Perfect for Me by D.H. Starr

Title: Perfect for Me
Author: DH Starr
Cover Artist: D. W. Skinner
Publisher: MLR Press
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Genre: Contemporary
Length: 81K words
Rating: 4 stars out of 5


Sean Sullivan is a principal and a happy person, but he has one major complication…HIV. Frustrated with constant rejection, Sean decides to stop dating negative men. When a student experiences a crisis and Sean meets Emery Benton, the case worker assigned from Child Protective Services, his decision is challenged.

Sparks fly the moment they meet, but Emery is negative and Sean doesn’t want the pain of another disappointment. As he struggles with his feelings for Emery, a war between the fear in his head and the fire in his heart force him to answer one simple question…Is this the perfect man for me?

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Sean starts out the book on a date with a man he has high hopes for. And in one swell foop we can see that he is an honorable man who gets his honesty thrown back at him. One too many rejections based on his HIV status and he’s willing to throw in the towel on dating from the HIV negative pool.


I’m not sure anyone outside the education field really knows all a principal does, but I’d like my (hypothetical) kids to have one like Sean—he knows his students, what they’re up against in school and at home, cheers on their successes, and digs them out of holes. And when one young man ends up in the hospital and taken from his dysfunctional family, Sean is there to bolster him. So is Emery, the caseworker from Child Protective Services. He’s another “best of all possible professionals,” and a genuinely nice guy. And he has eyes for Sean.

Instant attraction is delightful for the attractees, but I was a little distressed that they were both focused on each other to the point of having to remind themselves frequently that there was business to attend to, whether it was a teenager who’d been beaten or a school to run. They were just barely keeping a lid on it at work, which might be fine if you prefer the sighs of love to the edges of external plot, but I was ready to tap one or both on the shoulder from time to time. The young man’s plight really did need some undivided attention.

Since Emery is HIV negative, Sean is reluctant to get involved, no matter how appealing he is—too many rejections already mean he’s jumpy, and his current robust health might not last, and what then?

I enjoyed several aspects of the story, particularly the men’s efforts to help the young man, who had his own agenda and worries. The supporting cast, like Sonya the foster mom, and several others, were likeable and wise, in matters of teenagers, health, and occasionally the heart. New York City’s nontouristy areas were front and center: the author is clearly familiar with and fond of the city, and several of the meals Sean and Emery ate made me hungry.

The men so clearly belonged together that watching Sean figure this out was kind of frustrating, but in a good way. He did eventually figure out where exactly the problem lay, but not before wringing my heart a bit. Emery didn’t show quite the same sort of growth, but he was steadfast in his opinions all the way through, and clearly a good man. The story was definitely angsty, but not depressingly so—the material supported the emotions, not only between the men, but toward the teenager they were trying to help.

The style was mostly smooth, aside from a couple of Emery’s speeches that sounded like textbook prose, but the story would have benefitted from a more thorough proofreading—there were enough homonym errors and comma issues to become intrusive.

The story managed to treat a very serious issue with a hand light enough to entertain and serious enough to educate, and left me wishing Sean and Emery would be happy together for a long, long time. And if these men have anything to say about it, Lamar will make a success of himself too. 4 marbles

After the BBQ by Matthew Lang

Title: After the BBQ
Author: Matthew Lang
Cover Artist: Deanna Jamroz
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: Contemporary
Length: 9000 words



Trent Gaudeen was going to spend Australia Day alone--on principle, of course. When an invitation comes out of the blue to attend his ex's holiday barbeque, he goes along despite himself. Will he open a can of worms or find the perfect match to his American pumpkin pie?
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I like stories with a beginning, a middle, and an end. Here the beginning starts out with the promise of paranormal that doesn’t mesh up with the contemporary middle, which in turn doesn’t support the happy ever after ending. This could have made a lot more sense.


After getting the story, reading it, and wondering what the heck I just read, I discovered that this is part of a series, but even so, this degree of ?? wasn’t necessary. Merely starting the story a few pages later would have removed the paranormal element that went nowhere and let this story stand properly on its own. Just because the paranormal element was front and center in other books with other MCs doesn’t mean it has to appear here.

Once past the red herring, American in Australia Trent meets up with Vijay, a New Zealander of mixed Greek and Indian heritage, at Jake’s Australia Day barbecue. He’s intriguing and sexy, and Trent wants to be all over him. A walk home with adventures later, they’re home, getting in each other’s britches, and all is copacetic.

The HEA happens about 12 hours later. Um, whut? The middle doesn’t support this—it comes out of the blue. The story feels like a slice of life, kind of fun, but not utilizing the “two outsiders celebrating someone else’s holiday” set up and doing nothing at all with the paranormal elements. If you’re a fan of the other Talmor Manor stories, you might follow along better and enjoy this more. It’s pretty choppy, even for those who know the setup. 2 marbles

Angel in the Window by Charlie Cochrane

Title: Angel in the Window
Author: Charlie Cochrane
Cover Artist: Deana C. Jamroz
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: historical, Age of Sail
Length: 18k words

Alexander Porterfield may be one of the rising stars of Nelson’s navy, but his relationship with his first lieutenant, Tom Anderson, makes him vulnerable. To blackmail, to the exposure of their relationship—and to losing Tom, either in battle or to another ship.

When sudden danger strikes—from the English rather than the French—where should a man turn?

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There feels to be substantial back-story here, meaning that should Charlie Cochrane decide to write it, I will be jostling for first in line. According to her blog, this is her first foray into Age of Sail, and begins with an established couple.


The story has two major sections, the first at Alexander’s family home at holiday time, sometime after the Peace of Amiens, and the two men are very much a couple. They always have an eye out for someone who doesn’t wish them well and must be very discreet, because the Articles of War prescribe death for men in a relationship such as theirs, and the social suicide in the land-based society would be scarcely better. They have more freedom at the family estate than they do on board ship, but a country Christmas means houseguests, some with sharp eyes and secrets of their own.

Back aboard ship, Tom and Alexander have war to deal with and are yet more circumspect, which means that they dare not be together, nor exchange so much as a fond glance on deck. Even the hint of scandal is enough to cause an able sailing master, one who sailed with the legendary Captain Cochrane, to be lacking a berth. (Knowledgeable sources tell me Cochrane was the source for many exploits that ended up in Ramage, Hornblower, and Aubrey stories.)

I loved the language, which was slightly formal for modern day, but gave it a period feel. The men would occasionally tease each other in ship’s terms, but the playfulness kept the nautical language from being dry or overdone. The sex scenes have a similar restraint, which was kind of cute and kept from introducing coarser terms into the story that would have spoiled the effect. (See what kind of effect the story is having on me? The mores are catching!) The naval jargon is present just enough to place the story, but isn't overwhelming and doesn't require specialist's knowledge.

Tom and Alexander clearly love one another and are protective of each other, but problems that an able first officer should solve without troubling the captain might not be the same as what one lover should keep from another. The battle sequences are exciting and fraught with danger, and winning brings problems of its own.

The love story and the nautical story wrap together very nicely, and tie in with an external danger worse than the French. My one quibble is that the solution to this problem had something of a deus ex machina feel to it, although it certainly solved the issue.

I enjoyed this story, and would recommend it not only for aficionados of Hornblower and the like, but for anyone who’d appreciate an m/m historical that doesn’t bend the reality of then to allow a more present day liberty. Charlie Cochrane deserves her legions of fans, and this story is a great addition to her work. 4.5 marbles

Brothers in Arms by Kendall McKenna

Title: Brothers in Arms
Author: Kendall McKenna
Cover Artist: Jared Rackler
Publisher: MLR Press

Genre: contemporary, military
Length: 34,000 words


Jonah Carver is a Marine and combat veteran. He and his former Captain, Kellan Reynolds, once shared a scorching night, but then lost touch; something Jonah has long regretted. When an investigation into government corruption, and the murder of U.S. troops, ends in the killing of a V.I.P. on Jonah's watch, the FBI arrives. With them is Kellan Reynolds. When Kellan is kidnapped, Jonah has to find and rescue him. If he doesn't, not only will the investigation unravel, but he'll lose Kellan for a second time--for good.

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For those who love military fiction, this one may be a bit of a mixed bag. I like such stories, but there’s a reason fiction is written differently than after-action reports.


Gunnery Sergeant Jonah Carver is a Marine’s Marine, and something of a walking legend. He’s serving in Iraq, and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is a fact of his life. The one he’d really like to have the discussion with is Kellan Reynolds, who was off limits because of chain of command. Once Kellan made clear his intention to leave the Marines, they could act on their desires, but duty intervened, and they fell out of touch. This part both bothered me and was kind of understandable—mix two guys who’d rather fuck than talk with an oppressive policy where they can’t speak as openly as the subject requires anyway, and there probably isn’t going to be much communication. But still, all that incendiary sex and mutual respect, just dwindling to the point where Kellan thinks Jonah doesn’t care?

Of course that’s not true, and there are second chances, which, if everyone survives, will get taken.

Kellan doesn’t appear in the flesh until after the half-way point, though he certainly figures in Jonah’s thoughts, and is intimately involved Jonah’s mission. Part one of that mission ended in blood and death—part two has the potential for the same.

The style is very military, heavy on the jargon, and more than a little dry in spots. This is okay for the mission heavy sections, although it’s not as riveting as it could be. The story was heavy on military jargon, which was good and bad, as it lent a realistic air but occasionally slowed the story with explanations.“Person did this” and “that was that” sentence construction, with very little variation aside from the occasional passive construction, led to a certain dryness. Even the sex scenes had a military flavor to them, and while that maintained tone, it muted the heat.

“This pleased Jonah [presence of supplies]; he planned for this to be a night-long campaign, and Kellan had done a stellar job of logistics.

Jonah’s three-pronged plan of attack was in motion.

Um, okay for consistent style, but I didn’t feel the sweat particularly in the rest of it either. At least the sex scenes didn’t have endless military style acronyms. The mission sections, both in the ill-fated Grizzly section and in the tenser Kellan section, fared somewhat better with the style.

The mission sections shone for me—I like external plot, and this delivered. Possibly not the first or last treatment the particulars will receive, but well done from a grunt’s-eye view. They had a horrifying plausibility, and if I read more newspapers, I might have seen such horrors pass through them. We all may yet.

Once Kellan is taken, the pace sped considerably, and made me believe that much of the lapse in communication was that Jonah couldn’t find words—he can find decisive action for any of his people, and twice as much for Kellan.

I want these two to make it as a couple, and for the US policymakers to listen to Kellan’s wise words. 4 marbles

(Side note--the cover is noticeably better than MLR's usual.)

Going for Gold Ed EM Lynley

Title:Going for Gold
Author: various, Ed. EM Lynley
Cover Artist: Deanna Jamroz
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: contemporary, sports
Length: 117k words


It's not hard to see the outward appeal of the Olympic Games: watching the fittest and most-accomplished athletes in the world compete—generally with fairly skimpy uniforms. Voyeurism aside, there's nothing sexier than a beautiful body running, jumping, swimming, rowing, and a couple dozen other activities. Who wouldn't take the chance to enjoy the spectacle?

But the Olympics are more than just a chance to watch athletes at the peak of physical perfection. Every competitor at the Games has a story behind why they run or jump or swim, and why they compete. How they got to the Games, and what they sacrificed along the way to make the cut. To spectators, they may perform superhuman feats, but each and every one is human in the same way we all are.

In this collection of stories, you'll find there's a lot more to competing at Olympic level than being the best in one's field. Expectations and pressures from family, friends, coaches and country add up, and sometimes it's only the love of the right man who can make the effort worth it. And sometimes, love is more important than going for gold.

Including:
Hot Shots by Michael P. Thomas
Into the Deep by Nico Jaye
The Quad by Kelly Rand
Lightning in a Bottle by Sarah Madison
Swimming the Distance by Annabeth Albert
Shoot for the Gold by Whitley Gray
An Olympic Goal by K-lee Klein
Tumbling Dreams by Kaje Harper

Review
I enjoyed this collection: I love the Olympics, I love stories with depth and development, I love stories where I might learn something, and of course, I love the hot guys. Every story delivered on most of those goals, though with some different strengths. Averaging around 15k per story, these are all longer than I typically find in anthologies, and with correspondingly more meat. The early stories had me thinking “okay” but after a brief warm-up, my socks were knocked completely off.


Hot Shots tackled shooting sports, and this offering from Michael P. Thomas, a new to me author, nearly put me off the whole collection—I wouldn’t have chosen it for the lead off position, because it had the one character I found horribly annoying, compounded by not finding out his name until a third of the way through. Bo, a self-confessed athlete groupie, is only interested in sports in order to cuddle up to the other sportsmen. Even in a piece intended as humor, his assumption that he can get good enough at any sport in six months to even stand next to athletes who have been perfecting their technique since before they started shaving didn’t set well. Bo does some learning, growing, and falling in real love, and the story did grow on me by the end.

Nico Jaye is another new to me author: Into the Deep pairs an American diver with a London local during the Olympics, and while the story was pleasant, it had a flavor of “The Virgin Gazillionaire’s Private Pool” about it. Heavy doses of coincidences and overly extreme characterizations detracted from bartender Blake’s very real doubts about getting involved with a foreigner, and the whole was sweet but trite.

I have met Kelly Rand’s evocative prose before and enjoyed it here again in The Quad, the only story set in the Winter Olympics. Her skater needs the confidence to land the quad jump in competition, and finds support from the most unlikely quarter. This story unrolled beautifully, playing with Kevin’s confidence in his skating and in his personal life, and the man who steps in to help him doesn’t promise more than he can deliver. As she has done before, Kelly Rand leaves the characters standing on the edge of dazzling possibilities. Very well done.

Sarah Madison’s thorough understanding of horses and equestrian competition shines brightly in Lighting in a Bottle, where she focuses more on the lead up to getting into the Olympics than on the big event. Her protagonists have a complex and not entirely happy history when they are thrown together again to prepare Jake and his horses for competition. I absolutely felt like I was in the barn and in the jumping ring with the competitors, and rooted hard for Jake and Rich to make a go of both their relationship and the competitions, and to untangle the complexities that plague them. I still have no idea what the name of their particular event is, involving both dressage and jumping, but the story is so good I almost don’t care.

Distance swimming and the perils of being out publicly are the focus of Annabeth Arden’s Swimming the Distance. Bohdan Petrov is torn between love for his partner, Kyle, and being open about it as Kyle would like. Bohdan’s performance in his 1500 meter race is at stake as he repeatedly denies being gay and/or in a relationship. The ups and downs of his performance and his relationship provided some satisfying reading, although I was a little distracted by formulating my own replies to nosy interviewers.

Back to shooting sports again with Whitley Gray’s Shoot for the Gold, where marksman Matt Justice beans himself on some scaffolding at the Olympic Village and has to deal with the residual effects of the injury. He’s severely limited in treatment options unless he cares to disqualify himself from competition, but sports doctor Levi Wolf, who’s carrying baggage of his own, has some non-pharmacologic treatments (not that, get your minds out of the gutter!!!) that can keep Matt competing honestly. Professional ethics, past history, and personal attraction conflict here, adding a nice dimension to the story. This is another new to me author, and I’ll be checking out the back list.

In An Olympic Goal, K-Lee Klein examines the conflicts between playing for a professional team in one country and a national team in another, and adds the complication of one’s lover playing for the other country. This sounds like a lose/lose proposition on a couple levels, but the Swiss and Spanish football (soccer) players turn it into a win for everyone somehow. Soccer is one of those “wake me up when it’s time to cheer” sports for me (yes, I am aware this is blasphemy in some quarters) but I remained interested in the conflicts and the lovers, if not the sport.

Tumbling Dreams was the story that had me sniffling and rereading immediately, and is an amazing finish to a great collection. Kaje Harper’s gymnast Tyler has a berth on the Olympic gymnastics team, a threatening injury, and a roommate whose heart breaks silently and repeatedly with every backflip and vault. Eli’s living in quiet desperation, both wanting Tyler to achieve his dreams and to back away from the sport, and for Tyler to want him as more than a friend but not if every morning brings a fresh chance to destroy himself while Eli has to watch. Densely layered and slightly tragic, this story doesn’t wrap everyone and everything in gold.

The book did have a couple of formatting issues that cut severely into the reading experience. While certainly not the authors’ fault, the construction of the MOBI file did not permit jumping to the table of contents. Come on, MLR, this is pretty basic. Also not the authors’ fault, and maybe not even the editor’s choice, it’s hard to say, but the trademark acknowledgements at the beginning of each story felt like a great big slap in the face. Yes, it’s legal jargon and has to be there, but no, I did not appreciate the big jolt out of the reading mood between stories. Stick it at the front where I can get it over with or at the end where I can admire the legal thoroughness instead of after each title where I get knocked out of the story before I even start.

Between a couple of just okay stories and some irritating publisher’s choices, I can’t say this is a gold medal read across the board, but there are certainly a lot of winning stories in this volume. Warmly recommended. 4.25 marbles

The Declaration by Geoffrey Knight

Title: The Declaration
Author: Geoffrey Knight
Cover Artist: Deanna Jamroz
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: historical, short story
Length: 6000 words



A humble stable boy might just be the inspiration Thomas Jefferson needs to finish writing The Declaration of Independence.

On the night before his draft of The Declaration of Independence is due, Thomas Jefferson sends his trusted servant boy Jasper to fetch more writing supplies. It is a task Jasper jumps at, knowing he'll be able to spend a few last precious moments with Myles, the stable boy, before Jefferson and his staff leave Philadelphia in the morning.

But just as their love begins to fully blossom in the lantern-lit stables of the Graff House, the drunken stable master threatens to end not only Jasper and Myles' romance, but their lives as well. Can the love of a black servant and a white stable boy overcome hatred and cruelty? And will their declaration of love be enough to give Thomas Jefferson the inspiration he needs to finish writing one of the most important documents in human history?

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“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

These are words that changed the world and redirected history. These words helped create our current lives: they ring with poetry and truth. But they were truly revolutionary when they were written, and how did Thomas Jefferson come to change our thinking so much?


I’m a sucker for “real moments in history used in m/m stories” which is what attracted me to this piece. The blurb tells the bulk of the story, which is quite short. The only real bit of novelty is the actual achievement of the inspiration, but it’s still a sweet and sexy look into what could have possibly happened.

This was a time of both radical innovations in thought and politics and institutionalized injustices to large portions of the population. Geoffrey Knight performs a delicate balancing act with both. Jasper is a slave, but important to both Jefferson and his lover Jasper. He’s an object or an annoyance to some, but a fully realized person to the forward thinkers in his vicinity, and if a hint of a personal interest on Mr. Jefferson’s part drives that, it doesn’t matter a whit to Jasper.

The language has the merest whiff of period to it, just enough to place us in time, and a few charming turns of phrase, as well as a few clunkers, sometimes in the same sentence. My favorite:

Unsure of what to do, Jasper imitated Myles’s actions as the two guessed their way through foreplay.

The ending does turn into a bit of history lesson and lecture, but it’s true for all that. There’s not much for me to spoil; the blurb does a better job of that than I could.

Fortunately for the lovers and for us all, history is made. Thomas Jefferson may have declared only that we may pursue happiness, but Jasper and Myles really did catch some. 3.75 marbles

The Card by George Seaton

Title:The Card

Author: George Seaton

Cover Artist: Deanna C. Jamroz

Publisher: MLR

Genre: memoir (memoir-ish?)

Length: 7000 words

The dynamic between fathers and sons is complex, most often least understood by the players themselves. But is it the father who does not know his son, or is it the son who does not know his father?

The discovery of a Father's Day card in a box---long ago shoved into a dark corner in a cellar---provides a revelation to a son, a gay son that shatters all previous conclusions about his father. Set in Denver, the ravages of a massive flood, and the disappearance of a nine-year-old girl, provide the background for a son's coming of age, and a father's eerie ability to "...read the hunch...," that is essential to his prowess as a cop.

 ********************************

If this story isn’t a true event in author George Seaton’s life, it really feels like it—this story ranges from present day to back in time, back and forth, with stories and details that feel absolutely real.

The narrator’s father—he never outright claims to be George—is a Denver cop, and his abilities to solve cases and intervene in crises border on the uncanny. The father showed his abilities in incidents during the  1965 South Platte Flood that devastated Denver (there are still buildings with high-water marks showing) and also in a crime involving young Anne Marie Canino. The narrative isn’t linear at all—it jumps around from one detail to another, and then to present day, as the narrator considers this Father’s Day card, the only one he ever gave, and which he’s felt compelled to keep.

The story has the feel of an evening’s chat, maybe as if the narrator were sharing a comfortable sofa and a glass of whiskey with the reader, reminiscing about his youth and how he felt about his old man: unapproachable, often silent, more often absent, but still the lodestone of the family. The son knows his father’s  cases better than he knows the man, and each time he comes back to talk about this greeting card, the mixed feelings come through, and every time he talks about the past, a little more of both the father and the son come through. The son fears that he doesn’t measure up to expectations, and maybe that the father has detected too much at home.

There isn’t a romance element here exactly, although a teenage companion helps with early experiments. The narrator’s long term partner appears now and then, to tease about dragging boxes of keepsakes from home to home, repackaging when the cartons fall apart but seldom peeking inside. It takes his different perspective to see what the narrator might have found for himself long ago.

And that’s what will put the tear-prickles in your eyes. 4 marbles
 

Firenze by Barry Brennessel

Title: Crossroads: Firenze
Author: Barry Brennessel
Cover Artist: Deanna Jamroz
Publisher: MRL Press
Genre: contemporary
Length: 3100 words

Brandon Meier's academic year in Europe takes him far beyond museums, castles, and classrooms. When he embarks on a month-long rail journey, his sightseeing includes an edgy French boy, a Carravagio-esque Italian, a rich Swiss lad, a Croatian heartbreaker, and an Indonesian beauty in Amsterdam, to name but a few. These are lessons no textbook can ever teach.

It's not long before Brandon realizes that the best sightseeing is almost always off the beaten path. From sultry nights in saunas, to midnight strolls in seemingly endless parks, chance encounters in sleepy seaside towns and nights of wining, dining, BMW convertibles and penthouse apartments, Brian's year in Europe is anything but "by the textbook."
Next stop: Firenze


Review

Sometimes you have only five or seven minutes—this series of stories is meant to fill that need. A few thousand words isn’t much to build an entire story with, and this is really more of an interlude.


Firenze is one stop on student Brandon’s itinerary, and he isn’t in the city more than an hour before he encounters a gorgeous, willing Italian man to enliven his sightseeing. He’s not planning to be in Florence even twenty-four hours, so this is not a relationship to last. This is one in a series—Brandon’s visiting a lot of cultural centers.

We really don’t get more than the highlights of Brandon’s sightseeing and the brief tumble he takes with Stefano, who is everything Caravaggio would love in a model, from fine skin to wavy hair, and is sweet in bed. Brandon thinks of him as art more than as a person, until the very last moment.

When I say that the story is travelogue with sex, I do mean that it’s a great deal more than what I usually encounter in this microscopic size—it manages to be thoughtful about a passing encounter and not try for a grand passion in ten pages: PWP with art history does fit into the space. It’s a petit-four of a story: tasty, with layers, and a mere mouthful. And sometimes a mouthful is all you want. 3.5 marbles

A Blog Hop Excerpt by George Seaton

The Card
Fathers Day 2012 Release
By George Seaton

The dynamic between fathers and sons is complex, most often least understood by the players themselves. But is it the father who does not know his son, or is it the son who does not know his father?

The discovery of a Father's Day card in a box---long ago shoved into a dark corner in a cellar---provides a revelation to a son, a gay son that shatters all previous conclusions about his father. Set in Denver, the ravages of a massive flood, and the disappearance of a nine-year-old girl, provide the background for a son's coming of age, and a father's eerie ability to "...read the hunch...," that is essential to his prowess as a cop.

***************

I am looking at it now. It is an unremarkable card from the folks at Hallmark. It is mostly cream-colored, with a textured gold-colored ribbon surrounding the sentiment and drawing on the front. The sentiment reads, “To the best father in the world.” The drawing provides a briar pipe—quite simple in its design—resting in an ashtray on a round tabletop with a thin spiral of white smoke coming from a small red glow within the innards of the pipe’s bowl. A pair of leather gloves lay next to the ashtray. I do not know why this particular card captured my interest then, so many years ago. Then again, perhaps I do. I wonder at the symbolism of the drawing, especially the leather gloves. But even now I smell the delicious aroma of the tobacco mix (a tinge of vanilla), and I know the gloves would smell just as lovely if I could pick them up and cradle them against my nose. Maybe that was it. Maybe the image on the face of the card just impressed me as something the best father in the world would have on his side table. And, yes, perhaps the best father in the world would live on a wooded drive, in a two or three-story farmhouse in Vermont or Maine. Perhaps he and his son would walk the woods of ancient oak—the trails layered with the colors of fall—along with their three or four Irish Setters, and trade thoughts about life and living and the future. And, as the day began to fade and the wind picked up, they would walk back to the warm inviting farmhouse, the father’s hand upon the son’s shoulder.

My father smoked fat cigars. A large tumbler of scotch/water invariably sat next to his ashtray on the side table next to his—and only his—recliner; a large leather chair that sputtered a complaint when he first sat down and creaked whenever he stretched to retrieve his scotch or cigar from the side table. We, my mother and I, lived with my father in a ranch-style house in southwest Denver, with a backyard fenced-in by chain link that corralled a black, brown and white dog of indeterminate lineage; our trees were modest, bushes really. Our lives, unfortunately, did not conform to the pleasant world evoked by Hallmark.

***************

Coming on Father's Day (June 17) from MLR Press!

Find George's news and tidbits at here at his blog, and there's a review to his gothic romance, Finding Deaglan, somewhere around here, which is set in Colorado. I think the Byers-Evans House was part of the setting.

Tommy's Story by AKM Miles

Title: Tommy’s Story
Author: AKM Miles
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: contemporary
Length: 100 pages

It's going to be a real test of Tommy Marsh's strength for him to be able to let go of his past in order to have the relationship he wants with Daniel Anderson.

Tommy Marsh's life was good now. The last nine years had made up for the hell he'd gone through during his first twelve. After growing up at Scarcity Sanctuary, he'd become a counselor with extensive psychology training, working with abused children.

The thing that was missing from his life was a loving, passionate relationship with the man of his dreams, Daniel Anderson. Tommy was so afraid his past would interfere with the future he wanted. A traumatic event sets things in motion and he's forced to admit his feelings and face his fears. Will Tommy's new strength and Daniel's love be enough to get him through?

This was previously released but the story has been re-edited and expanded an additional 12k from the original.

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Within ten pages I was snuffling -- with a very clear notion of who these people are and how much the world has kicked them around before they found each other, safety, and family, and now all that’s been rocked to its foundations. Soldier and Dillon foster children, giving them the security, stability, and love they need to heal from the atrocities in their pasts. Seventeen-year-old Gom was gay-bashed, and the whole group is worried for him and about what this will mean for their future.


Unfortunately, those sniffles didn’t last. I think I liked the idea of this story better than I liked the execution.

Tommy, who came to Soldier and Dillon's Scarcity Sanctuary when he was twelve, with a really terrible history of abuse, is now twenty-two, graduated from college, and secure enough in himself to be interested in Daniel, whom he knows through Social Services. Daniel’s interested, too, and in the course of solving Gom’s attack and placing another boy with Scarcity Sanctuary, they find they’ve both been nursing years of undeclared love for each other. Most of the relationship development apparently takes place in another book, if at all, because here it's all about whether or not they can manage a satisfying sexual relationship after the "I love you's" fly out early.

No one seems willing to believe that Tommy isn’t totally defined by only his terrible past. Instead of trusting him to have grown up, healed some, and be capable of exploring a relationship at his own pace, everyone, from Daniel to Soldier, keep bringing up his past, in dialog that sounds like therapy sessions. While it was absolutely right that Daniel and Tommy go slow, the bricks of dialog that went with it made their encounters seem very clinical.

“I’m not stopping until you tell me to, but I want this to be a good experience for you, not one that’s filled with confusion and anxiety. The   shivering is just your body responding to your nerves and excitement. At least, I think it’s excitement, if this is anything to go by,” Daniel said, sliding one hand down and caressing the hard ridge in the front of Tommy’s slacks.

There were other passages where it worked much better, such as when Tommy’s exploration of his own boundaries turned out very pleasantly for Daniel, and the dialog with it sounded much more natural. But the overall tone is much more like a therapeutic intervention than newly admitted love unfolding. One unfortunate effect of this particular love issue hit my gag reflex: a thirty-five year old man who’s never had a real relationship admits he’s been waiting for years for an abused kid to grow up and be interested back, and then calls him ‘baby.’ It doesn’t seem quite so unhealthy in the general context of the story, but when considered separately it’s creepy. It was probably supposed to be romantic and “only you for me,” an idea that crops up elsewhere.

Big sections of story, such as resolving Gom’s attack, also suffered from the bricks of dialog/bricks of action problem, and were handled so speedily that it was clear this was the less important issue. Tommy is there for Gom during his recovery, and is one of the better sections of the story. Unfortunately, the one female character in the story was a cardboard harpy whose vitriol level verges on the psychotic.

A note I found while collecting the blurb indicates that the story has had rewrites and expansion, which may explain the pacing problems and the varying smoothness of the different scenes.

So while I think the theme of not being defined by the past and growing into a relationship in spite of the hurdles that past provides is good and worthy, the execution is uneven and occasionally clunky. Some of the sections are considerably better written than others, and it’s too bad the entire piece didn’t maintain the promise of the opening. 3 marbles

Hunting for Clay by N.J. Nielsen

Title: Hunting for Clay
Author: N.J. Nielsen
Publisher: MLR Press
Length: 24,000 words


Two years have passed since Clay and Hunter met on that fateful morning in Tello’s Diner. Getting passed the fact Clay was stalking Marlowe was the easy part. Clay Montgomery’s life changed for the better the day he found the man who was meant to be the other half of him. Hunter understood him well, and knew how to give him exactly what he needs to be happy. Hunter Weldon knows what he wants, and just how to get it. For two years he has loved the man in his arms and now it was time to up the ante.
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Hunting for Clay follows on from another work which I have not read, although there is enough backstory included here that I didn’t feel lost. Two established couples, Hunter and Clay, who are the primary couple of this story, share a house with Marlowe and Angelo. They’re all friends now, and have a pleasant, easy-going friendship.

Two of the men’s families have serious issues with their gayness, which unfortunately requires much sneaking around for them to spend any time with their younger brothers. Both younger brothers are gay as well, which complicates things further. The subtext of the story is what makes a family? and the efforts everyone makes to spend time with the younger brothers is a large part of the story.


Unfortunately, the theme tends to wander through several subplots that meander through in little snippets, but 80 pages/24K words isn’t enough to explore all of them, so none gets examined in any detail. This gives a “slice of life” feel to the story rather than a coherent plot arc. A large number of secondary characters sail in and out, again, too many to spend any real development on in this length. The overall effect is a series of mostly unconnected events, although the arc becomes more evident in retrospect. But no sooner does one start reading a bit of one character’s actions than someone else waltzes in to take attention.

The style of the writing was making me uncomfortable in a way that took a while to identify: the language is very simple and without contractions in the dialog. This may suit other readers better than it suited me, but I felt like I was reading something meant for middle grades on style, but for adults on content.

Hunter reached down and gave the plug in his arse a twist and relished in the way Clay moaned. “I will be back in a second to help you, love.”

The contrast was jarring, and was not improved with numerous proofing errors, enough to become intrusive. I can cope better with constant endearments if the rest is done correctly.

The Aussie slang was fun, I now know what “full as a goog” means, and it helped to give a nice sense of place as well as characterization. (A goog is an egg, and the saying implies you've eaten or drunk too much.)

The element of BDSM-lite didn’t feel consistent, because while Hunter and Clay trotted out the toys, Hunter “couldn’t live with himself if he ever hurt Clay,” which was said in the context of getting out the nipple clamps and ball gag.

The ending is very happy – it all comes together in one huge celebration that resolves absolutely everything in the story, from the big family issues to the relationship. It was cute but hasty, and involved much handwaving on some major problems.

The story was certainly ambitious in what it was attempting, but with a main couple, two secondary couples and some strays looking like they’d get paired off, and some absolutely enormous issues, all in 80 pages, this is a sweet rush-through with little depth. 2 Marbles

Always Faithful by William Neale

Title: Always Faithful
Author: William Neale
Cover Artist: Kris Jacen
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: contemporary
Length: 65k words


When Cade and Mark said their vows it was for always and forever. But that was before Mark entered the Marine Corps and before Cade enrolled in college. Four years later, with Mark's impending discharge and Cade's graduation, they're seemingly ready to finally have a long-awaited life together. Their hot and passionate attraction to each other remains as strong as ever. But their long separation has changed both men. And even the strongest of marriages can be threatened by temptation, suspicion, and broken promises. Can their love survive? Or, will they discover that "always" does not always mean faithful?

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Always Faithful follows on from A New Normal, which I have not read, but stands on its own. Enough backstory wove through the text that I didn't feel lost, although it did appear in the occasional "As you know, Cade" chunks. There was plenty going on around it.

Cade and Mark pledged their commitment to one another while they were still teenagers, and are still going through their growth as young adults. Cade, on the brink of college graduation, is poised for some huge changes; the one he longs for is to have his husband home full time. Mark is still finding his strengths too; the Marine Corps has definitely made a man out of him, and maybe not one that Cade recognizes. I was thinking that the stats on teenaged marriages might not be all that different if they're both male.

The pair have had only four weeks of every year together for four years: they are still in the honeymoon phase and have had little opportunity to work on the mechanics of being a couple. Money and possessions are still "his" and " his" rather than "ours," joint decision-making is a skill they have yet to master. This flows out to the people around them; not everyone recognizes them as a married couple with the same rights and responsibilities to each other as a het couple. One pointed example of this ended with me pumping my fist and saying "Go, Mark!"

Mark's father, Jake, and his husband, Grant, are having their own set of difficulties in maintaining their marriage; Jake administers a VA hospital and its demands always seem to come ahead of Grant. Their path is littered with good intentions that don't come off, and Grant is understandably tired of always coming second. I do think having the GAO show up on your doorstep qualifies as an emergency, but the situations aren't always that dire. Jake is forced to assess his priorities, and then make good on them, because his actions haven't been matching his words.

I enjoyed watching both couples struggle with their relationship traumas, which were variations on "what's most important to you?" Mark and Cade had an additional stinger in their troubles, which resolved too easily. It involved an action that some readers will find distasteful, but one that I had wanted to do at intervals throughout the book and found completely understandable in the situation.

For all that the couples were dealing with highly charged emotional situations, I didn't feel entirely invested in their feelings. Part of this was due to occasional dialog with the tone of a self-help book. Cade, a relatively inexperienced drinker at first, was dealing with his anger using two bottles of wine a night, and didn't seem to feel the effects. Jake worried about him, but wasn't putting two and two together: twelve drinks a night for months on end is a serious alcohol problem. The sections where I connected best emotionally were Cade and Mark's reunion at the beginning of the story—their desperation to touch rang out loud and clear, and in the stinger situation, where Mark's explosion felt genuine.

Having two couples' stories wound together didn't dilute either, although I did feel that their resolutions depended too heavily on large doses of "I didn't mean it." Of the four men, Grant put the most thought into what he wanted and was willing to give; I liked him a lot. Jake's understated paranormal ability played next to no part here, getting mentioned as something he would not use, and if this was meant to show him as honorable, it was really only a distraction. He did find a way to make his intentions concrete and meaningful, even if I was a little dubious about how that would work out in practice. Cade and Mark still have some growing up to do, but I think they'll make it. 3.5 stars

Blue River by Theo Fenraven

Title: Blue River
Author: Theo Fenraven
Cover Artist: Deanna Jamroz
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 14k words


Photography genius Ethan Mars unexpectedly travels back in time and meets Quinn, a sexually-innocent farmer just begging to be corrupted. Falling in love is the last thing Ethan expects, and when he abruptly finds the way back to his own time, he is faced with an impossible decision. Stay...or go?

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That Ethan considers Quinn an innocent to be corrupted tells you a lot about Ethan. Very full of himself, Ethan's figures a little pleasure trip into another time via a handy fog-portal is a pleasant day's jaunt. If there's a cutie on the other side to mess with, so much the better. Quinn and his sister Hester have already had one fog-traveler drop in on them, so they aren't exactly taken by surprise when Ethan appears. They're willing to be hosts for as long as it takes the fog to return to take Ethan back to 2011.

Ethan's a crude young man, never using plain speech if a vulgarity will work, and not shy about revealing his gayness right off the bat before recalling the reality of frontier 1863. Quinn admits his own lack of enthusiasm for his upcoming marriage, and Ethan's ready to show Quinn everything he's been missing.

It takes Ethan a while to adjust to a previous time's way of doing things; he fluctuates between understanding that survival means a hell of a lot of work if you have to do everything yourself, and enjoying the vivid tastes and smells that come with this way of life. Some of the smells, at least. Unwashed bedding grossed him out but he wasn't offering to do the laundry either.

Quinn's pretty certain about what his life is going to be like: he sees his responsibility to marry and to be part of the community, no matter what his sexuality is. Never having been able to act on his desires before, he hesitates at first, but he quickly learns all that Ethan can teach him in bed and out. And while riding a horse backwards, too.

Somewhere in Ethan's desire to debauch Quinn—'corrupt' is Ethan's own word—his feelings turn to love, but the choices aren't really his anymore.

The necessary HEA happens, but at the cost of Quinn's turning his back on everything, including his honor, an idea that hovers in the background without being stated. Ethan, the POV character, possibly doesn't recognize the concept. For Quinn's sake, I was ready to sniffle for the star-crossed lovers until I didn't have to, and then I just hoped that Quinn was an adaptable sort and recalled where the fog was.

This probably should be considered a fairy tale with realistic elements and therefore I shouldn't be so picky about the sacrifices being made, but Quinn was a significant element of a small community, a responsibility he considered vital until he got laid. I couldn't help but think he'd given up the more important part of his manhood in exchange for sex with a not especially likeable guy, and was confusing love with Hobson's Choice. 3.25 marbles

Time Waits for No Man by Kiernan Kelly

Title: Time Waits for No Man
Author: Kiernan Kelly
Cover Artist: Deana C. Jamroz
Publisher: MRL Press
Length: 29 pages


When wishing for a way to save yourself from drowning under a deluge of personal disasters, remember that the old adage, "be careful what you wish for" applies doubly during the holidays. Robert Hanley finds this out the hard way when he books himself a time-traveling penny saver vacation that lands him knee deep in danger of losing not only his mind, but his heart.

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Poor Robert Hanley, the word "nebbish" was made for him. If it can go wrong, it will go wrong, all over him. The holidays are anything but cheery for him; he's looking at the total collapse of his love life, his job, his living situation. You just know that there's a letter from the IRS waiting in this guy's mailbox, but he doesn't go home, he goes on this crazy cut-rate vacation instead.

And of course, since everything in this guy's life sucks moose balls, vacation doesn't go as he hopes, either. This is a total romp of a story, so getting whisked to ancient Babylon via some unexplained high-tech gadget makes perfect sense, and is probably more pleasant than the journey he expected. Except for the landing. :hysterics:

Being the only blue-eyed blonde for several thousand miles makes Robert a curiosity; being naked and broke makes him the property of the first person strong enough to claim him. And then the property of the first person wealthy enough to purchase him. But it's only for a week, and being the temporary sex slave of the king beats unlimited rot-gut rum on some crowded tropical beach.

This is sheer fantasy, so a little handwaving is enough to transport Robert back 2500 or so years, and a little more handwaving makes everyone understand one another. The language is light and bouncy, and so much fun that of course you want to buy into whatever ludicrous situation comes next. Time waits for no man, though, as Robert considers the end of his week:

The deadline for my departure was nearing, and I began to wonder why I was in such a hurry to leave Babylon. What was waiting for me back home? Yes, there was indoor plumbing, antibiotics and television; on the other hand, I had no job, no boyfriend, no money, and no prospects.

This is a much sweeter take on the master/slave theme than most, because Robert has the option of not playing with Marduk, but of course he does. That leads into a niggle – there's an element of the sex that doesn't ring true, but Robert's certainly happy with how things go.

The holiday connection is a little tenuous, which is okay; the story is so much silly fun we can ignore that awful Santa hat on the cover models. The resolution is sweet but not over the top, and is almost a little too somber for the tongue-in-cheek-ness of the rest of the story, but fitting. Time may wait for no man, but the time spent in this story was time well spent.  4 marbles

Music in the Midst of Desolation by Charlie Cochrane

Music in the Midst of Desolation by Charlie Cochrane
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: Contemporary, Erotic Romance, M/M, GLBT
Length: Short Novel- 20 Minute Read/ 58 pages

Old soldiers never die -- they get whisked straight back to earth to take part in angelic "manoeuvres". Patrick Evans has no idea why he and Billy Byrne, who fought their wars a century apart, have been chosen for this particular "op", nor why it seems to involve fixing up the man Billy left behind with someone Billy's always hated. When Patrick realizes his old lover also has a connection to the case, will the temptation to refuse orders become too great?


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Proving that old soldiers still know the drill, and that young ones who die haven't finished with their duty, Charlie Cochrane puts a new twist on the notion of guardian angels. Music in the Midst of Desolation has another mission for fallen soldiers Patrick and Billy, one only they can do.

Allot more than twenty minutes for this story no matter what the cover suggests; there's plenty going on. Patrick and Billy get tapped for some afterlife recon by a heavenly intelligence agency whose duty is to make sure important choices are made to play out long term goals and plans, and that certain people can perform their destiny-critical parts in life. If it takes some gentle manipulation and exposure of truths (these guys are literally on the side of the angels; they will do the work honorably) that's what they do, even if the living people are dear to them and the choices are hard.

Patrick's had nearly a century of afterlife to let his emotions cool into angelic dispassion, unlike Billy, for whom everything is very recent and raw. He needs Patrick's cooler head to keep him on mission, because he's so very close to the living people he's trying to guide. The two work very well together; Billy's modern directness and Patrick's older-school reserve mix together with their sense of duty and get the job done.

There's some subtle humor, such as Billy trying to curb his soldier's language for angelic surroundings, and when he finds out what people really think of him. Angelic agents trying to use corporate-speak and military-speak bring a smile; you'd think they be naturals at flow charts. No sex—none of the relationships are at that point.

Their mission becomes more clear as the story progresses; Billy is truly the only operative who can ensure success, and for him there is a separate success, in learning to see past what he believes. This is more a story of healing than a romance, although one couple who truly deserves their chance at happiness looks like they will have it after a long drought. The triumphs are low key and mostly set up to happen rather than playing out on page. The birdsong in the trenches that lifted the men's spirits is playing here: Music in the Midst of Desolation has hope for all these dead soldiers. 4 marbles

Finding Deaglan by George Seaton

Finding Deaglan by George Seaton
Publisher: MRL Press
Genre: Contemporary, M/M
Length: 457 pages


A coterie of inheritors of Denver's old money, including twenty-four year old Stephen Thaxton, find themselves inextricably entwined in an imperative to close a hoary circle left open in the other world, the other side where retribution is sought for wrongs committed by their progenitors a century before; wrongs that eradicated wolves from Colorado, and saw the indigenous Indian tribes of Colorado robbed of their lands, all to enhance the wealth and privilege of those who now find themselves the last of their family lines.

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Finding Deaglan is a big, sweeping novel, ranging a hundred and more years through time, involving many of the leading families of Denver. Fortunes were dragged out of the mountains, grave injustices done, and now George Seaton spins a Gothic yarn to right some part of the damage.


The ensemble cast features the last scions of many of Denver's leading families, which made their fortunes in ways both fair and foul. A hundred years removed from the original crimes, the author makes sure we know these are much nicer people, who right wrongs, do business honestly, and bounce small children on their knees, but they are still expected to pay for crimes that echo through time. What happened in the historical massacre Seaton invokes and in the deliberate slaughter of the wolves was awful, but horror on horror has to be added to the ancestral crimes, until we are sure their hearts were so evil that their sins ought to be visited unto the seventh generation, except that the families are ending a few generations short.

The most interesting characters are Merriweather, the psychic who interprets the paranormal goings on, Tasha, the young Native American woman who has been trained by her grandfather, Two Looks, in the old ways, Two Looks, who is still quite spry for being a hundred years old, and Mobley, the irascible lawyer who is unfortunately not given his worthy opponent. The other voices tend to blend together. They, with Deaglan, the mysterious baby, have a task to complete on behalf of the spirits: wolf, human, and Wolf. The paranormal elements are only understood by a few; it remains an open question precisely what they accomplish.

This story was a learning experience – I hit the dictionary several times. Some of the text is luminous:

Trummel looked up, smiled into the exquisite blue of the April sky that hovered just above the tops of the tallest of those Seventeenth Street edifices where the rich, no, the extremely wealthy did their deals and perhaps cavorted with the devil as they counted their millions.

Some is just long: sentences with four actions and two descriptions each aren't uncommon, and every single motion is important enough to mention. Every small step of preparing a cup of coffee, for example, isn't that fascinating. A stronger editorial hand could have trimmed the irrelevant, redirected an off-the-wall subplot with Finster and Mobley into something that connected better with the main story, and softened some black-and-white ancestral issues into less heavy-handed and more interesting shades of gray.

Finding Deaglan has some wonderful scenes and some true horror; readers looking for a pure romance story will not be happy here, but those who want a paranormal with gay characters will find something to enjoy. 3 Marbles

Salad on the Side by Karenna Colcroft

Salad on the Side by Karenna Colcroft
Publisher: MLR Press
Genre: Paranormal, GLBT
Length: 232 pages



Since moving to Boston, Kyle Slidell has met only a few of his neighbors, including Tobias Rogan. Kyle is very interested in Tobias, and is ecstatic to learn that Tobias wants him too. But his neighbors have a secret: They're werewolves, and Tobias is the pack Alpha. When one of the wolves attacks Kyle in the neighborhood garden one night, Kyle learns the truth in a hurry. Now he's a werewolf too-and since he's vegan, he refuses to eat meat. With Tobias's help and love, Kyle must adjust to his new life and protect himself and his friends from a neighboring pack.

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I went into this story all stoked on the premise of Salad on the Side. A werewolf who has philosophical issues with his usual foodstuff is going to have bigger worries than just getting furry. Karenna Colcroft could have played it several different ways, from comic to a matter of life or death, choosing to work it in as just another detail of shifter life and not trying to make it carry the entire weight of the book. This pack has more to be concerned about than a picky eater.


In spite of the unusual twist, I didn't really warm up to Kyle. He doesn't have much going on, existing as a work drone, with enough depth to stick to his convictions, more or less, but shallow enough to pat himself on the back for his good looks in the middle of a tender moment. A man who says, "I'm vegan. I'm not always good at it," to excuse the lapse he wants to make might think a little bit more about what he needs to do to stay alive.

Tobias, the alpha werewolf, is a mess of contradictions. He's worried about appearing weak because he wants a male mate when he should be more concerned about being weak; he's not an especially good leader. He's strong, but an Alpha who hates being able to compel his wolves but can't prevail by force of will or by persuasion has to make up his mind what he's going to do. A leader who repeatedly allows his least wolf to disobey him with little more consequence than being sent to her room, but raises his hand to his lover for a legitimate comment, probably should get challenged.

The relationship between Kyle and Tobias was one of the joys of the story. Tobias is sweetly virginal with another man, but grows and flowers with more experienced Kyle's attentions. However, I do not especially want to hear about Kyle's past lovers when Tobias is there and naked. Still, these two do complement each other in bed and out, and I was glad for their happy ending.

A lot of this story is pack meeting – what's happened, what shall we do about it, on and on. It isn't consistent; Kyle is pressed to decide a point, which he declines to do, but when he offers an opinion, he's told he has no right to speak because he's biased. The middle of the story bogs down with all the meetings. Even the wolves are fed up with the talk:

“Too much discussion,” Mr. Frelich grumbled. “All we’ve done today is discuss. Alpha, with all due respect, we need to act."

The decisive actions of the beginning and end of this book, plus the relationship, are what make this book for me. Kyle's dietary requirements make him unusual as a shifter, but aren't enough to distinguish it greatly from other werewolf stories. 3 Marbles