I’ve read for some time.”

– Kate Mosse, New York Times bestselling author of Labyrinth, Sepulchre and Citadel

“As compelling and smoothly chilling a tale as you’ll find this year. The Demonologist shows an enormously gifted writer at the top of his game, producing a novel of eerie menace and unique depth. Those of us who write supernatural stories do not throw the names Ira Levin, William Peter Blatty, and Peter Straub around lightly. You’ll be hearing all three associated with Mr. Pyper soon, and all such comparisons are warranted, the highest praise I can offer.”

– Michael Koryta, New York Times bestselling author of The Prophet

“Andrew Pyper’s satisfying prose propels a narrative sure to please readers with or without a dog-eared copy of Milton’s Paradise Lost on their shelves. If you’re looking for smart horror that chills without resorting to Grand Guignol, give The Demonologist a try.”

– Christopher Buehlman, author of Those Across the River

“Andrew Pyper is a rare breed. Reading The Demonologist is like running through a house on fire—you’ve got to get through; nothing will stop you. And when you’re out, brokenhearted and bewildered, you’re left wondering if what happened was real. That’s Pyper’s brilliance: he does it so well you never see the fiction. Contemporary and masterful, this is grown up horror for grown up people.”

– Sarah Langan, three-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Audrey's Door

“Recommended for teens who enjoy intelligent, literary puzzles . . . Genuinely scary and unexpected.”

– School Library Journal

“A road tour of American-Gothic grotesquery. Effective, literate, nightmarish.”

– The Sunday Telegraph (UK)

A stunningly crafted, intelligent and moving horror story . . . There is an elegance to the storytelling and a command of what evil may mean, that lingers with you long after the end. No surprise that it is in development as a major film.

– Daily Mail (UK)

"A chilling exploration of how we all have to do battle with our own demons."

– Mail on Sunday (UK), Thriller of the Week

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The Demonologist

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