The Lion of Kent by Aleksandr Voinov & Kate Cotoner

TITLE: The Lion of Kent
AUTHOR: Aleksandr Voinov & Kate Cotoner
PUBLISHER: Carina Press
LENGTH: Novella
GENRE: Gay historical erotic romance
COST: $3.59

After five years away from his estate, Sir Robert de Cantilou has returned from the Crusades, ready to return to the life he once knew. None is more happy to see him than Squire William Raven. As the bastard son of the manor’s reeve, William is determined to become a knight and bring honor to his name. He’s inspired by the example Sir Robert sets and dreams of finally getting his spurs, but his focus gets diverted by sudden intrigue within the castle and a mysterious man who visits him at night, making him feel things he’s never felt before…

Earlier this year, I reviewed an anthology over at Three Dollar Bill Reviews that introduced me to the work of Aleksandr Voinov. The story he co-wrote in it was hands down one of my favorites within the collection, and I decided to pursue more of his work, only to realize that I had this novella, co-written with a different author, already sitting in my virtual TBR pile. I pulled it out eagerly, and though it doesn’t reach the heights of the short story I read, it’s certainly a strong piece, meriting even more trust for this author and his work.

The story begins with Robert’s return as William is training. From the start, William is enthralled by the man, by his honor and goodness, by his physical attractiveness and keen intelligence. Robert is hosting a hunt for a group of French emissaries, which for William, seems like the perfect opportunity to finally prove his worth and earn his knighthood. His training seems to be a series of failures, however, his anxiety about looking good for Sir Robert getting the better of him more than once. The evening before their guests are to arrive, William is visited in the night by an unknown man, one who gets William off without ever seeking relief for himself. Life seems good to William, until he overhears a plot to kill Sir Robert. The most important thing now is to protect Robert no matter what.

This historical does what not very many in this genre really do for me – made me forget I was reading a historical. It’s not because of the lack of detail to create the setting. It’s the opposite. The story is just so well-realized that it never feels intrusive, never feels like I’m being reminded page after page that this happened a long time ago. It rings of authenticity, which is a credit both to the rather seamless prose and the meticulous structure of its presentation. There aren’t awkward information dumps, or pages of facts that have nothing to do with moving the story forward. I sank into this story as if I was a squire within Sir Robert’s household already, a natural extension of the world the authors created. In fact, the only thing holding me back from believing in it one hundred percent was the occasional anachronistic term.

William gets compared constantly to a young lion, but honestly, I never understood the appellation (though Robert explains himself toward the end, an explanation that seemed utterly superficial compared to the depths of the rest of the tale). Instead, he seemed very much the eager puppy to me, panting to please his master, tumbling over his own gangly legs in his efforts because he has yet to learn his own balance. This manifests in every aspect of William’s life – his fighting, where his impetuosity often gets the better of him; his actions, where he leaps to be the hero rather than take the safer, surer approach; his sex, where he fumbles to be everything he can for the man he adores. It’s symptomatic of his age as he’s very young and green in this, but it also makes it a little hard to take him completely seriously.

Robert, on the other hand, is suitably enigmatic, with an appealing melancholy edge. His characterization suffers, however, as he’s seen so much through William’s rose-colored glasses. I never quite believe he’s as good as all that, in spite of all the right moves that he makes. He’s just a little too altruistic in their affair, though I wonder if that might have been mitigated if I’d been able to perceive William as he does. When he explains in the story about why William, I found myself wondering, “Huh? That doesn’t sound like the guy I’ve been reading about.” It leaves the romance in this feeling only partially formed. The sex scenes are functional without having the real heat I would have expected considering the passionate prose, and my commitment to the ending isn’t complete.

However, considering what an immersive world the authors created, those are minor quibbles. I was still very much invested in following William’s adventures, regardless of how correct his actions were or who he might take up with, and credit for that is due to the wonderful scene-setting constructed around him.

Readability	9/10 – Intelligent and immersive
Hero #1	7/10 – More like an eager puppy than the lion Robert kept proclaiming him to be, but still charming in his own way
Hero #2	6/10 – Enigmatic with an air of melancholy
Entertainment value	7/10 – Transports to the time and place, and if I didn’t completely fall for the romance, the setting made up for it
World building	9/10 – Vibrantly realized, the only reason this isn’t perfect is because of some of the modern terminology that occasionally shattered the illusion
TOTAL:	38/50

Solstice Heat by Leila Brown

TITLE: Solstice Heat
AUTHOR: Leila Brown
PUBLISHER: Loose Id
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 30k)
GENRE: Paranormal erotic romance
COST: $4.99

Once the alpha of his pack, Jason now lives on the periphery, trapped in his wheelchair, desperate for a mate. He thinks he’s found her in the woman he’s been talking to online, but appearances are not what they seem. Gio discovered the correspondence her little sister has been having with a stranger online and vowed to face this sexual predator, once and for all. At Jason’s house, however, his wolf sees her verbal attack as a threat and before either one knows it, he’s bitten her…

I often find myself at a loss with some of the crazes that sweep through published fiction, mostly because they don’t hit my kinks. A few I’ll read anyway if a story sounds good enough. Werewolf stories fall into that small category. I can take them or leave them, and honestly, nine times out of ten, I leave them. I don’t swoon at the idea of forever mates, or insta-mates, and most of my experiences with werewolf stories have been with authors who use these genre tropes as shortcuts to real storytelling or genuine character growth. This novella stood out with its promise of a handicapped hero—a kink I do have—and I bought it in hopes of getting a story about a man struggling to come to grips with the conflict between his disability and his alpha nature, with some hot sex along the way.

That’s not what I got.

It starts out that way. Jason wants to find a mate who doesn’t remember him from the way he was before, a woman who will want him for the man he is now, trapped in his chair. He’s been corresponding with a woman online for the past three months, and now, he’s finally had the nerve to ask her to come see him. His goal is to make her fall in love with him so he can take her to the pack’s solstice ceremony and turn her. The pack’s laws dictate that once a human knows about them, they have to be either turned or killed, so he wants to make it so that this woman wants to be turned. There’s a problem, though. The woman who arrives at his front door is not the one he’s been writing to. It’s her sister, who is pissed off and convinced he’s a sexual predator. Her verbal attack sparks him into an unexpected shift, and he bites her and forces her to submit before it’s too late to stop him.

That’s where the story changes. See, once a woman gets bitten, she goes into heat. She needs to have sex to ease it, or go mad as a result. And because Gio has been bitten by an alpha, that means even more sex and an even stronger reaction. So instead of a hot tale of a hurt man learning to love again, it’s basically a fuck-or-die story. Gio needs to have sex with Jason as soon as, and as often as, possible, or risk going out of control. Because she’s such a strong personality, she fights it. All good, right?

Up to this point, it wasn’t that bad. The prose is simplistic, and the characterizations lack any sort of nuance, but I still had hope. Then it got to this point. Now, I’m not a fan of the fuck-or-die scenario (yes, in this case, she doesn’t literally die, but the intent is pretty much the same since the circumstances if she doesn't are still dire with a capital D), but I will, and have, read some done well. It might be because the prose was just too hot to ignore, or I loved the characters, or there was a fascinating psychological approach taken to the scenario. This story had none of those. Then it got worse. I can tell you the exact moment this story lost me. My jaw dropped, and then I laughed out loud at how ridiculous it was. It’s inevitable Gio and Jason have sex, right? At the end, I read this: Then she felt it. His essence flowed into her, making the fire deep inside cool. That essence is his come because they can’t use a condom (Jason says so). And when she tries to get up… “No. If you stand up, my cum will leak out, and the heat will return…” His come literally turns the flame down (not quite douses, Gio realizes, but she feels normal again).

There is zero subtlety there. Zero nuance. This typifies the work in other areas, as well, from the shallowly written bad guys, to the not hot at all for me sex scenes. Gio redeems herself slightly when she faces off with Jason’s ex, but when her abrasive attitude isn’t directly warranted, she came across as unnecessarily angry and shrill. Jason fares slightly better, but even he lacks any kind of depth.

I don’t read enough werewolf stories to know if this is typical. It might be, for all I know. Fans of this type of shifter very well could have different reactions than I did. But from a non-rose-colored glasses perspective on the genre, this story fails to deliver a coherent romance, genuine emotion, or interesting world-building.

Readability	6/10 – Simplistic with a lot of redundancies
Hero	5/10 – Lacked any sort of nuance to make me fall for him
Heroine	4/10 – I liked how she kicked ass when it was necessary, but when it wasn’t, she felt angry, abrasive, and obnoxious
Entertainment value	2/10 – It lost all credibility when his come literally puts the fire out inside her
World building	6/10 – Though some attempts are there to create an interesting world, it’s presented haphazardly and leaves a lot of important questions unanswered
TOTAL:	23/50

Ariadne's Thread by Marie Treanor

TITLE: Ariadne’s Thread
AUTHOR: Marie Treanor
PUBLISHER: Samhain
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 46k)
GENRE: Paranormal erotic romance
COST: $4.50

Helping to rob a wealthy man on New Year’s Eve seems like the quickest way for down on her luck Addie McSween to get out of the financial hole she’s in. Until she discovers that the man they’re robbing is the renowned concert pianist, John Maxwell. And that his house is haunted by multiple ghosts. And a snowstorm has stranded them, forcing her to come face to face with the first man to ever make her feel alive…

After reading another book by this author last summer, I promptly went out and bought a number of books from her backlist. Just like I kicked myself then about taking so long to read it, I’m kicking myself again about taking so long getting around to reading other titles by her. Because honestly, this is an author who writes heroes and stories I literally sink into.

This is a ghost story/crime caper gone wrong/romance all rolled up into one. Addie is a single mother from Glasgow, who’s hooked up with her brother and his criminal friends to be the driver on their heist. They’re robbing a house out in the middle of nowhere on New Year’s Eve, using the party with its numerous guests who come and go as their cover. Things go wrong almost from the start, however, when Addie, who’s supposed to keep an eye out, gets caught by the owner of the house. He introduces himself as Johnny, and she pretends to be a friend of his sister’s, but the chemistry between them is electric. Things go even more awry when the weather turns, and the sister wanders into the middle of the robbery, and there’s no way to get out of the house until morning at the earliest. Amidst all this, Addie is convinced she’s seeing ghosts, and then discovers that they’re there to steal original music from one of Scotland’s greatest composers – a man who turns out to be Johnny’s great-grandfather.

This is only the tip of the iceberg of what happens in this short novel. The author packs a ton of story in, with remarkable ease. It never feels overdone or incomprehensible, and instead manages a couple surprises along the way. It is, in turn, an incredibly delectable romance, a farcical crime caper, and an eerie ghost story, with each element genuine within the moment. They blend almost seamlessly, in ways I find few authors can pull off, and I’m incapable of picking a favorite since I was drawn into each equally.

Perhaps key to ensuring this balance is kept is the vivid cast of characters. I loved Addie and Johnny almost from the start. They are sharp-witted, hard-edged, and intelligent (though Addie’s impulsive nature backfires on her more than once). Johnny, especially, embodies one of my favorite hero types—the tortured artist who needs to find a way to return to the world. In Johnny’s case, he’s retired from his own career as a professional concert pianist, due to the scandal that erupted when he was charged and tried for his wife’s murder a year earlier. The result was Not Proven, so doubt has lingered in the public’s mind about his innocence. That same doubt is there for the reader for a good part of the story, too, which adds to that air of danger he carries about him.

The secondary cast is vast and colorful, with most of them receiving good treatment when it came to rounding them out. For some unknown reason, I had a soft spot for Malky, the brute force on their heist team, though I suspect it’s because he has a Lennie Small air to him. I’m also dying to know more about Dan, Johnny’s brother-in-law. Something tells me, he has a lot of story to tell himself. The ghosts themselves feature prominently, as easy to recognize as any of the living. I bought into their existence without any problem at all, and applauded Johnny’s great-grandmother more than once.

The story’s not perfect, but my complaints about it are minor. It’s not quite as clean a copy as I expect from Samhain, and the book I purchased had a few odd formatting problems. I wouldn’t be surprised that’s because it’s an older title. It was released in 2008, and Samhain has come a long way since then. I’m also not entirely fond of the author’s frequent choice to switch to minor character POVs every once in a while. It doesn’t really add to the story very much, and I ended up spending/wasting time wondering how that character is going to factor into a larger role in the story since apparently they’re important enough to merit their POV shown. It’s distracting. But again, these are minor complaints, because when it comes down to it, I’m falling head over heels for this author’s work. This is the second hero of hers in a row that has completely pushed my buttons, with heroines I admire to boot. I only wish this one was available in print, so I could get one for my literal shelves as well as the one for my virtual shelf.

Readability	8/10 – Not as clean as I would expect from Samhain, but the author’s voice compensated for it
Hero	9/10 – Hurt, enigmatic, and compelling
Heroine	8/10 – The authenticity about her really drew me in
Entertainment value	9/10 – I literally couldn’t stop once I’d started
World building	8/10 – When the ghosts are just as real and believable as the living, something right has been done
TOTAL:	42/50

Bastards and Pretty Boys by K.Z. Snow

TITLE: Bastards and Pretty Boys
AUTHOR: K.Z. Snow
PUBLISHER: Liquid Silver Books
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 35k)
GENRE: Contemporary gay erotic romance
COST: $5.50

Charlie Larkin’s latest purchase—a cottage on a lake—will give him a retreat as well as a hunky neighbor who distracts him every time he sees him. His boyfriend of the past five months isn’t quite as thrilled about the distraction, calling to mind all the doubts Charlie is starting to have about their relationship. Those doubts become even stronger when he actually meets the neighbor. Booker is gorgeous, talented, and fun to be with, but as Charlie learns more about him, he has to decide for himself what it is he really wants…

I have a love/hate relationship with this author’s work. On the one hand, her work tends to have a very lyrical literacy to it, helping it stand out of the crowd, and when her characters work, they really work. On the other, she often makes stylized choices within them that seem more about the craft than the storytelling, as well as having a propensity for liking soapboxes. This is one of those stories that falls on the short end of the scale for me.

Told in 1^st person, it’s the tale of Charlie Larkin, a twenty-nine year-old man whose divorce two years earlier was about his finally coming to terms with the fact that he’s gay. A successful business owner, he has bought a cottage on a lake, partially because he wants to face his fear of the water, partially as a retreat. His next door neighbor catches his eye right away, but when Charlie’s boyfriend notices his interest, the boyfriend turns it against him, using it first for some hot sex, then announcing that Charlie isn’t the only guy he sleeps with. Charlie has started wondering if he and Kenneth (the boyfriend) really have much in common, but it’s his budding relationship with the neighbor, the practically perfect Booker, that helps to make up his mind.

I liked Charlie at the start, primarily because of the author’s voice. She really does have some different turns of phrase than what’s normally out there, and I find the lyricism of it compelling more often than not. My problems begin when Booker starts revealing his secrets to Charlie. Booker is an ex-con, on parole from time spent in jail for dealing marijuana. It’s a minor offense—a point repeated more than once—and provides one of those soapboxes the author is fond of. This one is about how drug laws in the US need to be revamped, an opinion that not only Charlie and Booker become vehement about, but so does Charlie’s ex-wife later on in the story. I loathe being preached to in a story. It’s hard to do it well. Most of the time, it’s obvious and heavy-handed, which is exactly how this came across to me. It doesn’t matter if I agree or not (I did in this case, and frankly, usually do). It’s the manner of how I feel being lectured to that bugs me so much.

This personal peccadillo aside, the story derails for other reasons as well. Halfway through, the plot takes a complete left turn, when Charlie and Booker’s lives outside the lake become inextricably linked. I found it completely implausible that such a coincidence could occur, and almost gave up the story on the spot. I hoped that it would rectify itself somehow, but honestly, it only got worse. Plot points were introduced and never followed through on (the help he gets from his ex-wife), and the ending was too pat and too abrupt.

I’d like to say at least I had the romance to fall in love with, but I didn’t. Yes, the two leads have chemistry and they’re actually quite sweet with each other. But Charlie is head over heels in less than a week, in spite of everything he’s learned about Booker, and I didn’t believe for a second they’d survive the long haul. Charlie idealized Booker too much to make him any kind of equal partner. I can sometimes let myself go and give insta-love more quarter, but not in contemporaries like this one. Toss in all my other issues with the story, and this one’s a miss for me.

Readability	8/10 – A smart voice gets hindered by completely implausible plot twists and a plot that just wanders off
Hero #1	6/10 – Showed promise at the beginning, but never lived up to it
Hero #2	5/10 – Sweet, but idealized since seen through Charlie’s eyes
Entertainment value	4/10 – I liked the start, but the implausible plot twists as well as a romance I don’t believe for a second will last dragged this down
World building	6/10 – The lake is its own vital character, but the rest of it falls to the wayside in the face of Charlie’s needs and feelings
TOTAL:	29/50

Wild at Heart by Crystal Kauffman

TITLE: Wild at Heart
AUTHOR: Crystal Kauffman
PUBLISHER: Lyrical Press
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 26k)
GENRE: Historical erotic romance
COST: $3.50

Penny Thompson has been promised in marriage to a friend of her brother’s from college, a man she has never met. But her world gets turned upside down when she meets John Black Feather, another friend of her brother’s, the half-breed son of the Navajo chief . John is enthralled by the tempestuous, independent woman, and while he knows he should stay away from her, the attraction between them is too combustible to ignore…

Sometimes I feel guilty admitting some of my kinks. I’ve made it clear before that I have a real soft spot for Native American heroes, but honestly, I’m not sure why I keep bothering since so few authors ever move beyond the stereotypical noble savage archetype, especially in historicals.

This story is no better. The heroine, Penny, is a tomboy at heart, helping as much with the horses as her big brother does. She can’t cook, she hates dresses, and the last thing she wants is to get married. Except her big brother Will has decided it’s time for that to happen and arranged for her to marry one of his friends from college back east. The story opens with her trying to catch a wild stallion, only to discover that it actually belongs to Will’s Navajo friend, John Black Feather. John is the son of the Navajo chief and a white woman, and acts in many ways as a liaison between the tribe and the local white men. To Penny, he’s the most beautiful man she’s ever seen, and her first attraction to him explodes when he reciprocates.

It’s evident from the start that the prose isn’t anything special. It’s clean enough editorially, but it tends to lack verve or passion, even during the sex scenes. Part of that stems from the sheer predictability of the whole thing. The story feels like it’s been written a thousand times before, twenty years ago. The misunderstood Native American, the misunderstood heroine, the attraction of his savage beauty, and so on and so on. If that’s what a reader wants, then great, but really, I felt guilty as I was reading, partially because I could actually see a superficial appeal in John, partially because it felt like I should be reading something that actually gave the Native Americans some new depths. That’s my issue, though. I fully recognize some readers, especially those that might be drawn to this in the first place, won’t care about either things.

For them, Penny is appropriately strong-willed and relatable, while John is sexy and enigmatic, disappearing like a ghost after nearly every encounter. The plot chugs along with little surprises, and ultimately, it just turns into a waiting game to get to the end. The sex scenes are serviceable, if formulaic, and for the traditionalist, John gets to be the hero in the end (though that should not be a surprise at all).

But none of it is new or fresh, and I'm left still hoping that someone out there is interested in creating a three-dimensional Native American hero that I can fall in love with.

Readability	6/10 – Simplistic prose and a sense of the throwback makes it an easy, but unchallenging, read
Hero	6/10 – Lots of potential never realized
Heroine	6/10 – Spunky but ultimately incredibly predictable
Entertainment value	4/10 – Felt like a throwback to older romances that were all about the allure of the noble savage
World building	6/10 – Some of the attempts to recreate the western historical life are there, but it doesn’t leap off the page
TOTAL:	28/50

Fit to be Tied by Kate Willoughby

TITLE: Fit to be Tied
AUTHOR: Kate Willoughby
PUBLISHER: Liquid Silver Books
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 27k)
GENRE: Contemporary BDSM erotic romance
COST: $4.75

In high school, Sadie had one fantastic, incomplete night with the geeky Max, and then turned around on Monday and called him names in front of the whole school. Ten years later, she has the chance to apologize. Time has done wonders for Max, turning him from a nerd into a raging hot intellectual. He’s never been able to forget Sadie, and this seems like the perfect opportunity to finish what they started. But he’s changed in more ways than just filling out his clothes better. The question is, can she handle the masterful man he’s become?

This is one of the authors I can usually count on for frothy, funny contemporary erotic romances, and while this started out like that, it didn’t quite end up that way.

Sadie is a free spirit, rarely staying in the same place for very long, intent on visiting and experiencing all fifty states. Her latest job puts her right in the path of one of her biggest regrets. In high school, she spent one great night making out with Max Brody only to be interrupted before they could go all the way. On Monday, with her snotty friends watching, she disparaged Max in front of the whole school, and the potential of that one night was never realized. Now, she apologizes and discovers that he’s an expert in the very field her next job is about – tarantulas. He agrees to come check out the tarantula she has, and when the friend she’s staying with gets unexpected company, offers to let Sadie stay with him. Their attraction explodes, and one night turns into more. The sex is great, but Max has secrets he’s not sharing, secrets that are starting to drive Sadie crazy.

The story starts like many of the author’s better works. The characters are quirky and fun, delightfully different from the standard erotic romance protagonists. Max is an obsessive intellectual with control issues, while Sadie’s free-spiritedness borders on flakiness. The more I learned about Max, however, the harder it got for me to have fun with his differences. His independent wealth and various achievements start to make him too good to be true, and while I think I understand why his characterization went in that direction, I was a little disappointed he didn’t stay as more of an everyday, quirky Joe.

Sadie’s characterization suffers as well, though primarily because of events that occur in the last couple chapters. Gradually, she learns of Max’s interest in BDSM, specifically rope play, and she seems okay with it at first. Even when a previous traumatic event puts a hamper on their explorations, I was okay with it. What I wasn’t okay with how that traumatic event got resolved. It’s too easy for what was involved, frankly, even if this is meant to be lighter erotic romance fare. The seriousness of those sequences, actually, is very different tonally to the frothiness of the beginning, and it never meshed well for me. The greatest bulk of that rests with how lightly it’s handled. This could just be a sore spot for me, since the rest of the BDSM is handled tastefully and intelligently. But I just find it very hard to believe such a traumatic event – even for a strong, free spirit like Sadie – could be taken care of so easily.

This one’s probably middle of the road for me for this author. It has elements of what I adore in her writing, but I just can’t get over the resolution of Sadie’s problems enough to merit this higher.

Readability	8/10 – Mild headhopping and the sense of being two stories merged into one held this back
Hero	7/10 – I liked his quirkiness but it bordered on too much for me
Heroine	6/10 – An interesting blend of flakiness and likeability, but I wasn’t so sure about how quickly things turned around for her in the end
Entertainment value	6/10 – I was enjoying this as some pleasant escapism until the end that didn’t seem believable
World building	8/10 – Highly credible on a lot of levels, at least until the end
TOTAL:	35/50

Moonspun by Lee Benoit

TITLE: Moonspun
AUTHOR: Lee Benoit
PUBLISHER: Loose Id
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 43k)
GENRE: Gay paranormal erotic romance
COST: $5.99

Playwright Jamie Cowan isn’t having the easiest time of it. His writing isn’t flowing, his roommates are making him uncomfortable, and he’s being turned into an errand boy for the theater producing his play. When he picks up an order from the tailor, he meets Spider, the enigmatic, beautiful owner of the shop, and wonders for the first time if he’s met someone he can be with. But Spider has a secret, one he’s never shared with anyone else, and he has no idea how Jamie will react if ever finds out the truth…

I have tremendous respect for this author. While I may not purchase all of her titles, or love everything I read, she’s one of the more literate, intelligent m/m authors I’ve come across in the genre. That makes it harder to admit how much this book just didn’t work for me.

Jamie Cowan is a young budding playwright, recently transplanted from his sheltered upbringing in Maine to Sister City and the first professional production of his work. Life is not what he expected it to be. Though he isn’t out of the closet, he does recognize his desire for a relationship, but finds himself uncomfortable with the blatant displays of his roommates. His writing isn’t flowing, either, so his available time is getting him relegated to errand boy. It’s on one of these errands he meets Spider. Spider owns a tailor shop and is the most beautiful man Jamie has ever seen even if he’s shy and overly polite. Spider’s neighbor, however, overwhelms Jamie. She talks of Santeria and puts a bead bracelet on his wrist, making it very obvious she’s matchmaking between the two young men. Spider is attracted to Jamie, but he has a secret he doesn’t believe anybody will ever understand. When the moon rises, he’s forced to sit at his loom and weave until it sets again. The tapestries he creates seem to foretell a future, but they’re melancholy and dark, at least until Jamie arrives in his life.

It’s obvious almost from the start that the author is attempting to integrate magical realism with genre fiction, in this case, m/m erotic romance. It’s a valiant effort, but I honestly don’t think it ever worked. The dreamy quality that often accompanies magical realism in literary fiction isn’t a natural fit with most faster-paced genre stories, so it has to compensate in other ways in order to draw a reader in. For instance, the characters could sparkle, demanding attention when the action doesn’t supply it, or the prose can be so beautiful, it’s impossible not to savor it. I found neither in this short novel.

Jamie and Spider are both terribly innocent, neither truly comfortable with his sexuality, both relatively ignorant of their chosen professions. Jamie is the country mouse living in the city, and Spider, while knowledgeable in the tools of his trade, has never truly delved into the reasons behind his moon weaving. The latter is actually very typical of magical realism – that which is unexplained is merely accepted as the way it is – and Spider’s attitude toward it, as well as his inability to explain it to anybody’s satisfaction, wouldn’t be a problem if it wasn’t also weighed down by Jamie’s naivete. It lends a sweetness to their romance, but at the same time, their almost constant passivity regarding each other and the events of their lives is very frustrating. The juxtaposition of Jamie’s more contemporary nature with Spider’s more ethereal one never gels, either, since Jamie’s constant questioning about what is going on jars me from buying into the magic whole-heartedly.

These might not be issues for me if I could bury myself in the prose, but unfortunately, that’s not the case. While there are some beautiful turns of phrase scattered throughout the story (comparing the taste of Spider’s erection as “silvery, like blood and moonlight” still lingers with me), there aren’t nearly enough to lift it above its sluggish pacing or frustrating characterizations. It alternates between reading too contemporary or too ethereal, and doesn’t ever manage to blend the two without leaving the seams exposed.

If I can’t enjoy it for its literary qualities, and I can’t enjoy it for the romance, I’m left not really enjoying it at all. I wanted to. I really did. The beginning showed promise, even if it was slow, because I was so intrigued by the magical journey it hinted at. But I didn’t. I struggled with the last third of the story and finished it very underwhelmed. The author tried, but she’s done better in my opinion. Much better.

Readability	6/10 – The prose isn’t graceful enough to counter the dreamy pacing, turning it into a sluggish read
Hero #1	6/10 – His naivete might add to the story’s texture, but it also slows it down and leaves me frustrated
Hero #2	5/10 – Intriguing but ultimately too passive
Entertainment value	4/10 – Ultimately it failed to engage me as either magical realism or romance
World building	6/10 – Though I can appreciate what I think the author was striving for, the final result is very underwhelming
TOTAL:	27/50

Cross My Heart by Paris Brandon

TITLE: Cross My Heart
AUTHOR: Paris Brandon
PUBLISHER: Ellora’s Cave
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 25k)
GENRE: Contemporary suspense erotic romance
COST: $4.45

Six months ago, cop Jack Sutton asked Valentine Cross to marry him. She turned him down, and he walked away. Now, the case of a missing woman forces him to seek Val out again, as she is their best chance at finding the safe house the woman is likely at. He just has to hope she doesn’t throw him out when she sees him…

Though there was a lot of potential in this short novella, none of it is actually realized, much to my disappointment. The characters start off perfectly fine. In fact, the prologue where Jack meets Val, a liberal late-night radio talk show host, is crisp and hot. The first chapter then opens two years later, at which time Val and Jack have been broken up for six months. He asked her to marry him, and she flat-out refused. He stormed off, and the two haven’t seen each other since. Jack’s boss has a missing woman case that he’s being told to back off from, but something about it bothers him, and he wants Jack to follow up. Val has a direct line to the biggest safe house for battered women in the city, and Jack’s boss wants him to use his connection to her to find out if the missing woman is there. So Jack goes to see Val, wondering how long it’ll take for her to kick him to the curb this time.

Sounds fine, doesn’t it? And it is, for the most part. I liked the intensity these two displayed, both individually and then initially together. It hinted at some real heat as the story progressed. But Jack never brings up the issue about the missing woman, distracted by the fact that when he arrives, Val has had a break-in. He’s worried for her safety, and that worry somehow results in these two having a temporary truce/getting back together. His anxious feelings for her felt genuine, but honestly, I spent that whole time mistrusting his desire to get back with her. It felt like manipulation to get the information he wanted, rather than genuine need, in spite of his continuous assertions to the contrary. That ended up holding me back for the entire story.

None of it is helped by the fact that shortly into the story, it starts headhopping. Badly. Sometimes paragraph to paragraph. My tolerance for headhopping is low as it is, and this time, I just couldn’t handle it. It’s further hindered by the author’s propensity to tell rather than show, and the explanations that sometimes occur end up being more confusing than if she’d just shown us what happened rather than tell us after the fact. It weakens the suspense angle considerably (not to mention the fact that much of it feels forced and/or convenient). All the good ideas in the world aren’t enough to fix the poor story construction, even when the characters have some serious chemistry. I didn’t believe the resolution of any of the suspense storylines, and ultimately failed to engage with the author’s voice.

Readability	4/10 – The headhopping and telling not showing really wore me down
Hero	6/10 – I had real issues believing in his reunion when I knew the only reason he’d gone back to her
Heroine	6/10 – Strong, but too unwilling to bend for me to like very much
Entertainment value	4/10 – While there were some good ideas and lots of potential, it never lived up to any of them.
World building	6/10 – Though there were sporadic bits of painting their world, they never felt cohesive enough to give a good picture
TOTAL:	26/50

Mini-blackout

Oops. I really need to think about postdating reviews for publication so that when I can't get online for some reason, my schedule doesn't get screwed up. Probably nobody notices but me if I don't have my M/W/F reviews up, but my obsessive side hates the break in my pattern.

But we have a new router now, and my Internet is back, so my schedule resumes as normal tomorrow.

Bound Together by Jane Davitt

TITLE: Bound Together
AUTHOR: Jane Davitt
PUBLISHER: Total-e-bound
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 18k)
GENRE: Gay contemporary erotic romance
COST: $4.36

Book lover Simon Weatherly is always on the lookout for special editions, but the book Chris Ross shows up trying to sell him is all too familiar. Recognizing it as belonging to his ex, Simon purchases the book from the enigmatic man and later learns Chris has spent his own time in the ex's bed. A transaction like that has consequences, however, results that extend beyond the cash trading hands, and the unexpected attraction between Simon and Chris gets put to the test…

Though you won’t find a Jane Davitt title reviewed on this blog, I’ve read her before and enjoyed her intelligent eroticism to the point where I always check out her new titles when they come out. I don’t buy them all. I still need to read the blurb and excerpt and determine if it’s a book that interests me. But I know that I generally really like her voice, and this was no exception.

The story starts with Simon receiving a visitor. Chris Ross doesn’t seem like your usual book person. His hair is dyed, his ear has multiple piercings, and his leather jacket doesn’t exactly scream bookworm. The book Chris offers to sell him, however, is not Simon’s usual fare. He recognizes it as once belonging to his ex-boyfriend, so after much negotiation—and intriguing attitude—a deal is struck. Simon calls his ex to sell it back, and discovers that Chris is more than what he seems. He’d been sleeping with the ex as well, while doing some carpentry work for him, and when the job was done, the ex kicked him to the curb without payment. This complicated scenario starts a swell of events that drive Simon to striking yet another deal with Chris, one that benefits the both of them in other ways.

The thing I like best about this author’s work is her voice. There’s a subtle intelligence to her work that consistently shines through. It comes through in details, like discussing the foxing on a book, or in carefully orchestrated erotic scenes. What I enjoy so much is that it never feels obvious. Not only is her prose some of the cleanest I come across, but it often seems effortless, too. It’s helped that her particular brand of eroticism manages to hit a lot of my buttons. Even with a simple kiss, I find myself engaged on multiple levels. That’s not true of a lot of authors.

These aspects are where this short novella shines for me. The chemistry, once Chris and Simon kiss, is electric, and the promise of it is delivered as the story progresses. I leapt through the latter portion of the book, as breathless and anxious as Simon. I came to a grinding halt, however, when a misunderstanding arose that came out of nowhere and stalled the story dead. Simon’s motivations prior to that were a little muddled, partially because he’s still in the process of figuring them out himself, and frankly, when he jumped to this particular misunderstanding, I had no idea how he got there or what he was saying. I was as confused as Chris was. Even after it’s cleared up, I didn’t get it, and it diminished my overall enjoyment of the story.

While this story isn’t quite a keeper, there’s enough chemistry and hot eroticism between the characters to make it worth the investment. One of these days, she’s going to absolutely blow my mind. I know it.

Readability	8/10 – I love that there’s an intelligence behind the prose without being obvious about it
Hero #1	7/10 – I quite liked him until he went off with the misunderstanding two-thirds of the way through the story, that felt like it came out of the blue
Hero #2	6/10 – Slightly enigmatic, I never felt like I could get a bead on him
Entertainment value	7/10 – For my reaction to her eroticism, not for believing in the flow of the romance
World building	7/10 – Details about the book world were fantastic, and while I believed it was the UK, the rest kind of blended into the background
TOTAL:	35/50