Carpe Demon by Julie Kenner

When Kate Conner, an average stay-at-home-mom with a husband, two kids, and a mortgage, finds a real demon in her neighborhood Wal-Mart, all hell breaks loose. What the demon doesn’t realize that Kate is a retired demon hunter and while she’s a little out of practice, she’s still as deadly as ever. Unfortunately her family doesn’t know about her past. Now Kate is on to the biggest challenge of her life (okay, second biggest challenge – coordinating the car pool is still number one ;) ), a high demon is interested in a holy relic stored in a nearby cathedral. So unless she finds a way to stop the demon and his minions, her family, her town and possibly the whole world may be destroyed.

This is one of the funniest books I’ve read in a while, but I guess it really doesn’t qualify as a romance novel, because there isn’t any romance :( . Julie painted an incredibly detailed picture of everyday life in a modern suburban community. But when you least expect it, she seamlessly drops you into a paranormal world that coexists with the one we’re familiar. For example, you’re shopping for dog food in your local Wal-Mart, and you notice a demon in a human body, shopping there too. This book is so good, it’s not going in my have-been-read-read pile, but going back in my to-be-read pile, so that when I get a copy of the sequel California Demon, I’ll read the pair together.