Review: Love him? Or hate him?
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 08 14, 2012
Dex Foray.  Man of mystery.  Or at least, he was.  After getting a lengthy glimpse into the craggy landscape that is his tortured brain, he's not entirely the riddle he once was.  The Dex files gives the fans of the EIT series an up close and personal view of where he comes from, where is is and where he's going: straight from the horse's mouth.Is he the character that you love to hate or hate to love?  At the onset of the book, he's more the former than the latter.  In the beginning, he's the guy you'd like to strangle.  He's the embodiment of just about every bad male trait there is.  He's a self admitted hypocrite and skirt chaser.  He's cynical in the extreme.  He looks out for number one.  When he's not berating the people around him mentally, he's figuring out how he can steal your girlfriend.  That's the type of guy Dex is.In the beginning.There are reasons for why Dex is the way he is though.  It's hard to blame him for his attitude and behavior.  Crazy mother?  Seeing the bloody spectral images of ghosts at every turn?  Being dependent on mind altering prescription drugs to keep the demons at bay?  Having his perceived one true shot at a life with a woman he actually cared about violently torn away from him?  Is it any wonder why he is the way he is?No.  And that's what makes The Dex files a joy to read.As each tale gives way to the next, we're treated to the most important thing in the life of any character: Growth.  After all, if Dex didn't start at rock bottom, there wouldn't be anywhere for him to go, would there.  THAT'S what we're given in the Dex files.  The biggest growth (other than the perpetual one in his pants) is his feelings towards Perry.  Anybody who's read the series knows how he feels about her.  But that's from her perspective.  Seeing it from HIS perspective is an altogether different thing.  It's straight from the source.  Undiluted, uncolored.  We get to see him go from just wanting to get some action to someone who cares to someone who's in love.  In the end?  We see someone who's trying to become a better man because he's opening himself to the fact that he loves Perry.  No matter what.My hat's off (as it always is!) to Karina Halle for once again being able to enter the mind of another one of her characters and give their inner thoughts their own completely unique voice.  We've been getting steady doses of Perry's personality and then she switched gears in Old Blood by writing through Pippa's POV and now we get it from Dex.  And it feels right.  It's exactly as I expected Dex would think, how he would sound in his own head.There's also a very good variety in the storytelling as it revisits familiar scenes from the series.  They range from the sad to the depressing to the nearly uplifting to the steamy (as an aside, a couple of these stories could almost be described as erotica and very well written erotica at that.  Always with a purpose though as it serves the story and character development as a whole.I think the last story in particular is the most intriguing because we get to see what happens immediately after the final page has been turned in On Demon Wings.  Something interesting going on with a certain someone.  I have my suspicions but I rule nothing out as Halle is a clever devil ;)Annnd, this review is becoming a novella in itself.  Stop reading it.  Go read the book.  If you haven't read the previous ones, go do so now!