Sierra Simone’s Newest Masterpiece: Devil
It is quite hard to try and distill the experience of reading Sierra Simone's words into writing of my own. This may not land for everyone but her books remind me of listening to a live orchestra. She is the conductor using words like the strings of violins to pull emotion after emotion from my gut. It's a full body experience. Sentences that have the hair rising on the back of my neck, others that have a warm syrup fill my limbs, and some that make my stomach shake. But by the end, I always feel a catharsis, a sense that I am wholly illuminated by a story. Changed.
Sure, is this possibly a dramatic response? Of course. I am a wholly dramatic person but that is how I would describe it.
And, after reading her newest book, Devil, I feel this way entirely. It’s a story of a charismatic student who corrupts his teacher with a pomegranate and his beguiling golden curls.
Devil is a book that begs the question of where the line between obsession, abuse, and adoration lies. How do people cope with needs that lead them into unsafe situations? And the altogether puzzling question of whether there is something truly beautiful to be found down there in the pits of that situation.
Ryan Bell is not the hero you should dream of and Birdie Cooper is not the heroine to sculpt yourself into. But they are the perfect characters to journey with in a quest for love.
Why this love story works in such a profound way is because their needs and wants align. Ryan, the man who is obsessed - and I mean obsessed like the definition - has shaped nearly a decade of his life around a woman because of the feeling he got when he looked into her eyes. His actions were so far past rational that they moved into an absurdist version of devotion. When you look at the facts it might make your stomach turn but love is so rarely about facts. Stories hinge on feelings. And what we see is a man who cherishes the women in front of him as if she were the rarest jewel. It is something we feel rather than think about.
His perfect counterpart is someone who longs to be cherished. And Birdie is just that. She is the girl who has toiled away in an isolated existence. Her world and her circle was always small, but when Bell's careless actions rip her away from the life she carefully chiseled, she is shoved into a life where she is endlessly treading deep water so far away from any type of rescue that it would not take much to pull her under completely. She is bone-numbingly lonely for years with no one to care for her or adore her or cherish every freckle and curl.
That is why when you read a tale like this one, where so many of the facts are wrong, your heart wins over. You feel more than anything else how powerful it is to be cherished by someone who believes it is their soul purpose in life.
In many ways, this purpose is the underlying theme in the Bell Brothers series. Each book is grounded in the conversations of purpose versus vocation and where that intersects with faith. These conversations in each book are truly my favorite part of the series. Simone has this incredible way of holding space for faith and intimacy– so much so that I plan to dive deeper with each of the siblings. What I will say now, this book feels like a masterclass in the theology of lust.
In all honesty, my head submitted to my heart very quickly with this book. At this point, I go into a Sierra Simone book knowing I will be safe and well taken care of and she does her part by giving me explicit warnings at the beginning of the book and with the knowledge that she knows and sees the realities of these characters. I let her take me on a journey. Then, at the end she checks in one more time, just to make sure you are okay. She takes time to care for her readers because she just dragged us along with her characters as they went to hell and back. So if you read her warning and you ask yourself whether you could go on this journey, then yes, I think you must absolutely read Sierra Simone's latest foray into sex, love, and God. Devil.
