Review: Houseboat on the Nile

Title: Houseboat on the Nile
Series: Spy vs. Spook
Author: Tinnean
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 30 March 2012
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 126,649 words

Blurb:
Mark Vincent is WBIS—Washington Bureau of Intelligence and Security. Quinton Mann is staunchly CIA. Mark thinks the CIA is full of dilettantes who leave him and the rest of the WBIS to clean up their messes. Quinn thinks most WBIS agents are sociopathic loose cannons. So they don't exactly get along.

Of course, just because they don't like each other doesn't mean they can't play mind games on each other. Or sleep together. But when an explosion at Mark's apartment sends Quinn to the morgue to ID a body, he has to reevaluate his position on denial.


Rating:


Review:

Main Characters:
Mark is a man who does what it takes--whatever it takes--to complete a mission. He has bigger things to worry about than how well-liked he is; he practically relishes the dislike others, even those within his own organization, hold for him. He's the best, knows he's the best, and wants to be sure that others know he's the best, too. This leaves him living a life filled with paranoia and secrets, even going so far as to rig his apartment door to explode if its locks are not undone in a precise order. He doesn't have friends, per se, and finds very few people who are worthy of his respect.

I'm torn on Mark. On one hand, I like his sociopathic self. On the other hand, he feels a bit flat to me, as though he's missing a dimension of development. It's offset more toward the end when his personal relationships begin to come out more, but for much of the book I found him hollow and unfinished. (Upon reflection, this is probably deliberate as Mark develops rather a lot as the story progresses, but I still find his earlier caricature to be underwhelming.)

Quinn is the perfect man, or very nearly, even if he does work for the CIA. Secure in a good position, respected even by WBIS agents who think the CIA is utterly useless, he's independently wealthy, from a family with a strong security lineage, and meets his mother every Sunday for some horseback riding. Although far more unassuming than Mark, he recognizes Mark's mind games and is not above playing some of his own.

I'm as torn on Quinn as I am on Mark. I do like him; he's far better balanced and certainly interesting. But he's just too perfect. I could handle most of it, but I found myself rolling my eyes when dressage came up; not only is Quinn handsome, wealthy, and intelligent, but he's also an almost-Olympian, prepared to ride for the 1980 US dressage team before they pulled out of the Games. It was just over the top for me, and ruined a bit of his shine.

Chemistry:
Although there is certainly raw attraction between them, Mark and Quinn first come together (and continue to come together) in a series of mind games. Neither is willing to let the other win, and footsie under the table quickly leads to home invasion and dubious consent. Strangely, the dubious consent (which usually pushes my buttons) doesn't bother me here, probably because it's only another level at which they're attempting to overcome each other; neither resorts to outright rape, but pushing the boundaries is par for the course. The constant one-upsmanship means that the sex is intense every time as they each struggle to come out on top.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast is fairly broad, though some notable characters don't get the development they needed. I enjoyed Quinn's mother quite a bit, as well as Matheson, who is adorable in his earnestness. I also have a soft spot for Sweetcheeks and Pretty Boy, who are absolutely charming prostitutes without succumbing to cheesiness. I really wish that Sperling had gotten more attention, though; I never felt that I understood his motivations or the antipathy he and Mark held for each other. (I get the loss of the team for personal glory, but I also got the impression that there was more to it than that.)

Story:
Although things happen in this story, I didn't get a sense of an overreaching arc outside of the escalation of Mark and Quinn's mind games. I suppose the Sperling issue might be the main plot outside of the unconventional romance, but that never really came to the forefront enough for me to really consider it strongly; it came up sporadically, around other missions and mind games, rather than tying the whole story together. I also found the ending to be rather abrupt; it's very apparent that there will be a sequel. (I'm not complaining about it being part of a series, not at all. I do wish, however, that there was less of a brick wall at the end.)

One thing that bothered me about the story is the repetition. Every event is examined from both Mark's and Quinn's points of view; one chapter will be about Mark's particular actions with Quinn, and the next chapter will be about Quinn's reactions to Mark. While it's interesting to get both viewpoints, it also got old by the end, as though the book was twice as long as it needed to be; I didn't need to be that much in both of their heads.

Writing:
My biggest complaints were probably repetition and exclamation points. Aside from the repetition of events cited above, tidbits of information were also repeated more than was necessary. (I got that champagne makes Mark horny the first time, honestly.) I kind of got the impression that the author would forget that a point was already made between all the shifts. As for the exclamation points, there were far more than I'm used to. It may be personal preference, but I found them jarring, especially when they'd show up in every sentence in a particular section of dialogue. The impact was reduced, leaving them reading as a bit silly. Aside from those things, though, I found the writing to be perfectly fine and easy to get lost in.

Other Thoughts:
For some reason, Mark makes me think of Val Toreth in Manna Francis's Administration series. He's nowhere near as dysfunctional, but I couldn't shake the impression. (This is not a bad thing, as Toreth is one of my favorite sociopaths. Seriously.) The thought of Toreth Lite is now making me laugh.

Overall:
Conflicted, manipulative characters kept things interesting even when repetition bogged the story down. A bit less rehashing would've helped to tighten the story up, but it was nevertheless entertaining, if a bit longer than necessary. I'm looking forward to the sequel.

Review: Warrior's Cross

Title: Warrior's Cross
Author: Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 31 August 2009
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 99,889 words

Blurb:
Cameron Jacobs is an open book. He considers himself a common waiter with normal friends, boring hobbies, harmless dogs, and nothing even resembling a secret... except a crush on a tall, dark, devastatingly handsome man who dines alone at his restaurant on Tuesday nights. All it takes is one passionate night with Julian Cross to turn Cameron’s world on its head.

Julian's love and devotion are all Cameron could have hoped for and more. But when his ordinary life meets and clashes with Julian's extraordinary lifestyle, Cameron discovers that trust and fear can go hand in hand, and love is just a step away from danger.


Rating:


Review:

Main Characters:
Cameron is a man content with his lot: head waiter at an upscale restaurant named Tuesdays and proud owner of four West Highland White Terrier puppies. So what if he's nursing a crush on an enigmatic patron? Every man is allowed his weaknesses. He's an unremarkable type and okay with it, though his unassuming exterior hides a spine of steel. The problem for me is that he's so unremarkable that he didn't leave much of an impression as a character with me; immediately after finishing the book, I had difficulty remembering him. I liked him well enough during the story, but once it was done, he was pretty forgettable.

Julian, on the other hand, left rather more of an impression. Operating on the wrong side of the law, he's a shady character who makes himself deliberately difficult to approach. With few friends in the world outside of his colleagues and evil cats, he isn't quite certain what to make of Cameron--or his attraction to him. Despite his job description, he's on a fairly even keel, with a dry sense of humor and a temper that's slow to rouse. Although he appears mild-mannered and soft-spoken, he's not a man afraid of doing what it takes to get things done with a necessary ruthlessness. I found him charming, especially in his more humanizing moments; he's an adorable sickie. It's also sweet how careful he is with Cameron and Cameron's puppies, as though he's afraid of breaking them.

Chemistry:
The tension between Cameron and Julian is more cute than sizzling, but appealing nonetheless. The dynamics are a bit unbalanced at times, though, with Julian's secrets weighing down a lot of their interactions. This doesn't keep the sex from being hot, between Julian's take-charge attitude and Cameron's care-taking. I have to admit a weakness for Julian hefting Cameron off the floor and pinning him against a wall--yum.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast is small but interesting, if in need of just a little bit more character-building. I liked Blake and Preston quite a bit but am not clear on their positions or motivations; much is either implied and never addressed. I'm less enamored with Miri, who comes off as a bit too intrusive and inconsiderate; she's skirting the edge of the stereotypical overly-meddling female friend, but only just.

Story:
The story is rather unevenly paced, starting off slow as Cameron and Julian come to know each other, then packing a lot of action into the end. The beginning and end seem almost like two separate stories without much to connect them; though there is some foreshadowing, much of the ending all but stands alone. It isn't a terrible thing, but I found myself losing interest when the action started; although I recognize Julian's competence, I think I preferred him uncertain and hesitant.

Writing:
The writing was certainly enjoyable, without many errors; I liked being able to turn off my mental red pen and just read. Nothing particularly wowed me, but it was still solid and easy to sink into.

Overall:
Appealing (if not particularly memorable) main characters and an interesting romance kept me reading even when the plot made me want to tune out a little. I wish the secondary characters had had a bit more development, along with the climax, but altogether it's still a book I enjoyed, and one I wouldn't mind revisiting.

Review: Dark Chocolate and Raspberries

Title: Dark Chocolate and Raspberries
Author: Sui Lynn
Publisher: Silver Publishing
Publication Date: 23 April 2011
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 62,515 words

Blurb:
18-year-old Dylan's talent for music almost equals his diva mentality. A spoiled rich kid, Dylan enjoys pushing people around. Or does he? When Taj is charged with taking Dylan under his wing, he discovers the shy boy behind the diva mask.

But Dylan walks in on Taj kissing Ben, their budding feelings may not be able to withstand the blow. Stunned, Dylan runs from the room. Taj gives chase, trying to catch him to tell him the kiss he saw was the result of a game played in the dorm called 'Raspberries'. Will their love blossom into kisses, drown in drunken chocolates, or erupt in raucous raspberries in Dark Chocolate and Raspberries?


Rating: 2 out of 5


Review:

Main Characters:
Dylan is a young man fresh out of high school, fleeing a less-than-ideal home life to attend Trinity University, where he'll be able to focus on his singing. He maintains a diva personality, looking down on anyone who's not at his level and pushing away everyone else, to mask his personal pain, trapped with a mentally ill mother and estranged father. He's also not gay, or so he says.

As a character, I just could not connect to him; I spent much of the book actively hating him. His diva personality is inconsistent and often silly, and his level of obsession with Taj makes me think that his mother isn't the only mentally ill one in the family; there's a point in the story at which he becomes so jealous of girls flirting with an uninterested Taj that he vomits--a little extreme to me, and certainly not healthy behavior.

Taj is a bit older and better balanced. He performs with various choir groups, helps out in different aspects of university, and has a tight circle of friends. He's apparently dated before, though nothing of his past boyfriends ever comes out. Although he's better balanced emotionally, his character is still inconsistent--he very rarely acts his age, coming across as much to mature to be believable. At the story's climax, Taj rides to the rescue when Dylan is trapped into taking care of his unstable mother. He drags Dylan away from his mother as she's abusing him, then dials a psychiatrist (presumably, as her actual job description is never revealed) he just so happens to know who just so happens to work in the psychiatric unit of the nearby hospital. How does he know this woman? Why should he need to call her before he calls 911 when the first responders are perfectly capable of notifying the hospital prior to their arrival that they have a psychiatric case and there's no guarantee that she would be staffing the unit at the time? Further, he seems awfully knowledgeable about admittance procedures for mentally ill patients, especially violent ones who are forcibly committed. It's rather different than his taking a depressed friend for treatment, and the overlap isn't enough to explain his knowledge. To add to my suspension of disbelief, he also all but blackmails Dylan's father (despite his disclaimer that it's not blackmail) into leaving Dylan alone. Altogether, it was just way too much for me.

Chemistry:
The attraction between Dylan and Taj goes from zero to sixty in a very short span of time. There's almost no tension for a good portion of the beginning, and suddenly Taj is desperate to kiss Dylan while Dylan has erotic dreams of Taj. The lack of lead-up made their getting together a bit jarring, and their obsession with each other even more so.

The level of obsession is what honestly put me off the most. Taj is worried that Dylan will be jealous that Taj is leaving their make-out session to be with another man, when what he's doing is taking the other man to the hospital. Dylan, fully aware that Taj has other responsibilities one day, is determined to have a shit day because Taj isn't there with him. It escalates ridiculously.

And then there's the testing. As soon as Taj and Dylan identify as a couple, Taj is insistent that they both get tested before they have sex (or even come together, apparently). Okay--a little weird, but okay. Later, it comes out that Taj has been intimate with other men and worn a condom. My question became: why is it okay for Taj to wear a condom with other men but require testing before he can so much as cop a feel with Dylan? I was further baffled when Taj and Dylan got a hotel room after submitting the blood for testing--why couldn't they do that before, if they didn't have results anyway?--and when they planned to use a condom after the testing. Wasn't the whole point of the testing to establish their lack of need for a condom? It's not like Dylan's going to get pregnant. The extreme emphasis of the testing and the contradictory behaviors when it came to sex became rather aggravating after a while.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast was nearly as frustrating as Dylan and Taj, full of caricatures without much substance. Dylan's parents in particular fall short of what they could have been; his father was reduced to a manipulative, blustering asshole, while his mother became an insane whore. Although the characterizations made sense in concept, there just wasn't anything there to flesh them out, to make their behaviors believable as functional human beings. I also found Paul to be downright annoying--again, a caricature with nothing behind him to make his mannerisms anything but stereotypically queeny and almost offensive.

Story:
The characters were unfortunately not the only weakness; the story showed its cracks, too. It's disjointed and jerky, with the climax having very little to do with the rest of the story leading up to it. Just a little bit of foreshadowing couldn't have hurt.

The reactions of some characters also don't necessarily make sense. To convince Dylan to take care of his mother, Dylan's father threatens to expose Dylan's relationship with his mother to the world. Given that Dylan's father's concern is his own reputation, I fail to see how making the world aware that he let his wife abuse their son for years after abandoning them both would further his cause. I also don't understand Dylan's reaction. I can understand the shame aspect--who wants the world to know that they've been a victim for most of their life? But why on earth would being the victim of abuse ruin any career he might have?

For a story that focused so much on Dylan and Taj being musicians, too, the music fell by the wayside awfully quickly. Before they get together, there's plenty of mention of Dylan singing, or Taj's groups. Later, there's an offhand mention of them singing together in choir, but no further mention of anything else choir-related. It seemed lax.

Writing:
Commas, commas everywhere, but not a pause to need. I'm a comma queen, and even I found the usage of commas to be excessive here. Commas frequently combined sentences; what should have been two or three sentences is spliced into one awkward sentence. For example: He smiled to himself, the aloof attitude Dylan exuded when people were near had a firm hold, but despite Taj telling him he was gay, Dylan had let him in when they were alone.

Even without the comma issues, I found the writing to be a bit disjointed.

Dylan couldn't help becoming irritated. He wanted the girls to leave them alone. Taj belonged to him. Dylan glared at the two babbling girls and his ire increased, but they ignored him. Their incessant drivel rubbed Dylan's nerves raw. Taj chatted politely for a while, but seemed to sense Dylan's growing discomfort and soon tried to end the conversation.

The reiteration and repetition is prevalent throughout, and the style is just not one that corresponds with my tastes at all.

There are also quite a few errors in general: missing punctuation, missing possessives, incorrect verb tenses, words that should have been deleted but weren't. Some proper nouns are also used improperly which, while not a big deal, didn't improve my opinion. (The two that really stuck out for me were Xbox (not X-box) and HIPPA (not Hippa).)

Other Thoughts:
One thing that threw me early on is a line of Taj's in which he proclaims that he thinks that words like gay and homosexual are just words people use to hurt other people. I can't pin down why it bothers me. It just seems so contrived, I think.

Overall:
In the end, it took me two weeks to read this book simply because I grew increasingly frustrated as I read, to the point that I'd have to put it down and walk away or abandon it entirely. If you don't mind obsessive characters and uneven storytelling, this might be the book for you. For me, there's just not enough of a happy medium to endear it to me.

Review: The Missing Butterfly

Title: The Missing Butterfly
Series: The Missing Butterfly
Author: Megan Derr
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Publication Date: 19 January 2010
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 51,000 words

Rating: 4 out of 5

Blurb:
Cassidy Monarch had dreams—to sing, to be famous, to tour the world at the head of his own rock band. Then his parents were killed in a tragic accident, leaving him to raise his two siblings. Determined to hold on to what remained of his family, Cassidy settled into an ordinary life, his dreams of fame reduced to occasional nights of singing at karaoke dives. But his careful, ordinary life began to fray with his new job, and the beautiful, charming boss who reminds him of all the things he tried to stop wanting.

Malcolm Osborne is a classic rags to riches story, a foster child who wound up with the perfect family and more money than he knows what to do with. He's wealthy, beautiful, successful, and completely miserable. Then he hires a new worker for his office, a young, hard-working man with a sadness in his eyes that Malcolm aches to banish, hoping that in doing so he will be rid of his own loneliness as well.

Review:

Main Characters:
Cassidy is a man who had adulthood thrust upon him well before he was ready when his parents were killed by a drunk driver, leaving him to raise his two younger siblings at the tender age of 18. Working a food service job from Hell to make ends meet and keep Social Services off his back, he had to set aside his dreams of rock super stardom with his band, Four Butterflies. Dreams are not always so easily pushed away, though, and Cassidy keeps picking the scab by spending weekends singing karaoke in a city two hours away or writing songs. His coworkers have no idea that beneath his frightened-rabbit exterior beats the passionate heart of a bad boy.

Although he'd like someone to be with, especially with his younger siblings growing up and leaving the nest, a bad ending to his single attempt at a relationship has left him gun-shy. Random hook-ups have lost their appeal, and the fact that he's lusting after his boss is just salt in the wound.

I'm conflicted on Cassidy. On one hand, I really like him--it's admirable that he was able to raise his siblings without resentment, and he really is a sweetheart. On the other hand, the aforementioned frightened-rabbit exterior gets a bit wearing. I kept waiting for him to grow up just a little bit more. The kicker that really made me want to shake him was in the scene in which Malcolm finally connected the dots:

Chasing Cassidy out the side entrance, he raced down the alleyway, lunging at the last moment. "Cassidy!" Grasping Cassidy's arm, yanking hard, he nearly sent them both crashing to the crowd, but managed at the last moment to twist enough he landed hard against the wall. His breath wooshed out of him, and he barely managed to keep hold of Cassidy. "Cass!"

Abruptly Cassidy froze, looking like nothing so much as a terrified, wide-eyed cat.

Moving without real thought, Malcolm reached up with one hand to lightly cup Cassidy's face. "Why did you run? Why...why would you hide this?"

Cassidy only stared at him a moment longer, then abruptly began to tremble. "B-because I'm not supposed to do it," he said, then began to try and struggle to get free. "Let me go."

His youngest sibling is 18, well past the point at which he could be removed from Cassidy's home. Obviously his employer doesn't care that he has tattoos and sings karaoke, given that his employer is in the dive to recognize him, so why the overwhelming fear?

Once Cassidy and Malcolm have begun their relationship, the fear makes a little more sense--Malcolm is, after all, Cassidy's boss--but his similar reaction to a situation with his former band just struck me as also a bit over the top.

Malcolm is a foster care kid who discovered he had a wealthy globe-trotting uncle when he was a teenager. When his uncle died shortly thereafter, Malcolm was left with millions--and a hole in his life. He has enough money to never need to work another day, but he can't imagine the life of a lonely jet-setter. He passes time as head manager of accounting for Amberton-Lord Entertainments for lack of anything better to do. He occasionally splurges to playfully poke at his siblings (especially when it comes to his car) and owns houses around the world that he rarely visits.

Malcolm has a string of bad relationships to his name; he prefers bad boys but doesn't have the best taste in them, resulting in more than one unsavory break-up. The latest tops the cake, though, when Malcolm has to fend off not only his ex but also his buddies with nothing but a baseball bat. He's ready to begin to re-evaluate his tastes, but can't seem to shake that bad boy craving.

Malcolm was much steadier than Cassidy, but I'm still conflicted on him, too. He is good for Cassidy, I think, with a gentle regard for him and a protective streak that's quite charming. I'm less fond of other aspects of his personality, though. He's snarky to a fault with his brothers (more on this later), he strikes me as a little irresponsible (given how often he hides in Antoine's office), and then there's the manipulation. After he finds out where Cassidy worked that gave him such a dismal outlook on employment, Malcolm buys the diner just so he can fire the manager that so scarred Cassidy. Further, after he realizes that Cassidy is the missing member of the band playing the company's picnic, he buys off the group's current lead singer to ensure that they'll need a new one for the picnic--and there Cassidy will be. They're sweet gestures on paper, but kind of creepy in reality. It would've been nicer to see the situations resolved in some way that didn't involve throwing money at them.

Chemistry:
Cassidy and Malcolm are adorable together. The attraction between them is apparent (to everyone but Cassidy and Malcolm, at least) and the tension is perfect. My issues with Malcolm's monetary solutions aside, I think they balance each other well, both bringing something to the table to contribute to the relationship. The sex is hot (and not overly graphic, although some of it is still not safe for work), but I find I prefer them in their downtime. (My favorite little blurb is this:

"Yes," Malcolm said, carefully not thinking about the few moments when he heard Cassidy sing—catching Cassidy singing in the kitchen while he cooked or cleaned, singing in the car, the shower, and most precious of all were those nights they lay in bed and Cassidy sang just for him.

Just too sweet!)

Secondary Characters:
My trend of being conflicted on characters continues with the supporting cast. I hated some of them. Antoine and Carlos (Malcolm's foster brothers), though I suspect they are popular, drove me absolutely batshit insane. I don't think they had a single conversation with Malcolm that didn't involve one threatening to kill another or general threats of some variety or just a level of snark that went completely overboard. I never felt that I got a sense of them beyond snark generators... and I really didn't like the snark. I found myself skimming scenes that included them. The rest of the supporting cast was much better. Lindsay and Denny (Cassidy's siblings), for example, were also snarky but not so overblown; they struck a much better balance.

Story:
The story follows not only Cassidy and Malcolm's relationship, but also Cassidy's dream. It's generally well-paced, although there are parts where it does drag a little, particularly before Malcolm twigs to the reality of Cassidy. There are also some rather silly parts--Cassidy tipping the pizza delivery guy with his tongue springs to mind--but it's otherwise quite well done, tying together nicely as it speeds toward the ending.

Writing:
There are a lot of technical errors in this book--typos, grammatical errors, missing words, things that should have been caught in editing. (Hell, even one of my illustrative selections has an error in it.) It's distracting and occasionally aggravating. A few pieces of information got lost in the shuffle, too--the name of Cassidy's band post-Cassidy is referred to a few different ways, for example. If you don't read when a mental red pen, though, it's easy to move past the writing flaws to get into the meat beneath.

Overall:
This book is a light, inoffensive story with likeable characters that are easy to root for, with more focus on romance than conflict. Despite my complaints, I love this book--flaws and all, it's one of my desert island reads.

Review: Saving Liam

Title: Saving Liam
Author: Sasha L. Miller
Publisher: Less Than Three Press
Publication Date: 25 April 2012
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 120,000 words

Rating: 3 out of 5

Blurb:
Leyton lived a quiet, simple life as a prosperous, thriving merchant alongside his twin brother Liam. But that life is shattered when Liam goes missing, and Leyton is told that the only way to save his brother's life is to seduce a king. The task proves to be even more difficult than Leyton feared, and soon he is swept up in a tide of political machinations, betrayal, and a looming threat of execution once the men who blackmailed him are caught.

But the threat of his pending death is nothing alongside the constant fear for his missing brother's safety—and the tangle of intrigue in which he is caught is nothing like the tangle he put himself in after breaking the heart of a king...

Review:

Main Characters:
Although the blurb would have you believe that Leyton and Mijah are the main characters, the primary cast is rather broader. In addition to Leyton and Mijah are Leyton's brother, Liam, Mijah's brother, Temel, and Luam's partner, Shakil. Yes, they're all main characters, not secondary.

Leyton is the soft-spoken one of the bunch. He's got some steel under his mild mannerisms, though, and is also a savvy businessman who's taken over running the family wine trading business after the death of his mother. He's half of a set of incubi twins (Liam being the other half) and shares a soul bond with his brother that he uses for everything from communication to tracking to pain-blocking.

Shakil is a Kingsman, a clandestine agent of the kingdom of Samaria. He's huge and not above looming to get what he wants, but he's also a mage with the ability to see energy across different magical frequencies. He's upbeat and teasing, rarely serious. He owns a jacket in which he can store anything, up to and including a tent.

Temel is Mijah's brother, the eldest son of the late king of Adina who was passed over in succession due to his being a mage. He's short-tempered and irascible, and doesn't like to ask for or accept help. Although a mage, he's not a particularly advanced one, noticeably weak in aspects like offensive magic, as his father refused to allow him to train in anything he thought might be a threat, leaving him to focus more on theory.

Liam is Leyton's twin brother and Shakil's partner in the Kingsmen. He tends toward smugness and manipulation, though rarely maliciously, and will do anything to protect Leyton--except tell him the truth about what he is.

Mijah is the new king of Adina, following the death of his father and elder brother, Ghalib. He never wanted the role thrust upon him but is making the best go of it he can.

Chemistry:
There are actually three main couples: in the beginning, Leyton and Mijah; in the middle, Temel and Shakil; and in the end, Leyton, Liam, and Mijah.

Leyton and Mijah are a charming couple, even if they came together under less than savory circumstances. They both bring a vulnerability to the table, Leyton because he's desperately trying to seduce a king to save his brother only to find that said king is more than a mark, and Mijah because he's reeling from the death of his family. Leyton is adorable when he realizes that Mijah is seducing him as surely as he is Mijah, and it's obvious that Mijah is quite brokenhearted when Leyton's deception is revealed. Although I knew it wouldn't end well (at least initially), I ended up quite invested in their brief affair.

Temel and Shakil were less appealing for me. Although I saw their romance coming (mostly when Leyton choked over Temel's implied reaction to Shakil's threat to tie him down), I never really felt that they had any chemistry leading up to their first kiss, and that what chemistry there was afterward was rather tepid. I liked their dynamics as a couple, but it felt to me more like a romance of convenience than passion.

And, finally, Leyton, Liam, and Mijah. This is a very late development in the story, not even being mentioned as an option until less than fifteen pages before the end of the book. There was some foreshadowing in Mijah's reactions to Liam and Liam's occasional musing, but this was another that could have used more development. As opposed to Temel and Shakil, though, I did feel that they had more in their relationship than power dynamics and sex; they balanced each other well, all contributing equally to the relationship rather than centered on one person.

It should be noted that there is incest in this book; it's implied that Leyton and Liam are or have been intimate, though there is nothing more graphic than a kiss. Those who are bothered by incest in any form will probably want to either read with blinders or give this a pass.

Secondary Characters:
Given the size of the primary cast, the secondary is surprisingly limited; I can't think of any characters that last the length of the book. Some are more fleeting than others, but I never really felt that even those that stuck around longer had enough development; their characters and motivations came across as a little flat.

In some cases, they just completely eluded me. I'm still not quite certain I understand Grenville's motivations. Or Princess Marceline's. Not to mention Aifric's. None of the villains really had enough exploration into their characters to make them believable threats.

Story:
Given the title, you'd think that the story was about, well, saving Liam. And it is, initially. Liam, however, is quite thoroughly saved in the first third, leaving the rest of the book to focus on the plot behind his injury. It's an interesting story, but it dragged in parts (particularly between Liam's saving and the final confrontation with Aifric).

And then there were the holes.

Liam is found in a Healing House, not rescued from Grenville's clutches. How he came to be there is never revealed, as far as I can tell. It's stated that Grenville thinks he's dead, but the transition from tortured prisoner to Healing House patient is never really clarified.

It's apparently a non-modern world--they travel on horseback and fight with swords and daggers--but they have a heater under the tub? There's no mention that it's charmed, so I can't help but wonder about its origins.

After Aifric's plot falls apart, everyone is certain that he remained in Adina, but I couldn't find a reason why. Why linger there? And why the absolute certainty that he did so?

Aifric is stated to be a scholar and not a soldier, and hides as someone about as far from a solder as one can get. When he pins down Leyton and Mijah, though, he not only holds them at swordpoint (despite being a blood mage and presumably able to deal with them magically) but also has the fine control to whip the blade across Leyton's cheek and open a fine warning cut. Where does that skill come from?

Leyton and Liam as incubi twins are regarded with suspicion, but no real alarm, implying that they as another race aren't particularly noteworthy. So, if incubi are common enough to not engender panic and awe, why do we never have so much as a mention of any other instance of another race? There could have been a little more worldbuilding there.

Writing:
Although mostly pleasant, there were some quirks in the writing style that drove me nuts.

Statements frequently ended with question marks. It's a particularly annoying affectation? There are other ways to convey uncertainty that might work better than giving the impression of a valley girl speech habit? I'd thought initially that it might only be Leyton because of his general lack of confidence, but as the story progresses other characters do it as well. There were a few places where it made sense, but most of the time it was just bad.

Revisiting the non-modern world thought from above, there's a lot of modern language used. The first time someone was referred to as a jerk completely threw me.

There's a lot of redundancy in word usage (e.g. Mijah's thoughts travel to certain thoughts). It happens to all of us, but a little more editing might have caught a lot of it.

Punctuation is quite questionable at times, and there are some habits that made me blink each time they showed up. (Commas belong anywhere, but in the middle of this sentence.)

Each of the main characters has a section that's presented entirely from their point of view, but I felt at times that the switch was arbitrary, coming about just as I was getting to know each character and not when a particular character's focus had actually been completed. I did appreciate that within each section the point of view was limited, but I still could have done with fewer points of view overall.

Other Thoughts:
Early in the story is an offhand mention that Leyton's incubus magic ensured that he and Mijah came at the same time. I couldn't help thinking that this could be more inconvenient than not, depending on one's preferences and any games that might be being played.

Overall:
Despite my complaints, this isn't a bad story. I found it difficult at times to move past the flaws to really get into the story underneath, but if you can do so you'll find plenty to enjoy here.

Review: The Luckiest

Title: The Luckiest
Series: Lucky Moon
Author: Piper Vaughn & M.J. O'Shea
Publisher: Loose Id
Publication Date: 27 March 2012
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 91,476 words

Rating: 4 out of 5

Blurb:
Rock star Nick Ventura has finally hit rock bottom. Jealous of his brother’s new love, he starts overindulging in his usual vices and winds up crashing his car into a department store in a drunken haze. Publicly humiliated and on the verge of jail time, he enters into a court-ordered rehabilitation program.

Nutritionist Luka Novak is flamboyant, effeminate, the type of gay man that bisexual Nick would normally sneer at. His sunny nature hides a deep hurt from a previous relationship. Luka knows he should be wary of Nick’s reputation, but he’s drawn to Nick despite himself. Their tentative friendship turns into romance, but Luka soon comes to realize that Nick's fear of losing his bad boy reputation means he'll probably never go public with their relationship.

Nick never thought he needed anyone, until Luka Novak came into his life. Now he has to reconcile his carefree past with the future he suddenly wants more than anything. And the first lesson he has to learn is how to become the man that both he and Luka need him to be, rather than stay the boy he always was. Alone.

Review:

Main Characters:
Nick starts out as a very angry man, aggressive in his rebellion. There are masterfully woven hints that he's more than an asshole with a substance abuse problem, especially when he's on the topic of his brother, Shane. As the story progresses, though, he turns into a marshmallow, far more than I can buy, even with the hints of vulnerability. I do like said vulnerability and his inability to marry his old public persona with the man he's become for Luka, but I found that in execution he just became way too sappy. I still liked him rather a lot, but I preferred him with a little more attitude.

Luka, on the other hand, tends toward mellow but has a spine and is not afraid to stand up for himself. He works as a nutritionist at a rehab facility, but also teaches dancing on weekends and the odd weekday with his best friend, Jeana. (Actually, I'm not quite certain if his best friend is Jeana or Stephanie, his dog, but he has a lot of love to share.) He's described in the blurb as flamboyant and effeminate, but it doesn't come out much in the story itself, aside from his calling everyone 'hon' and 'sweetie' and liking musicals; it's enough to be a flavor of his flamboyance without overwhelming his character.

Chemistry:
Nick and Luka are certainly an entertaining couple, playing Luka's stubborn calm off of Nick's equally stubborn aggravation. The evolution from nutritionist and patient to lovers is lovely; I particularly enjoyed Nick's late-night/early-morning phone calls to discuss things he'd be damned if he mentioned to his therapist. The initial build of their relationship is very slow, but the burn of it is appealing, feeding back in on itself until it finally comes together.

I did wonder at times, though, how they actually stayed together as a couple. Nick fucks up. A lot. And Luka makes him suffer for a while but takes him back every time. By the time Nick's final fuck-up is resolved and they're back together for their happily ever after, I was getting a little frustrated. Nick the rock star and Nick the person never quite found a happy medium, despite his final acceptance and announcement of his life with Luka. It goes back to my preferring Nick with a little more attitude.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast is mostly returning characters from Moonlight Becomes You. Shane and Jesse both have decent parts (particularly in the later part of the story), and Dre has more of a presence as Nick's best friend. (Will, the fourth member of Luck, still got shafted, though.) On Luka's side, it's primarily Jeana and Stephanie. The secondary cast is mostly fleshed out well, with unique personalities and interesting interactions. I particularly enjoyed Shane in this story; it was interesting to see his evolution from Moonlight Becomes You, as he displayed rather a lot of growth. (I'd imagine he'd display even more if I had knowledge of the free stories that bridged the gap between Moonlight Becomes You and The Luckiest--I haven't read them yet--but what there is with only the two main books is satisfying.)

Story:
The story itself traces Nick's growth as a person by way of his relationship with Luka. It has its ups and downs and is generally well-paced, though it did drag in a few areas. (Honestly, I skimmed a lot of the sex; it got a bit repetitive after a while.)

There were a few unanswered questions for me. A situation comes up with Dr. Miller (the therapist at the rehab facility) in which he's harassing Luka about having someone better who should take his job. Luka resolves to discuss it with his boss, but that's the end of it. It struck me as unfinished and, as such, something that really didn't need to be included. I'm also still confused about the Rohypnol. Never mind that I find the premise that it just so happened to be in a random drink that Luka picked up ridiculous, it also seemed to peter out to nothing but a little bit of angst for Nick that perhaps he was too rough in bed.

There were also some elements that were too evocative of Moonlight Becomes You. There's the revealing talk about the Venturas' shitty childhood. There's the sudden craving for submission. There's the final grand gesture on stage to prove that their love really is true. Had I not read them back to back I might not have noticed or minded as much, but with The Luckiest right on top of Moonlight Becomes you, the redundancy was glaring.

Writing:
The writing style was a high point for me; it was easy to get sucked into. My main complaint is that, as the story progressed, it got harder and harder to tell Nick and Luka's narrations apart. When the story begins, there's a different energy in Nick's narration that's mostly disappeared by the end, leaving Nick and Luka almost identical.

Other Thoughts:
If the third book in the Lucky Moon series is not about Em, I will be very sad.

Overall:
Appealingly flawed characters with interesting evolution both separately and together kept me engaged. Although I missed Nick's attitude by the end and wish that a few loose ends had been tied up, it was still a story that I enjoyed very much. I look forward to picking up the final book in the trilogy.

Review: Faith & Fidelity

Title: Faith & Fidelity
Series: Faith, Love & Devotion
Author: Tere Michaels
Publisher: Loose Id
Publication Date: 23 September 2008
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 229 pages

Rating: 2 out of 5

Blurb:
New York City Vice Detective Evan Cerelli has lost his wife, the only person he ever loved and slept with. He's trying to get on with his life, build a life for his children. Former Homicide Detective Matt Haight is a ladies' man, all sex/no commitment. He's depressed, having a midlife crisis, and not sure where his life is headed.

The two find friendship in the bottom of a shared bottle. When the friendship turns to love, it shakes two straight men to the core and flips their lives inside out. Kids, families, careers that are not gay-friendly -- can all the love in the world overcome the obstacles to faith and fidelity?

Review:

Main Characters:
Evan is an officer with the NYPD, working in Vice. He lost his wife, Sherri, to an accident, and has been struggling since then to pull himself together to raise their four children. He's never had romantic thoughts about anyone but his wife--much less another man--and doesn't know what to make of it when attraction blooms between him and Matt. He's a mire of doubt and self-flagellation, and doesn't know how to go about helping himself. I found him hard to relate to; although his grief was palpable and well-done, it was also almost entirely who he was for the vast majority of the story.

Matt is a former Homicide detective, drummed out of the force after taking down a crooked cop and working now in private security. He's on a downward slide; he's alone and lonely, and the drinking he uses to cope with his life is beginning to take its toll. Although he does cut a rather pathetic figure, at least in the beginning, I found him much easier to invest in. I wouldn't say necessarily that I like him, but I at least didn't want to shake him as often as I did Evan.

Chemistry:
Evan and Matt begin as friends, bonding over each having lost their purpose for living--Evan lost Sherri, while Matt lost his position with the NYPD. It develops fairly quickly into attraction on Matt's part, lingers as one-sided for a short while, then bursts into a shared passion during a night of comfort. I wish the friendship had lingered longer, actually, as once they both recognized and acknowledged the attraction, things moved very quickly, almost too much so for my tastes.

Although they are attracted to each other, there is not a lot of sexual contact in this book; it focuses more on their growth as a couple, rather than their heat between the sheets. In fact, they never actually have penetrative sex. Handjobs, blowjobs, and frottage all make an appearance, but they never actually have intercourse. It's a surprising change, and actually rather refreshing. That being said: some of the situations in which they have sex throw me. The downstairs couch plays a big part in many of their sexual encounters, sometimes when the kids are asleep upstairs. If I were them, I'd be constantly on edge, waiting for someone to come downstairs (as kids are wont to do) and catch me in a compromising situation. I just couldn't believe that a man who cared so much about his children would leave such a chance open.

Secondary Characters:
There is a large supporting cast, mostly on Evan's side. Although large, they're never quite overwhelming and mostly well-drawn, though the motivations of some are questionable. (Sherri's parents elude and frustrate me. They apparently blame Evan for not only killing Sherri, but for taking her away in the first place. Don't people usually leave their parents' home when they marry? Why bear such a large grudge that they actually try to keep his children from him? It doesn't make sense.) The kids were the high points, although I also rather liked Vic and Helena.

Story:
The bulk of the story is Evan working through his grief. There is a lot of dwelling upon Sherri and their life together. A lot. Things come to a head after Evan is injured in the line of duty, leaving Evan and Matt to deal with the fallout of Evan's latest crisis. The events are a logical, appealing progression, but the pacing is frequently dragged down by the focus on Evan's all-consuming grief.

There doesn't really seem to be a whole lot of closure in this story. There are a number of threads left loose, and the ending is rather abrupt. The third book in the series apparently revisits Evan and Matt, which hopefully means that those issues left unaddressed with be resolved, but at least a little more tidying up at the end of this book couldn't have hurt.

Writing:
The writing was perhaps the weakest point of the book. There are frequent errors--typos, grammatical errors, word substitutions or misspellings, even a couple of what appear to be Find and Replace errors. The author had trouble keeping straight some facts, ages in particular. (Miranda is 16 or 17 depending on the scene. Sherri is 34 when she dies and apparently the same age as Evan, but Evan is later referred to as "nearly 40". Matt is identified as 42, but later is described as approaching 45.) And the ellipses... God, the ellipses. Every conversation--sometimes every line of dialogue--is littered with ellipses. There are 832 ellipses in this book. That's a lot of ellipses.

There are also a lot of shifts in the point of view. Most of the time they're delineated by section breaks, but there are also switches within the same narrative. Sometimes those switches are even to secondary characters, which makes them particularly jarring.

Other Thoughts:
I read this as a PDF, and the formatting is all sorts of crazy. There's white space where there shouldn't be white space and line breaks and indents where there should be a continuous flow. I'd thought it might be due to something with my Kindle Fire (which has thrown funky formatting at me on other PDFs), but viewing it on my laptop has the same formatting errors. Until I got the hang of reading where there was supposed to be white space and where there wasn't, things were a bit confusing.

Another thing that bothers me is the set-up for the sequel: After Evan pushes Matt away, Matt mopes about and after a while ends up at a bar to get his drunk on and maybe pick up some tail. While there, he meets James, in town for an unknown reason (at least that I can recall). They bond over beer and broken hearts, and eventually end up going back to James's hotel room and getting freaky. Not only was it very transparent as a set-up for James's story, but the ease with which Matt fell into bed with James was kind of startling. I was half-expecting the story to end with Matt and James getting together, while Evan went on with his miserable life.

Overall:
Uneven pacing bogged down by angst and problematic writing made this a difficult book for me to like. Although the characters are interesting beneath their grief, a little more growth and a little less wallowing would have helped make this ultimately-unsatisfying story shine.

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: Mongrel

Title: Mongrel
Author: K.Z. Snow
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 8 December 2010
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 202 pages

Rating: 5 out of 5

Blurb:
Hunzinger's Mechanical Circus, a rollicking seaside carnival where imagination meets machinery, shines as the only bright spot in the dreary city of Purinton. A shadow is cast there one day when a tall, cloaked figure approaches the stand of Will Marchman, a young patent-medicine salesman. Fanule Perfidor, commonly known as the Dog King, isn't welcome at the Circus. No resident of Taintwell is; they're all Branded Mongrels, officially shunned. But Will is beguiled by the stunning, mysterious Perfidor. Their mutual wariness soon gives way to desire, and a bond forms.

Soon the naive but plucky pitchman becomes embroiled in a dangerous quest. Fanule suspects Alphonse Hunzinger and Purinton's civic leaders are responsible for the disappearance or incarceration of countless Branded Mongrels. But why? As Will's passion and regard for his tormented lover grow, he's determined to help Fanule get answers and prevent any further persecution... or worse. They just have to stay together—and stay alive long enough—to see their plan through.

Review:

Main Characters:
Will is a young man with no one in the world. After the death of his parents, he was raised by his uncle, a patent-medicine salesman. Upon his uncle's death, he took over the business and found a place at Hunzinger's Mechanical Circus, where he sells the Dr. Bolt's Bloodroot Elixir that the circus's owner endorses. He's also a twor--a man who prefers the company of other men. Although he lacks experience, he's not without gumption, and once he's set on a path he doesn't hesitate. He's a refreshing character, with an appealing blend of naïveté and determination.

Fanule--Fan--is the Eminence of Taintwell, leader of the village in which mongrels--people who are part human and part... other--live. He tends toward arrogance, though it's not unfounded, and making his own rules. He's determined to help his people despite frequently being unable to help himself, as he suffers from a debilitating mental illness that leaves him reliant on a powdered treatment to maintain an even keel. He also has a vulnerable side that comes out primarily around Will, with a tenderness that comes initially as quite a surprise.

Chemistry:
The first time Will and Fan meet sparks intrigue in both--Will has never before met a mongrel, and Fan is perfectly willing to nurture his initial attraction. The second time they meet is explosive, with conversation turning quickly into kisses that lead to a hotel room and eager lovemaking. From there it's easy--perhaps a bit too easy, but only a bit--for them to fall from lust to love. They're a touching couple, balancing each other well and giving each other something to cling to.

Secondary Characters:
I loved many of the secondary characters, Lizabetta and Clancy Marrowbone in particular. Although I was initially prepared to dislike him, I also came to like Simon, particularly once it became apparent that the other shoe I was waiting to drop wasn't going to. My only real complaint with characters is that the motivations of the antagonists was never really revealed; what they did was apparent, but I never came to understand the why of it.

Story:
The story follows Fan and Will as they unravel the mystery behind mongrel arrests and disappearances, and how they're linked to Hunzinger's Mechanical Circus. It's unwrapped a bit at a time in perfect little chunks, woven well into the growing relationship between Fan and Will. It never lagged for me, moving along in a smooth flow from beginning to end. I could've done with a little bit more world-building--we learn very little of the city of Purinton and the village of Taintwell, and nothing of areas outside--but what there was was certainly enough to set the scene.

Writing:
The writing was an absolute delight, lush and evocative, and reading it felt sometimes as hedonistic as sinking into a milk bath sprinkled with rose petals. Will and Fan each had their voice represented, and each had a tone that made it easy to distinguish to whom the current point of view belonged.

Other Thoughts:
This is one of the first times I've seen bipolar disorder depicted in the genre, and I was thrilled to find it extremely well done. Fan is rapid-cycling, very nearly ultradian rapid-cycling, which in his case makes the slide from mania to depression and back again frequent enough to be almost crippling. I also loved Will's reaction to it; knowing when to soothe and when to leave him alone was the perfect response.

Overall:
Distinct characters and an engaging story are only bolstered by smooth writing and an intriguing, if not quite fully-fleshed, world. Reading it was a pleasure, one that I look forward to experiencing again.

Review: Daybreak

Title: Daybreak
Series: Eight Nights
Author: Keira Andrews
Publisher: Loose Id
Publication Date: 16 December 2008
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 135 pages

Rating: 4 out of 5

Blurb:
Lucas and Nate enjoyed eight steamy nights of forbidden romance last year at Hanukkah. Now after months of long-distance dating, they're living in their own apartment in Greenwich Village and beginning a new life together. Lucas hates lying to Nate's family about the true nature of their relationship, but being with Nate is worth it.

They revel in having a private place to explore their relationship -- and every inch of each other -- but Nate and Lucas soon discover that living together isn't always perfect. When an unexpected betrayal shatters their tentative happiness, they struggle to find their way back together as the holidays approach once more. As their first magical nights together become a distant memory, can Lucas and Nate's relationship survive the break of day?

Review:

Main Characters:
Lucas has grown up a bit since Eight Nights, transferring to NYU and finding a studio apartment to share with Nate. He does, however, still have a lot of growing up left to do, and a series of his bad decisions drive much of the story. It's interesting to see him growing into his possibilities.

Nate, on the other hand, still seems stuck where Eight Nights left him; despite spending the summer in Europe with his parents, he's no closer to telling them of either his orientation or his change in major. He's developed a jealous streak that is actually rather charming (most of the time), but he's also gotten prickly to the point that I sometimes found myself wondering what Lucas saw in him.

Chemistry:
Although the story begins with their living together, the sense that they didn't know each other was pervasive. They had sex--plenty of sex--and got on quite well in that aspect, but found themselves butting heads in other aspects of their lives. As events played out and they were separated, I wondered if it would even be for the best for them to get back together. That being said, they're still an attractive couple, just a very immature one, both with plenty of room left to find themselves.

Secondary Characters:
There is a large supporting cast, though they rotate through fairly quickly so that the numbers are never overwhelming. Some drove me nuts--I wish Casey hadn't played out the way he did--but others were surprisingly enjoyable; I particularly enjoyed the scenes with Nate's father or Sam. The secondary characters were breathed with just enough life to make them interesting without dragging the focus away from where it belonged, with Lucas and Nate.

Story:
As I'd mentioned, a large force in the story is Lucas's bad decisions, though they're not the only key points. Although some of the critical events, whether through Lucas's actions or an outside influence, came as a surprise, none of them struck me as gratuitous. My biggest complaint is the pat ending, when a particular player completely reverses a stance they'd taken regarding Lucas and Nate just in time for family sap; it seemed a little forced, and I'd rather have seen a more natural progression to resolution, rather than a switch being flipped.

Writing:
I enjoyed the writing in this book rather more than that of Eight Nights, though that may be simply because the author had rather more time to hit their stride. The balance of showing and telling was still excellent, and the dialogue was strong.

Overall:
Interesting (if sometimes frustrating) characters and a well-crafted story make this an easy book to like. Although the ending was a bit of a letdown, the rest of the story was charming enough to bear up through the stumble. I'm only sorry that we don't get to find out more about how Lucas and Nate grow into themselves.

Review: American Love Songs

Title: American Love Songs
Author: Ashlyn Kane
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 31 December 2010
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 251 pages

Rating: 4 out of 5

Blurb:
Jake Brenner has too many wild oats to sow to fall in love—or so he claims. Besides, he's much too busy with his band, the Wayward Sons, to go looking for romance. His reticence has nothing to do with his embarrassing crush on Chris, the band's lead singer and Jake's erstwhile best friend. But that was before enigmatic wanderer Parker McAvoy signed on as the band's new lead guitarist.

He can only deny his attraction to sweet, dorky Parker for so long before the urge to do something about it becomes impossible to ignore. The trouble is, Parker knows all about Jake's philandering ways—and oh, yeah, he's not gay. Or so Jake thinks until a string of related events provides encouraging new insight. Can he convince Parker to overlook his colorful past and give him a chance? Or will this love song fade out before it even begins?

Review:

Main Characters:
Jake is an easygoing guy, the mediator of his band of friends--and his friends in the band. He's a college dropout who hasn't looked back since he made the decision to pursue a career in music, a bit of a player, and completely oblivious to certain aspects of himself. He's a great, fun character, and one I came to adore as the story progressed.

Parker is much quieter and far more reserved, suffering from occasionally-crippling shyness. He is a musical genius with a gift for songwriting to go with his talents with instruments, and keeps secrets about his past close to his chest. He's downright adorable in his insecurities, and it's easy to root for him, especially as his past begins to come out.

Chemistry:
For much of the story, Jake and Parker are friends with no real inkling that they could be anything more. Their friendship is frankly sweet; I love the scene where Parker is dragged into bed by a sick Jake to play bedwarmer. Once they begin to recognize their attraction and act on it, though, things definitely sizzle. It's a slow progression, but a very appealing one; I found myself holding my breath each time they kissed, wondering if it would be that time they'd be carried away by it.

Secondary Characters:
The supporting cast is fairly large, including their bandmates, support staff, families, and other incidentals, but most are so well drawn that they're easy to keep track of despite the quantity. Several are stellar--I particularly liked Allanna and Mickey.

Story:
The story follows not only the development of Jake and Parker's relationship, but also the rise of their band from local notoriety to international glory. It was generally well-paced and engaging, but I found it lagged a little by the time Jake and Parker really started heating up; I found my attention wandering more than once toward the end.

Writing:
The writing was lovely, with engaging dialogue and lively prose. The prose was interspersed with occasional blog posts, which was interesting, and also sported the occasional footnote, for commentary by the characters.

Although I enjoyed the writing, the premise did throw me a little. It was presented as a story told to the fans, into which the blog posts and footnotes fit, but some of the things included that made sense in a traditional format didn't make sense as it was presented; would Parker really be comfortable with an account of him coming in his jeans being presented to the fans when he has to go onstage sans glasses to help control his nerves? I just couldn't quite equate the two.

Overall:
Likable characters and a fun story made this a pleasure to read. Although the premise still throws me, if you can move beyond that you'll certainly find plenty to like. I only wish it were possible to see more of Jake and Parker's growth together.

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: Dutch Treat

Title: Dutch Treat
Author: Andrew Grey
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 14 July 2011
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 200 pages

Rating: 2 out of 5

Blurb:
When Michael accepts a company assignment overseas, he doesn't count on being dumped by his boyfriend on the way to the airport. The breakup is a bad omen--Michael's time in Europe would be one long misery of loneliness and corporate backbiting if it weren’t for his friendship with his coworker, Stephan.

When he finds out Stephan wants more than friendship, Michael is torn. Even if he chooses to risk his one bright relationship in Europe for a chance at love, when this project is over, isn't his only choice to say goodbye?

Review:

Characters:
Michael is an information systems project manager for Shoe Box, an international athletic shoe retailer, with his life in line: he likes his job (if not his direct supervisor) and he's got a hot boyfriend who's been throwing around the L-word. Things begin to fall apart when he has a stint in the European office all but forced upon him... which is when his character starts to fall apart, too. He's supposedly (self-proclaimedly) strong and forceful, but I never really see it. He actually tends to be a bit of a pushover, mostly just going with whatever anyone else decides, whether it's his professional or personal life.

Stephan works in the marketing department of the Shoe Box European office. I had a hard time getting a handle on him, honestly. Part of it is that the entire story is told from Michael's point of view (which is not a complaint), but part of it I think is that he really didn't have much of a personality. He tends to come off sometimes as almost naive and childish, and runs hot and cold in an unappealing manner; the contradictions within the same conversation make no sense to me. (For example, there's a scene in which Michael rescues a child from drowning (more on this later). Stephan is all over him, claiming he's a hero. As the conversation progresses, it comes out that Stephan wants an intimate relationship with Michael and, when Michael refuses, Stephan calls him a coward and fumes. When Michael capitulates with an offer to date, Stephan is all sunshine and roses again.)

Try though I might, I cannot find Michael and Stephan appealing as a couple. Their chemistry is just zero; I zoned through their first kiss and ended up skimming most of the sex scenes. Even the declarations of love struck me as rote, something to be said because it was expected, not actually felt. It didn't help that I didn't buy into their first meeting: newly-arrived Michael is eating in his hotel's restaurant when he just so happens to be approached by Stephan, who'd heard someone new was arriving and thought it must be Michael when he saw him at the restaurant. I just don't buy it--it's too much of a contrivance.

The supporting cast was mostly conveniences. They popped up in sometimes non-sensical ways in time to give Michael an epiphany, then disappeared. Jake and Roger spring immediately to mind. Although they'd been Michael's friends for years, there's not so much as a mention of them until half-way through the book--how hard would it have been to insert a short scene with them prior to Michael's departure for Europe?--when they invite Michael to a dinner at which they make Michael think about how he regards Stephan. There's a brief conversation much later in which they give Michael more to think about when it comes to a pivotal decision, but nothing between the two, and nothing after. I realize that the focus is (and should be) on Michael and Stephan, but the sudden appearances and disappearances were jarring.

Story:
This is a decidedly character-driven story, so, while things happen, the story exists primarily to bring the characters together. Some of the events that work to do so, however, struck me as a little ridiculous. As an example: the aforementioned drowning child.

As they reached the spot where the walkway split to head out to the pavilion, Michael watched the waves break against the shore. A small round object bobbed between two waves near shore, and Michael stopped, watching. The object appeared again, and Michael took off running, tearing off his jacket and pulling off his sweatshirt, shoes left in the sand behind him. Hitting the water, he raced toward what was now plainly a small head of dark hair.

Aside from the introduction being clumsy (if it wasn't clear that it was, in fact, a child, why was Michael in such a hurry to get into the water?), the transparency of the vehicle was a bit off-putting. It seemed shoehorned in to facilitate the transition from Michael resisting Stephan's advances to giving in and agreeing to date. Other events (such as the final determinant of whether Michael stayed or returned to the States) struck me as equally forced.

Crises also resolve themselves a little too quickly. For example, there's a kerfuffle which first crops up on page 109 and which could have easily affected the rest of the story, but it was completely resolved 12 pages later--and it would have been sooner, had those 12 pages not included some sex. A little more in the way of lasting repercussions wouldn't have been a bad thing.

Writing:
It seems as though the author lost track of some of the details here and there. Michael returns from his first trip back to the States the day before Independence Day, but the Fourth of July comes around 31 pages later. Michael claims he doesn't date friends, but repeatedly asserts that he and Devon were friends first. Michael also claims he was never in love, but later shares the tragic story of his first love (which was almost embarrassingly melodramatic).

Although I can see how others appreciate the author's writing, it's really not to my taste.

"I wish I could talk more, but I have an appointment. Let me know what you decide." Dennis hung up, and Michael stood, walking over and opening his door before going back to work. At lunchtime, he ate alone. Usually Michael ate with some of the guys or other managers, but today he wasn't up for it. He had too much to think about. What bothered him most was that he knew he was going to do it. He knew he‟d put his life on hold and do this project because they'd asked, but he absolutely didn't want to go. It wasn't in his psyche to turn them down. Michael had always done what the company needed and asked of him, and it really wasn't in him to say no. He knew it, and he thought Curtis and Mark knew it too.

Though there's nothing technically wrong with the above, for me it's too much telling, too much information dumping. The reader is told more than s/he is shown, which makes it difficult to invest in the characters or the story.

I also found some of the dialogue to be rather unrealistic. Does anyone actually talk like this?

[...] "You must talk, Stephan. I don't know what Heinrich told you, but you have to talk to me. I want to hear your voice, your sounds, I want you to tell me what you like and what you don't. I want to hear you as well as see, taste, and feel you."

"But...," Stephan stuttered.

"You must always ask for what you want. I'll decide when and if you get it, but you must never be afraid to ask, and you must always say if you do not like anything." Michael touched Stephan‟s chin. "Always. I don't play games and I don't fool around. If we do this, it's an expression of our feelings for one another."

Other Thoughts:
There's a lot of mind reading in this book. The first time it struck me was when Michael had a conversation with his seatmate during his flight to Europe. Though he made no prior comment about being gay and the single word he said was Devon, Ruthie (the seatmate) instantly knows that Devon (a unisex name, last I'd checked) is a man and that he and Michael used to be involved. Later, Michael has a conversation with Devon in which Devon states that he was wrong to end things the way he did, which Michael immediately assumes means that Devon wants to get back together. There are other directions comments could have led, but the respondents always automatically know exactly what the speaker means. It's just a little unbelievable.

Overall:
It's not a bad story, but it's so out of line with my tastes that I just can't come to like it. Fans of the author will find a lot here, I'm sure, but this story has demonstrated that I am unfortunately not one of them.

Review: Change of Heart

Title: Change of Heart
Series: Change of Heart
Author: Mary Calmes
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Publication Date: 8 November 2009
Reviewed Format: ebook
Length: 260 pages

Rating: 2 out of 5

Review: Jin is a rarity among rarities: a male reah, the intended mate to a semel, the leader of a werepanther tribe. Driven out of his tribe as an abomination, he and his lifetime friend, Crane, set out across the country, never settling anywhere for long. That all changes when three tribes discover what he is--and decide that they each must have him. Will the threat of an end to Jin's independence send him running again, or will he find the one thing that could make him stop?

Jin tends to run hot and cold in ways that don't really make sense to me. One moment, he's swearing that he wants nothing to do with a mate, the next he's begging for Logan to use him like a nickel whore. It's almost like he's brainwashed in parts, and the explanation of his reactions to Logan as being normal for a semel and reah just doesn't jive for me, particularly given his desperate struggle for independence.

Logan never really struck me as anything beyond a chest-beating übermale. I couldn't see him as a great leader under Jin's influence (or, rather, with Jin's overly-distracting presence) and his possessiveness/obsessiveness over Jin was ridiculously overblown; the explanation that was offered again just didn't sit right. He never really evolved past a testosterone-laden jerk to me.

The relationship between Jin and Logan was far more violent than I usually prefer, and far more than was necessary, to my mind. The amount of biting and clawing and bleeding during their sexual encounters was downright off-putting, especially with the emphasis on how orgasmic the violence was. Maybe my skin's just too thin, but I had to walk away more than once. Even the sex scenes I think were intended to be sweet involved violent behavior; there was no escaping it.

The supporting cast was okay, with high points and low points. A few of them struck me as brainwashed also; Logan's father springs immediately to mind. The 180 in his behavior with a throwaway explanation made me wonder how he'd ever been semel, also; it just wasn't consistent in what you'd expect from someone in his position. Other characters were built up before disappearing entirely, which got annoying--why should I continue to care about a character that the author doesn't?

The story itself was so tangled in the characters that I found I couldn't escape my dislike for them long enough to enjoy it. The world-building was interesting, as was the physical development of the werepanthers, so I feel like it's a failure on my part that I couldn't immerse myself in that, at least, despite the characters. The writing itself was good, also, with only a few errors I caught. My main complaint there is inconsistent italicizing; sometimes the society-specific words were italicized, sometimes they weren't.

That being said--there was a bit too much repetition when it came to defining terms. If I didn't know what reah meant by the end of the first chapter, defining it again and again throughout the rest of the book wasn't going to help me. On the other hand, some terms weren't ever adequately defined; I'm still not entirely certain what role a sylvan plays, for example. The inconsistency was a bit annoying by the end, honestly, and the repetition distracted me more than once.

In the end, this was just not the book for me. Part of it may be my lack of familiarity with shifter stories--it's never been a particular interest for me--so someone who particularly enjoys them may get more out of this, For me, it set a tone for the genre that I didn't enjoy much at all, and which makes me leery of trying similar books. I may have liked this more had I known what to expect going into it, but, as it stands, I think I'll be taking a break from the genre for a while.