Review: Heart Doctor

Title: Heart Doctor
Series: City Hospital
Author: Drew Zachary
Publisher: Torquere Press
Publication Date: May 2009
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 132 pages

Rating: 2 out of 5

Blurb:
Drey Banerjee, head nurse on the cardiac floor at City Hospital, loves his job. He loves it even more when heart doctor Brady MacDonald joins the team. Brady is cute, good at his job, and also gay. Soon the two are flirting like crazy and Drey's showing Brady the ropes, the local diner, his bedroom...

Brady's got rules, though, about not dating his co-workers. Not to mention the hospital frowns on fraternization between employees who work the same floor. Where does that leave Drey and Brady when innocent flirting begins leading to much, much more? With a cast of secondary characters egging Drey and Brady on, Heart Doctor is a heartwarming and delightful tale of falling in love.

Review:

Main Characters:
Drey is out and proud, loving his job as head nurse in the cardiac floor at which Brady is a new arrival. He's half-Indian and loves to cook... and that's about the extent of what we know about him. He's sassy and upbeat, but in a rather generic way; there's nothing in particular that makes him stand out as anything but half of an erotic equation.

Brady is equally difficult to get a hold on. Although he's initially more interested in circumspection than Drey, his rules quickly fly out the window. Beyond those rules and his relationships with Drey and, to a lesser extent, Eve, we're never really shown much about him. We know he likes to work out and doesn't cook, but we know nothing about his actual life--does he have friends? family? past lovers?--and that leaves him decidedly hollow, a vehicle for smut and not much else.

Chemistry:
Drey and Brady spend the vast majority of the book having sex in one form or another, but I never really felt drawn into it. Their lack of individual personalities made the depicted sex kind of sterile to me, like watching digital wire models going at it, unfinished and unsatisfying. I would've been much happier to have some character development to go with the smut, as the lack of it is definitely noticeable.

Secondary Characters:
Honestly, I strongly disliked most of the supporting cast. They were limited primarily to women--Brady's neighbor/friend Eve, the other nurses on Drey's floor--and the women were embarrassingly unrelenting fag hags. The nurses ran pools around Brady and Drey's relationship and took notes when pressing Drey for intimate details, then shot sly looks at Brady whenever they saw him. (This bothers me for another reason entirely, too: we're told that Drey is head nurse, which is a position of some authority. How can his authority be believed at all when we're never shown that the other nurses feel even a hint of respect for him? Friendship I could buy, if a particularly haggy friendship, but respect? No.) Eve pressed for details and, from the sound of it, listened avidly and shamelessly when Brady had Drey over for Chinese and loud sex. Some variety in the secondary characters and less of the fag hag stereotype would've helped my enjoyment quite a bit.

Story:
This is a book in which not a lot happens. They meet, they have sex, they move in together, the end. Things that might have been conflicts (the aforementioned fraternization being revealed) were neatly nipped in the bud, addressed quickly and forgotten. I get that conflict distracts from the sex, but a little more distraction couldn't have hurt.

Writing:
I was unfortunately not terribly impressed technically. The writing tended toward awkward, with conversations going on in parallel threads that were all too-neatly addressed in response. Some things were inserted for, I'm guessing, the sake of being cute, but where they were inserted didn't always make sense. (For example, while looking at an apartment, the manager has to leave Brady and Drey to attend to a matter. Brady tells him that the manager can trust him, he's a doctor. I get where the author was trying to go, but I don't think the situation was one where the destination was a possibility.) There's a lot of awkward phrasing, too, which makes the characters sound a lot younger than they're supposed to be (I still can't buy Brady as mid-30s), and a fair number of typographical errors.

Other Thoughts:
In addition to being a stereotype, Eve as a concept and as a character pushed a number of my other dislike buttons. First, she met Brady when he'd moved in next door to her, about a week before the story picks up... and the first conversation we're shown with her is Brady going on about how hot Drey is, in detail. I can't believe that anyone would share that much information with someone who is at best an acquaintance at that point. She also tends to come up with nicknames that strike me as intended to be cute and that come across as rather more insulting: Gay Drey and Drey the Fey and the Screamer. Way to trivialize a guy.

Overall:
Weak characterization and a lack of plot left me cold. Developing the main characters more, working in some secondary characters that weren't unrelenting stereotypes, and adding a touch of conflict could only have helped make this a more appealing story. Instead, it's a flat story with too much sex and not enough of anything else.

Review: Beneath the Shield

Title: Beneath the Shield
Author: Diana DeRicci
Publisher: MLR Press
Publication Date: February 2011
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 106 pages

Rating: 3 out of 5

Blurb:
Jack Torres has been harboring, zealously nurturing a hidden guilt for three years. This mire of emotions has hardened his heart and his want to reconnect to the living world, keeping him isolated and unapproachable.

Brant Teller is a chance encounter Jack keeps from growing physically violent in a crowded nightclub. Parting ways, Brant doesn't expect to see the brooding, silent officer again. Yet when a domestic violence call brings the surly officer right to his ER, Brant takes a chance. What begins as a Sunday of football has the possibility to become so much more. If Jack will open himself up enough to release the agony of his own personal nightmare.

Review:

Main Characters:
Brant is an ER doctor with a third degree black belt, a man who is used to taking care of himself. He's understanding to a fault but has no problem saying 'no' when the situation warrants it, and doesn't give up easily. He's an interesting, likable character, but somehow too good to be true when taken as a whole, which made it hard for me to invest in him.

Jack is a former DEA agent turned cop after the death of his partner and lover, Leo. He's closed himself off from the world, nursing his pain in silence with only his cousin Trevi for company--and even that is accepted only grudgingly. So much of his characterization is tied in to his psychological solitary confinement that it was difficult for me to get a hold on who he was otherwise. The flashes of him as a person outside of his pain are appealing, but they're also few and far between for the bulk of the book.

Chemistry:
Brant and Jack's relationship begins with a mutual attraction after Jack rescues Brant from a confrontation with an ex, though neither act upon it for some time as Jack is in denial. Brant's early insistence that Jack could at least have a friend was touching, and the way that they developed their relationship into a romance was sweet, even if my eyebrows lifted over how much (or, rather, how little) time it took for "Just keep me warm," to turn into "I'm seducing you." The sex was well-done, but it went on forever; by the end of their first encounter, I was skimming. (Thankfully, follow-ups weren't anywhere near as drawn-out.) I did greatly appreciate the fact that both Brant and Jack considered themselves reversibles, though; a lack of strictly defined roles opens up so very many possibilities.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast is small and, honestly, I'm conflicted by it. I enjoyed Janet (a nurse in the ER) in her brief scenes, but Trevi put me off; although he's 24, he came off as a bouncy teenager to me. Ryan (Brant's ex) was a handy impetus to bring Brant and Jack together, but it was never really shown why he was so fixated on Brant; a little more backstory might have helped me see him as something other than a cartoon villain.

Story:
The story is woven between Brant's determination to develop a relationship with Jack and Jack's desire to remain alone and mired in guilt over Leo's death. It moves along fairly well, although it is bogged down periodically by Jack's moping; it's much more even when Brant is the narrator. Once they work past Jack's angst, things seemed a bit rushed; the length of time from their first meeting to lifelong commitment struck me as just way too short to be believable.

Writing:
Although pleasant, there were quirks in the writing that distracted me fairly often. Comma usage is inconsistent, so that I found myself repunctuating as I read. Some word choices threw me (e.g. Brant's tongue shaking hands with Jack's cock) and the order of some phrasing seemed reversed to me, which lessened the impact. On the other hand, there were choices that made me smile, like Brant's wallowing like a happy pig in the mushy feeling Jack instilled in him. There were typos here and there, but nothing truly egregious.

Other Thoughts:
Brant's understanding stretched the bounds of belief at times, but there was one part that sucked me into their relationship: Jack is questioning his worth and insisting that he's a bad person who can't even stand to look at himself, and Brant tells him, "[...] learn to trust in what I see, Jack." It made me actually say 'awh'.

On the other hand, there's the balls-punching scene. Frustrated with his attraction to Brant and the erection resulting from it, Jack nails himself in the crotch. I had to reread the scene to convince myself that it was an actual event, and not something Jack was dealing with in his head. I'm still a bit baffled by the reaction.

Overall:
By turns sweet and confounding, I'm torn on this book. Although it was an appealing story, flaws kept me from being fully engaged and invested in Brant and Jack's relationship. A bit more development and a bit less moping would've helped my enjoyment, but it was still a nice little story to pass some time with.

Review: No Souvenirs

Title: No Souvenirs
Series: Florida Books
Author: K.A. Mitchell
Publisher: Samhain Publishing
Publication Date: 9 March 2010
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 158 pages

Rating: 3 out of 5

Blurb:
A vacation fling. No complications. No connections. And no regrets.

Trauma surgeon Jae Sun Kim has just lost the job he wanted more than anything else in his life. Looking for a way to hit the reset button, he takes a scuba vacation. He didn't plan on seasickness, or a dive master who is sex-on-the-beach personified.

Shane McCormack's tendency to drift away from complicated situations has landed him a job as a dive master in Belize, which isn't as glamorous as it sounds. But with the big three-oh looming, asking his parents to bail him out again isn't an option. The job isn't without its perks, though, and as soon as he figures a way to keep that hot but arrogant ass of a doctor from tossing his cookies over the side of the boat, he plans to flirt the control freak out of his brittle shell.

The close quarters on the ship generate more heat than either expects, but a vacation fling is all that's in the plans. An unexpected adventure leaves them changed in ways that make it impossible to go back to their old lives. The risks they'll both have to take could leave them with nothing but more scars, or the best souvenir of all.

Review:

Main Characters:
Kim is prickly and unapproachable, even his closest friends held at a distance. He lives to work--and also in fear that his parents will discover that he's gay. He's an unequivocal top with no real history of relationships and a near inability to express himself. He's also an arrogant asshole. Despite that (or, perhaps, because of that), I adore him. He's uncompromising when it comes to his beliefs, but also isn't above trying to change when he feels it necessary. His evolution throughout the story is interesting to witness, and I think he comes out as quite likable (if you tend toward the prickly sorts).

Shane is far more easy-going. After nine years in college and with difficulties finding a position in his field, he takes a position as Divemaster as a stopgap, not having any idea what exactly he's going to have dropped in his lap. He's got a family that knows he's gay and loves him, although he doesn't really seem to have any other close friends. (At least, I can't recall any being mentioned, even in passing.) I liked him well enough, but he seemed a little more generic than Kim to me.

Chemistry:
Kim and Shane are definitely an attractive couple, which is good as they have a lot of sex. I particularly enjoyed that Kim was the dominant one in the relationship despite the height trope, although I could have lived with a little bit of reversing. I could also have done with a little more conversation, as, aside from one or two revealing talks, they never really seemed to get to know each other all that well.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast was thin on the ground; the largest were Joey and Aaron (from Collision Course), and even they barely made an appearance. While it was interesting to see how Joey and Aaron were doing, it also seemed as though they were thrown in for the sake of the cameo, without having any real impact.

Story:
Although there's a lot of sex, there's also a welcome amount of plot to be found here, mostly centering on a mishap during Kim's tour. Things move along well through much of the book, although almost too smoothly; there's not really any confrontation (mishap aside) until quite late. It could easily have been expanded, I think, especially as it's already a fairly short book--over 100 pages shorter than the previous book in the series.

Writing:
The writing flowed nicely, competent if not particularly captivating. It was easy to sink into, with few noticeable errors.

Other Thoughts:
This is so a non-issue, but I had to blink that at one point a condom was flushed down the toilet. Would you believe that threw me out of the story more than anything else? Tsk.

Overall:
An interesting story made for a good vehicle for appealing characters. If not particularly memorable, it's still an enjoyable read that has a place on my shelf.

Review: Collision Course

Title: Collision Course
Series: Florida Books
Author: K.A. Mitchell
Publisher: Samhain Publishing
Publication Date: 9 December 2008
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 266 pages

Rating: 3 out of 5

Blurb:
Immovable object? Meet the irresistible force.

Paramedic Aaron Chase doesn't have anything against love. It just comes with a lot of responsibility, like when he had to raise his sister and brothers after their drug-addicted mom took off for good. Now that the last one is off to college, Aaron's anticipating enjoying life on his own terms. He certainly wasn't expecting Joey Miller to accidentally drop into his life.

Joey's sexy, funny and annoyingly optimistic, and his tendency to get into trouble keeps sending him Aaron's way. Even the fact that Joey works for the hated social work system isn't reason enough to keep him out of Aaron's bed.

Joey knows all about love. He's fallen in it ten times—he thinks. It's not that he can't tell the difference between sex and love. All that experience has to count for something, right? With Aaron it's different. Maybe because there's something to fight for.

This time Joey's fallen for good. He's not going to let number eleven get away.

Review:

Main Characters:
Joey is an affable man who makes his living as a social worker, trying to save kids from bad situations. He enjoys surfing and has a waterbed simply because it's the closest he can come to sleeping on the waves. He's had ten boyfriends, with most of whom he remains friendly. He puts up with a lot, but isn't afraid to put his foot down when he feels that he's being needlessly targeted. He's certainly likable, and easy to root for.

Aaron is a bit more of an enigma to me. A paramedic (not an EMT) who raised three younger siblings when his crackwhore mother split, he's an arrogant asshole with issues maintaining close relationships. He also has no love for the social work system--or those who work in it. He never really evolved past the arrogant asshole for me, ultimately less compelling than Joey.

Chemistry:
Joey and Aaron might not have the best conversational skills, but they certainly did heat the sheets. It's a truly good thing they worked so well together, because there is a lot of sex in this book. There's also a touch of mild kink, though not enough to make most people uncomfortable, I think. I do wish they'd talked a bit more without one or the other of them getting angry, but they still shared enough that I could believe in them as a couple, rather than just fuckbuddies. They're a confrontational couple, but still a believable one.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast was widely varied and mostly well-drawn. I wish that some had gotten more attention--it seemed to me that Darryl was often overwhelmed and his issues kind of petered out--but they nevertheless worked well within the confines of the story.

Two of the secondary characters (Noah and Cameron) were the main characters in the preceding book in the series. It probably helps to understand them better to have read the first book (I didn't), as I found them a bit annoying; backstory may have mitigated that.

Story:
Honestly, I can't remember if there was much of a plot, as probably 75% of the book (if not more) was sex. Most of what happened that wasn't sex seemed to be a setup for sex, though there were a few events that provided revelations before the sex, at least. There was some family and work drama, but nothing with lasting repercussions; that came from the more personal, relationship drama. As a vehicle for the relationship as it progresses from sex to something more connected, though, the story is perfectly adequate.

Writing:
The writing was solid and enjoyable, with both prose and dialogue flowing well. There were a few errors here and there, but nothing noteworthy and not frequent enough to be annoying. Although there was nothing wrong, though, there was also nothing magical; no particular turn of phrase particularly stuck out for me.

Other Thoughts:
Both Joey and Aaron had voices in this story, though thankfully not at the same time; their points of view are clearly delineated by section. It's just enough to give an insight into both men, though I still feel that Joey is the clearer of the two.

Overall:
Well-developed characters and pleasant writing make this a quick, easy read. Although it lacks a spark to make it truly stand out, there's still plenty to enjoy here, with more in the series to look forward to.

Review: Grand Jeté

Title: Grand Jeté
Author: Diana Copland
Publisher: Silver Publishing
Publication Date: 11 December 2010
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 170 pages

Rating: 4 out of 5

Review: Jordan first sees Davis while attending a performance of The Nutcracker. The next time he sees him is under less pleasant circumstances: the dancer is brought into his ER with a career-ending torn miniscus. Even with Davis high on painkillers, there's no mistaking their instant connection. The problem? Davis lives on the opposite coast and they can only be together until he catches a flight home. With a country between them, is there any way that their connection will last?

Jordan is a teddy bear, still hurting over the failure of his last long-term relationship to the point that he sleeps on the couch rather than in the bed he'd shared. He enjoys his work as a triage nurse, despite difficult doctors and relationship-killing hours, and adores his family, even when they're driving him nuts. It's terribly easy to root for him.

Davis is getting over his own break-up, though it was rather more recent; he was dumped the same day his career ended. Suddenly single, unemployed, and injured, he needs someone to rely on. He's charming when blitzed out of his mind on painkillers, and sweetly vulnerable once he's off them.

Jordan and Davis fit each other quite well; Davis needs someone to look after him and Jordan needs someone to nurture. Not that medical services are all they share; in the short amount of time they spend together, Davis is adopted by Jordan's family, and Jordan has someone to hold him in bed again. Even the sex is sweet, for all that I spent the entire scene wondering about Davis's knee.

The supporting cast is varied, including Jordan's coworkers and family as well as people from Davis's dance company. Not many of them are particularly well-developed, but they are mostly warm characters with just enough variance to keep things interesting. (The main exceptions here would be the ER doctors when Davis is first admitted--personalities I've unfortunately experienced, which made them that much more aggravating, if believable--and Miles. Although assholes, they're not so overblown as to be caricatures.)

The story itself moves along surprisingly quickly; once I'd started reading it, I was sucked in to the point that I was suddenly on page 96 before I looked up. The progression is easy and natural, and what drama there was was resolved quickly enough as to be satisfying without it being so quickly that it lost its impact.

Between the likable characters and the sweet story, my time spent reading this was quite enjoyable. I crossed my fingers for Jordan and Davis the whole way through, and was quite satisfied in the end.

Review: True North

Title: True North
Series: Lost Boys and Love Letters
Author: Bethany Brown & Ashlyn Kane
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 12 January 2009
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 240 pages

Rating: 4 out of 5

Review: The last thing Jack expected to see when an injury at the worksite sent him to the clinic was Dr. Julian Piet, a new arrival to the small community. The attraction sparking between them was equally surprising, especially given how gun-shy Julian is and how closeted Jack is. Between plotting family, good news, bad news, and a medical crisis, will they be able to find a happy future together?

Jack is a teddy bear, cuddly and loveable. He's also not afraid to go after what he wants, despite his concerns of being outed to the small conservative backwater in which they live. He's one of those almost-too-good-to-be-true characters, though he does have just enough flaws to keep him believable.

Julian has baggage but isn't overwhelmed by it. He's sweet and considerate, will do anything for his family, but also has a mischievous side that's fun to experience--the initial hockey scene made me smile a ridiculous amount. I enjoyed how his history comes out, in dribs and drabs as is appropriate, rather than an information dump.

The chemistry between Jack and Julian is perfect, developing nicely from flirting to tension to consummation. I was actually almost sad when said consummation came around, as I was enjoying their will-they-won't-they so much. (I'm a sucker for unresolved sexual tension, really.) The sex was hot enough to be worth it, though, and just frequent enough to be satisfying without taking over the story.

The supporting cast is strong and appealing, with the natural highlight being Roz, though there is enough variety in the others to be interesting without being too much. They have their own subplots that move the main story along nicely.

Although the story itself focuses on the relationship between Jack and Julian, there are, as mentioned above, enough subplots to keep things going forward without dragging. The writing was solid, too, with few enough editing errors that I completely disregarded them, which was lovely; it gets tiring reading with a red pen in my head.

All that being said, for some reason this story just didn't stick with me. For the purpose of typing this up, I had to practically reread it as I went. I remembered reading it and enjoying it, but the specifics completely eluded me. I'm not sure if it was something in the story or something in my mindset as I read it, but it was a little odd. Still enjoyable, just not particularly memorable for me.

That being said, also, I did enjoy this quite enough to pick up the sequels. Memorable or not, it was still quite a pleasant way to spend an afternoon, and a world that I look forward to delving into again.

Review: 911

Title: 911
Author: Chris Owen
Publisher: Torquere Press
Publication Date: 13 December 2006
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 339 Pages

Rating: 4 out of 5

Review: Firefighter Drew and doctor Scott meet thanks to a hazmat scare.  In short order, they're roommates and, before too much longer, lovers.  Life is good.  They toy with the idea of adding a third to their relationship, but it's purely speculation until they meet EMT Eric.  Two becomes three as they struggle to overcome injuries, addictions, and the reactions of those around them.

I like Drew.  I like Scott.  I like Drew-and-Scott.  If the entire book had been about their relationship, I would've been happy.  This isn't to say that I don't like Eric, too--though his insecurity occasionally grates.  I even like the dynamic of their threesome.

What I like a little bit less is the pacing (though it's pretty standard for the genre).  By chapter 3, Drew and Scott are sleeping together.  By chapter 6, they're professing their love for each other.  It's a bit too compressed for my tastes, especially the declarations of love; there just isn't enough build-up to make it believable.

And then there's the sex.  There's a lot of it.  A lot.  There are 51 chapters in this book, and probably fewer than a half-dozen of them don't involve graphic sex.  It's hot sex, granted, but it's still a lot of sex.  The evolution of the various relationships between the characters is sometimes lacking, as it seems that they do most of their communicating with their penises.

I also didn't much care for the reactions of Drew and Scott's parents when their duo became a trio.  It just didn't jive for me with how their parents had behaved up to that point; it seemed like melodrama for the sake of melodrama.

Despite my quibbles, I really do rather like this book. The characters are mostly likeable, the sex is fantastic, and the ending is satisfying.  I wish that neighbor James had gotten his own spin-off, but, self-contained, this book is a definite keeper.