February Round Up

on Paper/eBook

Rule of Three by Kelly Jamieson - B  Very good m/m/f menage story where the characters actually talk about their relationship, their plans and (begin to) address potential traps which may arise.  Most of the book is spent developing the relationship and changing it from an m/f/m to an m/m/f.  As unrealistic as I gather they are (I understand from Twitter - my source of all the important information - that polyamory is mostly a couple who each (or maybe just one) have separate relationships with others - a triad is apparently kind of unusual), m/m/f are my favourite type of menage stories.  I felt there is more "equality" to the relationship where all three feel love and sexual desire for the other rather than the concept of the 2 guys "sharing" the woman.   The most unfortunately named Dag* is Chris' best friend from college.  He has been out of town, having left after realising his unrequited love for Chris would remain so.  He believes Chris is relentlessly straight.  Even though they have shared a lot of women together, there has never been any touching of man bits.  Chris and Kassidy have been dating about a year and have just moved in together.  They are very much in love.  Kassidy develops feelings for Dag, he develops feelings for her and Chris eventually recognises his feelings for Dag.  Lordly it is a sexy book.  I devoured it in virtually one sitting.  The writing was good; Ms. Jamieson has a very entertaining style.  I would have liked more about their life together as a triad, a bit more about some of the practical difficulties and how they would deal together - this stuff was only just brought up at the very end and, while there were discussions, I wasn't sure how it would work in practice and I wasn't sure if Chris would actually talk more about his feelings (something he struggled with the whole book).  How would Kassidy's parents react?  What would happen if there was some jealousy which arose?  Are interactions between 2 of the 3 okay or do all 3 have to be there?  To be fair, this was the getting together book, not the how it works book, but I can't say I wasn't curious.  Anyways, I enjoyed it quite a bit.

*I don't know if it means the same thing here as in the US, but a "dag" is a bit of sheep's dung caught up in the wool around their rear end and it's NOT what I want to be thinking of in a sexy book. Especially a sexy book where there's backdoor activity, if you know what I'm saying.

Hotel Pens by Geoffrey Knight - B  Very good m/m short about travel writer, Joe Jordan, who broke up with his lover some time ago and has been lonely ever since.  Because of his job, he's always in hotels and he's a keen collector of their pens.  While in New York for work, he meets Claude, a French ex-pat who is living at the Beacon Hotel and translating m/m romance books into French. Claude courts Joe and teaches him a thing or two about love, himself and New York by writing various messages in pen on Joe's body in a kind of scavenger hunt.  I found the writing overall to be engaging and sensitive and I liked how as Joe rediscovered New York, he rediscovered himself also.  I was also happy that Joe had things to offer Claude and it wasn't all one-sided.  The story was very short (56 pages) and ends in a HFN ending.  I wondered what would happen to the couple after - Joe is still a travel writer after all, but maybe there will be further stories for these two?  The author is Australian but I think he's definitely been to New York, there is a great sense of place in the book.

Beginnings and Ends by Suzanne Brockmann

Why I read it: I've read and enjoyed all of the Troubleshooters books and I'm a fan of Jules and Robin so I downloaded this one as soon as it was available.

What it's about:  (the blurb from Goodreads)  After years of playing the tormented actor, Joe Laughlin, on the hit television show Shadowland, Hollywood star Robin Chadwick Cassidy is ready for a change. Joe’s character embodies the real demons of Robin’s past—his struggle with his sexuality, his battle with alcoholism—and portraying the part has taken a heavy toll on his personal life. Robin’s husband, FBI agent Jules Cassidy, has noticed the strain and will do whatever he can to make Robin happy. And what Robin has in mind will forever transform his career, his marriage, and his family.

What worked for me (and what didn't): It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out what the beginning and end the title speaks of is - the end of the series and an addition to the family.  I really don't think that's a massive spoiler.  And, it's not that you actually see much of the latter in any event.  If the story had been more about the "beginning" and less about the "end" I think I would have enjoyed this one a lot more.  I didn't have massive hopes.  I was never expecting an A read - the story is only 38 pages long after all.  I expected a vignette maybe - a Jules and Robin slice of life.  What I got however, was a lot of stuff about Shadowland - a fictional TV show set in a fictional world.  

April Reads

on Paper/eBook

Frat Boy and Toppy by Anne Tenino - B- Brad Feller is a college student on a fraternity and athletic scholarship who, at the beginning of the book, realises there's no hiding from himself anymore - he's gay.  Sebastian is a TA for one of Brad's history classes and after Brad buys a paper online to get his attention, they start a relationship.  I found the second half of the book much more enjoyable than the first.  I was really struggling to get through the first half, but persisted because Sarah at DA liked it so much.  I didn't really get the humour in the first part of the book and I did not like the phrase "the nail in the coffin" which Brad's dad used when he was giving an example of why he thought Brad was gay - that seemed very negative to me.   Some of the phrasing confused me and I had to read over it a few times to work out what was being said and that threw me out of the story at times.  It's a fairly gentle story with not a lot of conflict - Brad's coming out is fairly easy from what I could see in the book and any struggle he may have had with being gay had been resolved before the book started.

However, thes scenes when Brad came out to his friend Kyle and later, to the frat itself, were very funny and the sex was definitely hot.  It's a short book - only 165 pages but it retailed at $6.99 which I thought was pretty pricey.  Between that and the title, I don't think I would have picked it up at all if not for Sarah's recommendation. It was one of those rare books where her tastes and mine didn't quite mesh - go figure.    Am I sorry?  Well, no.  But, I wish I'd managed to buy it on special somewhere.

Marathon Cowboys by Sarah Black First off, I really like this cover. Did I like the book though?  Well, I did. But.