Adam loves to drink alcohol. After all, he is immortal and can't die of scirrosis of the liver or any of the typical diseases that affect normal humans. Of course, this often leads to him waking up in strange places and with stranger people, but it's never been a problem. The problem comes when he discovers that some frat boys he's been hanging with following an epic kegger are found brutally murdered, their apartment having been trashed. He realizes someone was looking for him and was using a demon to do it. Further investigation tells him that someone wants him bad enough to put a full page ad in the newspaper written in ancient Latin and he also discovers a MUD dedicated to his whereabouts. This leads him to a young beauty named Clara (or rather, she is led to him) who is determined to discover his identity. Unfortunately, it also leads to Adam being taken by the mysterious man who seeks him.
The entire story is told a bit backwards, pretty much starting with Adam in his captive state, then telling how he got there, bit by bit. I love the ADD-style in which the book is written, meaning Adam will be continuing his story about how he got into his current predicament, only to offhandedly mention how someone reminds him of, say, a vampire named Eloise that he knew back in France in the 1700's. Then he'll go off on the Eloise tangent, telling her story, only to get right back to where he was before that. It's brilliant storytelling.
Adam's driving quest, aside from alcohol, is locating a strikingly beautiful red-haired woman with brilliant blue eyes. She, too, appears to be immortal as she turns up from time to time across the ages, only to make eye contact and then vanish before Adam is able to speak with her. He often gets into trouble seeking her and he is somewhat convinced that she has died since his last sighting of her ended in a deadly fire.
Along the way, Adam will talk about friends and foes across the ages such as the aforementioned vampire, Eloise, Jerry, an iffrit which is a tiny and untrustworthy man who loves to engage in all sorts of debauchery, Iza, a tame pixie who helps Adam along the way, a few demons here and there, a not-so-bright Pharoah and, worst of all, a very clever and dangerous businessman.
Throughout Immortal, Doucette keeps the reader completely engaged and the book never once lags or stumbles. While it's pretty obvious that Doucette isn't a big fan of organized religion, Adam's character clearly has no use for the stuff, having pre-dated just about everything you can think of. If you love a good page turner, check out Immortal. There's adventure, mystery, love, sex and violence, all wrapped up in a cleverly written tale about a flawed individual, just one that happens to be thousands of years old. Highly recommended.
