Luck of the Devil by Patricia Eimer

I hesitate to say this aloud because I'll jinx myself, but if I've ever had the luck of the devil it was in inheriting my mother's ability to avoid traffic tickets.  I think it still makes my sister's eye twitch a bit to hear this, but I've been pulled over seven times since I start driving without ever receiving a ticket.

No, Officer, it wasn't me.

To be fair, a couple of those stops were small-town nuisance stops*.   The first of those happened because (I am QUITE sure) the cop thought he was pulling over my little brother.  The second was for a bad tail light.  I was also once pulled over for failure to turn on my head lights, but it wasn't my car, and I was playing designated driver.  That time the officer must have simply felt sorry for me as he watched my passengers "help" me during the traffic stop.

*Not from a small town?  Where I grew up the town cops didn't have too much to do other than check on local high school students. Sometimes they were a little too vigilant.  I most definitely did come to a complete stop, but it's as good excuse as any to check to see if a 16-year-old has booze in the car.  Not that I knew anyone who did that. ;)

I have, however, been pulled over once for speeding in a well-known speed trap (Villa Grove) and been pulled over once for speeding on the open road (U.S. 36, just outside of Newman).  Both times I got off with written warnings.  That's Miss Binnie's luck shining through.  All in all, it's not a bad inheritance.

A perfect beach read

Faith Bettincourt, our heroine from Luck of the Devil by Patricia Eimer,  has a different type of inheritance.  From her father, she received horns, black wings and a tail.  She can also phase from one place to the next. (Think, Beam me up, Scottie, but with the Devil's magic, not Scottie's technology.)  Faith is a demoness, the offspring of a kookie human and Lucifer Morningstar himself.  She also a pediatric nurse trying to live in the human realm.  She's trying to start her vacation but she's got problems.  She's got sibling problems, parental problems, roommate problems, and "someone is trying to take my powers and kill me" problems.  Her vacation begins with some seriously bad luck, not at all the luck of the devil.

Luck of the Devil is a fun and irreverent romp of a romance.  Faith's geeky-cute neighbor has a pretty big secret, but that just means he's quite comfortable with Faith's secrets and all her assorted problems.  (A girl's gotta hide that tail and those horns, right?  And how do you casually introduce your date to your demonic dad?)

I found the author's blog through the BettyVerse and clicked around enough to find this book.  I'm so glad I did.  I would call this a perfect beach read.  Fun and light.  If you take all discussions of good and evil seriously, this probably isn't the book for you.  But if you like a lot of irreverence in your reading, Luck of the Devil you're in for a treat.