Book Review: One Saved to the Sea by Catt Kingsgrave (F/F)

Reviewed by Katinka

TITLE: One Saved to the Sea
AUTHOR: Catt Kingsgrave
PUBLISHER: Circlet Press
LENGTH: 29,000 words
BLURB: In the Orkney Islands, mothers tell their children of the selkies, seals who can shed their skins and dance on land. They also tell that whoever holds a selkie girl’s skin can trap her for a wife. From the lighthouse where she was raised, Mairead has watched the selkie girls secretly since she was small. She longs to leave the home that has never really been hers and join them. She could never have guessed that a limping selkie girl has been watching her too, nor what wildness the shapeshifter would draw her into. Their paths collide when most of the men including Mairead’s brothers have been called to war, the village idiot decides to catch himself a wife, and Mairead is the only one who can stop him.

Drawing on myth and history, Catt Kingsgrave writes a tale of the clash of the modern age with magic, of loss and searching, a tale that will sweep you away to a past that never was, and into a sapphic love story just this side of impossible.

REVIEW:

To be read on a stormy night…

A precious folktale, that delivered in more ways that I had anticipated. Kingsgrave’s writing has a certain poetic quality, evoking a dreamy atmosphere that I found myself reveling in. I expected this story, that’s set on one of the tinier Scottish Orkney Islands, to focus on hazy eroticism and not be very plot-driven. But it’s such a wholesome tale instead! With a plot that captivates and weaves all details together for a thrilling climax.

One Saved by the Sea is about a tough island-born girl, Mairead, who is called an unnatural creature behind her back, because she is still unmarried and – shockingly enough  – not the slightest bit interested in men. Instead, for as long as she can remember she has secretly spied on the selkies; beautiful pale and dark-haired girls, mythical creatures that shed their seal skin at night and crawl out of the gray sea to dance and make love underneath the stars. Mairead watches, loves and lusts from afar. And envies them…

They did not have to live on the island, with no escape from those smoke-dried, strangling moralities.

Now Mairead, she is not one of those spoilt city flowers who only come up to the Orkney Islands for the summer nights and Beltane fires. Smelling of kelp, rust and diesel, the taste of sea salt always on her lips, she is the Keeper of the Selkeness Light. The lighthouse’s flame a beacon during dark and stormy nights. Unfortunately, being a lighthouse keeper is considered a man’s job. And it’s only a matter of time before Mairead father, whose mind and body are consumed by illness, passes away.  With her three brothers fighting in the First World War, she will be left with empty hands.

But there are more pressing matters at hand. A girl alone is an easy target. And when one day a thief steals the skin of one of the selkies, leaving the seal girl naked and trapped on the island, Mairead has to fight back for the girl that occupied her daydreams for years. And for her future…

She couldn’t bring herself to care. Not with the memory of kisses so fierce she almost feared to end them still hovering about her lips. Not with the smell of what they’d done still haunting the back of Mairead’s throat – a lush, decadent perfume that the freshening sea wind served only to enhance. Any shame she might have expected to feel, now that her long-silenced yearnings had finally been met, simply could not make their way through the press of warm, flustered amazement. 

Final thoughts: I loved how the author kept me spell-bound throughout the story, her writing style – never vulgar and cliché, mesmerizing instead – fit the magical ambiance perfectly. I especially adored how the sea played a role in every aspect of Mairead’s life, the erotic scenes included. They didn’t make me tingle with desire, but their originality and beauty was something to behold. I would almost call this old school writing and cry out: “THIS IS HOW IT’S DONE, FOLKS!”.

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Book Review: Trick of Time by J. L. Merrow

Reviewed by Katinka

TITLE: Trick of Time
AUTHOR: J. L. Merrow
PUBLISHER: Carina Press
LENGTH: 27000 words
BLURB: A lover from another time

When Ted Ennis steps out the doors of the Criterion Theatre for a cigarette and finds himself in Victorian London, he begins to doubt his sanity. At first he thinks it’s all a film set, and is sure that the strikingly handsome young man leaning against a lamppost must be the leading man…

What starts as a sordid transaction with a beautiful rent boy quickly turns into something much deeper, drawing him back again and again as he gets to know Jem and craves meaningful encounters with him.

But Ted doesn’t understand the exact conditions necessary for his trips through time—and for Jem, time may actually be running out. Now Ted has one last shot to get back to Jem and save their relationship, before it’s too late…

REVIEW:

Question: you step out of your house one day to go to work and..WHAM..suddenly find yourself in 19^th century Victorian London. Astonished, you suck the grime, dirt and decay into your lungs and then…you lock eyes with a pretty boy who casually leans against a lamppost. He’s a prostitute and it shows.

Now would you or wouldn’t you get your freak on with him?

I have to say, knowledge can be a bitch. I confess to being somewhat of a history nut and thus can’t help associating Victorian rent boys with filth, lice, fleas, Syphilis and Gonorrhea. Victorian fashion may ignite romantic fantasies, in reality a large number of the London population bit the dust before even turning 30, among other reasons due to outbreaks of cholera, smallpox, typhoid and scarlet fever. What’s amusing, is that physicians back then apparently considered STD ridden prostitutes a blessing. They believed that Syphilis was “inflicted by the Almighty to act as a restraint upon the indulgence of evil passions”. So yes, I personally find it a little difficult to indulge in the idea of smutting it up with a Victorian prostitute.

Luckily, Ted Ennis has no such objections! More than a year ago, his husband and parents got killed in a car crash that left him with a permanent head injury and slurred speech. A family friend landed him a job as a jack of all trades at a London theater. Ted’s still in the process of trying to bounce back when he — much as in the case I described above — steps out of the theater on his cigarette break and finds himself in….Victorian London. In case you were wondering…… YES, he does get his freak on in what you can only call a school example of instant love. A rent boy leads him through a labyrinth of dirty, dark alleys, gets on his knees and….Ted’s been done for (if he wasn’t already). When he heads back to the theater and to our modern world, he realizes that his life cannot ever be the same again.

He has to see his historical lover again.

This being a novella, I decided to keep my review reasonably short (my kinda short anyway :p). A Trick of Time is a sweet, gentle romance with a hint of suspense and the time travel element to spice things up. Merrow has a pleasant writing style and paces her story well. I found myself rooting for Ted and his prostitute and had no troubling whatsoever finishing this book in a few hours.

On the other hand, this one was nowhere near as clever or quirky as Merrow’s other book; Muscling Through, which really put her on the map for me. If you haven’t read that one already, please make sure to check it out! Trick of Time was very much a middle of the road romance, and a somewhat shallow one at that. So if you enjoy picking your books apart and analyzing the author’s decisions, this one will leave you unsatisfied. Quite a few questions remain unanswered. The odd time travel thing and how it all played out will raise an eyebrow or two. Same with how the rent boy’s harsh life apparently doesn’t stop him from hopping onto the instant love train and taking all Ted’s crazy ass stories and his obvious handicap for granted. Then there’s the fact that this story is too short to allow Victorian London to come alive. Something that applies to the MC’s as well.

And yet, if you’re ready to leave your criticism at the door there’s a lot to enjoy about this cute piece of historical fiction with time-crossed lovers. I would therefore definitely recommend it as an uncomplicated feel good read in between your ‘larger meals’.

Katinka gives it:

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Book Review: The Elegant Corpse by A. M. Riley

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: The Elegant Corpse
AUTHOR: A. M. Riley
PUBLISHER: Loose Id Publishing
LENGTH: 158 pages
BLURB: Detective Roger Corso is open about his sexual orientation. He’s less forthcoming about his leather lifestyle. He thinks he’s doing a pretty good job of keeping it covert, but then something happen that changes his mind. Someone delivers an elegantly clothed corpse to his home. His couch to be precise. And that corpse is carrying a leather flogger. Roger’s taking that personally. Additional distraction comes in the form of the victim’s younger brother Sean. He’s annoying. Knows something about the murder he’s not telling. Wants something from Roger–and is everything Roger ever wanted. But before he can make Sean his, he’s going to have to solve the mystery of the elegant corpse.

REVIEW:

Like being buried underneath an avalanche of mediocrity, that’s basically how I felt about my latest reads. So color me very relieved when The Elegant Corpse turned out to be a breath of fresh air!

You won’t find overwrought flowery sentences and metaphors in this book. If you adore your m/m romance clichés and manipulative tropes, ones that leave you teary-eyed, you’ll be barking at the wrong tree as well. So lemme just step on my soapbox once more and shout from the top of my lungs……What a solid, smoothly- written old-school detective! A fast-paced murder mystery with a grim edge, in which dead bodies pop up everywhere, the killer’s one step ahead of the game, and the sturdy detective falls in love with a suspect…

…And I, in turn, fell in love with the detective. For some odd reason, my brain kept feeding me images of a Don Draper look-a-like, sitting behind his desk at the police station..

Anyway! Detective Roger Corso is cool as a cucumber. But even he understands that he better take it personally when someone leaves a dead body in his living room. And that’s not all. The body is in fact the wrapped, disemboweled, and ritualistically posed mummy of a beautiful gay boy, who disappeared 20 years ago. Roger, not a closet case but a private person nonetheless, immediately recognizes what the corpse holds in its hands. Those are not Egyptian artifacts, but BDSM equipment. In that instance, Roger realizes that his secret life as a Master is about to bleed into the fabrics of his life as a detective…

This book offers a bit of everything really: crime, torture, suspense, romance, humor, BDSM, poetry even…and sympathetic characters. And yet it appears as if I got to know the latter only in passing. In a way, The Elegant Corpse seems like the very first book in a shiny new series, in which everything is laid out for future reference. There are almost too many ideas stuffed into one book. I was dying to get to know the meticulous Roger and his sidekick Mary Anne better and am bummed that this apparently is a stand-alone?! Do something about that Riley!

I’d beg…?

Oh well, onwards we go. The references to the 80’s gay life, the Tom of Finland leather daddies and the AIDS epidemic added a rich and realistic touch. It’s an era Roger only remembers too well. It has shaped him. Thus he is all the more weirded out when he finds that he’s not immune to Generation Y kid Sean (can we say thirty going on thirteen? His age.. what a joke, psht!). The redhead is the brother of one of the mummified victims and too young, too vocal and too brash for Roger’s usual tastes…

Sean chewed his thumb, eyes darting around the precinct room, those bloody fingers tapping out an uneven rhythm on Roger’s desk.
“Stop that”, snapped Roger suddenly.
Sean froze. “What?”
Roger schooled himself to patience, took a deep breath in, and released it slowly. “It can’t be hygienic – or pleasant, either –to have gnawed bloody fingertips all the time.”
Sean lowered his thumb and looked at it as if seeing it for the first time. “Sorry,” he said, sounding angry. He folded his fingers around themselves in his lap and said: “I don’t suppose you have any bad habits?”
Roger raised his eyebrows, typing. He didn’t answer.

Yup, since Roger is distracted by a bouncy redhead who threatens to compromise the case – and Roger’s secret life – you’ll have plenty of time to see if you can solve the crimes before he does. Should be a piece of cake….hmm?

Two final notes. One: you don’t have to be into BDSM to enjoy this book. Not a fan of formalized BDSM myself, but other than a first scene (that I found dull, sorry), it was worked into the story unobtrusively. And two: Mary Anne. Who is definitely not a Mary Anne. What a kick-ass sidekick for Roger this woman is! For once, you won’t be stuck with a female character who is either a bitch from hell or a dowdy Mary Sue, as seems to be the standard in the m/m romances I read. If Roger’s love life doesn’t end up in shambles, I’ll settle for Mary – “I love you dearly, Roger, but I don’t want you to have kinky sex in my house, okay?” – Anne.

Katinka’s Rating:

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Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
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Book Review: Nowhere Ranch by Heidi Cullinan

Reviewed by Shelley & Katinka

TITLE: Nowhere Ranch
AUTHOR: Heidi Cullinan
PUBLISHER: Loose Id Publication
LENGTH: 240 pages/68,143 words
BLURB: Roe Davis is a man who works hard, keeps to himself, and never mixes business with pleasure — until he takes a weekend away from his new job at Nowhere Ranch and runs into the owner at the only gay bar for two hundred miles. Getting involved with the boss is a bad idea, but Travis Loving is hard to say no to, especially when it turns out their kinks line up like a pair of custom-cut rails. As Loving points out, so long as this is sex on the side, no interfering with the job, they could make it work.

The truth is, there’s good reason Roe never settles down and always spends his birthdays and holidays celebrating alone. Shut out in the cold by his family years ago, Roe survived by declaring he didn’t need a home. As his affair with Loving grows into more than just sex, Roe finds out what happens when he stays put a little bit too long: the past always catches up with you. Eventually, even a loner gets lonely, and home will grow up through whatever cracks you leave open for it — even in a place called Nowhere.

JOINT REVIEW:

Excuse us a moment while we flush the dirt from our eyeballs. Because not only are these cowboys the rough, tough and silent types, they sure know how to let their life on a ranch inspire them in the bedroom. Pony play anyone?

Let’s take the bull by the horns; some of the things these guys did for fun had us squirming and clutching the pearls at our necks with horrified fascination… And we’ve both read Bloodraven, for god’s sake!

But we’re getting ahead of things. Imagine being a young man from a religious family in cowboy country. You’re not exactly a smart puppy, but you try really hard and focus on what you know, like sheep, so you get by. Except for that fact that you’re also gay…

Meet Roe, Nowhere Ranch’s narrator. The discovery of his stack of gay porn results in a godly intervention to ‘heal’ him. Anger and displacement leads to a short prison stretch and once free, Roe makes a break from his Iowa hometown. It’s a lonely existence until he gets a job on the Nebraskan Nowhere Ranch, working for owner Travis Loving. It’s the perfect job for Roe: the boss is the quiet, private and respectable type; he lets him get on with it, no questions, and no dramas – perfect. Then Roe walks into the only gay bar for 200 miles around, and just who do you think is sitting at the bar…

“For a second we just stared at each other, and yeah, I was flipping out. I mean, the one guy at a ranch you work really hard to make sure he doesn’t find out you’re gay is the fucking boss. So I just stood there and tried not to piss myself. Then it occurred to me that there was only one reason he would be there, same as me.“

As the quote above shows, this is Roe’s story and he tells it in his own simple farm boy way without sophistication, grandeur or restraint. His voice is therefore deliciously forthright and without pretence. And, oh God, how we loved this! How refreshing! How devilishly divine it was to be in the mind-set of a real man. Kudos Ms Cullinan, you did brilliantly.

But that’s not all … y’all better cowboy up for them sex scenes! We knew it was going to be a smut fest, but we didn’t anticipate getting lost in the brutal intensity of the hottest, filthiest sex known to man. We didn’t expect our delicate sensibilities to be so thoroughly fisted trampled on. Pony play, puppy play, giant dildo’s, fisting, it’s all a go… Roe doesn’t mind. In fact, he’s quite accommodating….

“You want to tell me I’m your pony or your dog you’re fucking, I can do that. I think hotel carpets are gross, so I’d rather not do puppy play on the floor. But in bed’s okay.

This in turn brings out the best kinky in Travis. For example: he gifts his new hand an extraordinarily original birthday present. Although you could say that his present requires an acquired taste…which reminds us…, let’s talk about the not-so-vanilla sex some more!

Shell thought it wasn’t THAT rough. After all, there wasn’t any bestiality (of which there was plenty of opportunity) and she got the giggles when we got to that scene; all she envisioned was not being able to remove said appendage from said orifice. Gah! What would the doctor say at the ER? ‘Congratulations sir, you have a healthy fist?’ Intellectually speaking (ha!) the pony reins were a clever metaphor.

On the otherrrr hand….Katinka’s face wrinkled up during more than one scene, and she only managed to keep her cool and make it past those parts by whispering; ‘Omg-no- omg-no’ and keeping Shelley’s supportive Tumblr porn finds in mind. So suit yourself, hmm?

And really, Nowhere Ranch is amazingly, shockingly good… So many memorable scenes and precious moments … in tandem we sigh contentedly. It doesn’t matter that what was left of our sensibilities was thoroughly deflowered. We understood. We cared about these two. Unfortunately, we then got to the last 10% or so. The part where …

…Cullinan got hacked by Mary-fucking-Sue!

You read that right! Instead of sighing and swooning, that ending had us beating the hedges, smashing windows and destroying bus shelters in tandem. To say we were livered is an understatement! Why? Why? Why do we HAVE TO have an ending that was manipulated by Mary Sue Haley (self-serving little busy body) which spins the much appreciated characterisation of these men upside down and inside out?

Swapping Stetsons for aprons is NOT what we expected here. In our opinion all that syrupy sweetness is not in line with the relationship dynamic at all.

And their toys! That thing they did with their goddamn toys. Sacrilege! May we just pause to wipe away our tears, hang our heads and have a moment of silence for latex stowed away everywhere?

Ultimately, it’s only a testament to that beautiful combination of awe-inspiring feels and kinkiness, that we’d recommend Nowhere Ranch despite its superfluous ending. While Shelley will be rereading quite a few of those strategically highlighted scenes, Katinka secretly wonders which ‘hard limit’ will be blasted to pieces next.

Joint Rating: 

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Shelley & Katinka are one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read their individual reviews, click the links below:
SHELLEY’S REVIEWS
KATINKA’S REVIEWS
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Book Review: Tribute by Lisa Henry

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Tribute
AUTHOR: Lisa Henry
PUBLISHER: Loose Id Publishing
LENGTH: 205 pages
BLURB: When the fearsome warlord Brasius chooses Kynon as his tribute, Kynon tells himself it’s the price of peace, and that he can endure anything. If his slavery will save his father’s kingdom, then he will be a slave and submit to every indignity the warlord and the senate of Segasa require of him. He can live with the shame; it’s the mind-blowing pleasure that frightens him.

But the warlord wants more than a tribute who will respond eagerly to whips and bondage. The warlord might just want the man underneath: the prince, the soldier and the tribute, if Kynon can figure out who that is. On an enforced journey of self-discovery, Kynon learns that being the warlord’s tribute isn’t just about submission. And, to be the tribute that Brasius wants him to be, Kynon will have to defy all the traditions of Segasa and risk the wrath of the senate that really holds his chains.

REVIEW:

I was so thrilled to read Tribute! It fits perfectly into my master plan to..*cough*..‘professionalize’ my depravity. Since dating cruel bastards with little to none redeeming qualities would kind of interfere with this wholesome, little life I lead these days, I will just have to still my cravings through my reads. And what better book to choose then Tribute to do so? It has dub/non con, a bit of torture and a whole lot of humiliation, D/s and creepy, abusive fuckers in abundance. In short: all the sweet stuff.

You can read the blurb for yourself, so I’m going to skip summarizing the plot today. Although I recommend taking the warnings into account.If only because you won’t have to end up feeling obliged to 1 star this book for it not matching your expectations of beautiful submission and star-crossed lovers love. There’s nothing beautiful or swoon-worthy about Tribute. Not in the conventional sense anyway, ha! Harsh, porn-packed pain and humiliation and master/slave dynamics is what you get instead. It was cruel. And yet… not nearly as cruel as I had anticipated. Partly because the characters remained a little distant, I was never terrified. Narrator Prince Kynon didn’t crawl underneath my skin, thus ensuring that I was merely a spectator and didn’t have to join him on his sickening roller-coaster ride. I wasn’t sorry.

And this may sound weird, but Henry has such an entertaining writing style that I wanted to grab a bowl of popcorn and happily munch my way through another rape scene instead of gag and shudder. Imagine being able to write pulpy non con: that’s kind of special, right? Can’t say that I don’t love Henry’s blend of depraved and dirty, juicy fun in Tribute!

Not that I wasn’t disappointed on occasions. Warlord Brasius’ newly acquired virginal tributes (AKA war captives) were given a magical instant lust inducing potion that turned them into fuck toys. Ugh! I’ve always been one who likes the hunt better than the catch, so I was growling in disbelief when Brasius ‘introduced’ himself to Prince Kynon and Alysia (there’s some girly-bits, yes) in such a nonchalantly brutal and fast way. It was explicit. It was nasty. It was maybe a tiny winy bit hot? And it was over in the blink of an eye. Taking virgins who are writhing in lust without their consent …well… that’s quite a way to spin things! I think I would have appreciated a dash of forced seduction, perhaps a little unreleased sexual tension and overall more mind-fuckery.
Instalust potions: where’s the fun in that? 😀

Now Brasius. He should have done it for me. Instead, I ended up being vaguely dissatisfied with how he managed his business. His business being his tributes. Despite his power, good looks and other obvious..assets, he’s the kind of master I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy. The man’s a contradictory mess. Due to his role, it was expected of him to display his dominance over his captured enemies. And thus he cruelly humiliated Kynon left and right (not complaining about that, mind you! I’d say he did so rather unimaginatively, but effectively). Then he tenderly told the confused kid that he ‘wants all of him’? You don’t have to be a 19 year old Prince to slip into a nervous breakdown because of these mixed signals. Also, I had hoped that Brasius would be more demanding in an intellectual way. At some point it appeared as if he made an attempt, when he invited Kynon to play chess with him. But that scene, too, spiraled into straight-forward humiliation. But hey, at least you’ll get all the promised stuff!

If you decide to give Tribute a go, I’m curious to hear what you think about the romance aspect. I personally didn’t buy for a second that this was anything more than Stockholm Syndrome and whatever other labels apply. I got the impression that a mentally stable Kynon wouldn’t have swayed into that/those directions if he were given a choice. By now, it’s not a secret that I’m not a fan of HEA’s that seem misplaced. So I’m just going to be nice and pretend that this crazy conclusion didn’t happen to this book. Maybe I need to skip Henry’s final chapters from now on? Because, in the end, her entertaining writing style in combination with that kinky mind of hers really work for me! I’ll definitely auto-buy her work from now on.

Katinka’s Rating:

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Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

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Book Review: Taboo For You by Anyta Sunday

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Taboo For You
AUTHOR: Anyta Sunday
BLURB: Sam’s freaking out. He’s 30 in three weeks. And what has he done in his twenties? It’s pretty simple math: nothing exciting at all. But hey, he has three weeks right? Maybe that’s just enough time to tick his way through a 20s Must Do List . . .

Luke’s freaking screwed. He’s come out to his family, and his friends. Except there’s a certain someone who doesn’t know yet: his neighbor of 7 years. Who also happens to be his best friend. Who Luke needs to tell the truth, but he just . . . can’t . . . seem to . . .

Jeremy’s freaking over-the-moon. It’s the countdown to his 15th birthday, and his goal is simple. No matter what, he’s going to spend heaps of time with saucy Suzy. But first he needs to get his over-protective, no-girlfriend-’cause-you’ll-get-her-pregnant parents off his back. And what better way than pretending he’s gay?

Sam, Luke, and Jeremy. Three guys who have a lot of history together, and a lot of future too—

—well, if they can sort out their issues, that is.

A Friends to Lovers Novel

REVIEW:

I think the experience of reading Taboo For You comes closest to floating around in a warm bubble-bath. I had a serious case of warm, fuzzy feelings when reading this cute story. Considering that I usually only have a sweet tooth when it comes to food and not to my books… What can I say? The author did a great job. She wrote a heartwarming and amusing gay for you book — and wrote it well! My cheesedar didn’t detect much to bitch about.

Taboo For You in a nutshell: Two neighbors: Sam and Luke. Sam accidentally knocked up a girl when he was only 15 and has been playing the responsible parent to his son Jeremy ever since. But now that he is about to hit the 30, he can’t help but think of all the kickass stuff he’s missed out on. Like swimming with sharks and doing something sexually taboo… Luke, on the other hand, has secretly been in love with his straight neighbor for years and helps him out with his son where ever he can. There’s only one problem: now that Sam’s BD is lurking around the corner, Sam has decided to step up his game. Meaning that time is running out for Luke, who snatched a copy of Sam’s bucket list and wants nothing more than to be part of his neighbor’s taboo fantasy…

I already mentioned the cuteness of Taboo For You. So let me just add that, while this story gently flows on and is pretty much angst and heartbreak free, a lot of stuff happens. You will be entertained the entire time. I smiled on many occasions, experienced a few feels and rooted for the sympathetic MC’s. The unreleased sexual tension (UST) is strong in this one too. UST mostly drives me crazy in a good way. As long as the tension isn’t kept intact by artificial plot-devices and doesn’t become too unbelievable (since Sam came across as the friendliest, but not the brightest bulb in the box, I’ll give the author the benefit of the doubt here ;)). And as long as I’ll get rewarded eventually, of course!

I’m not Mother Mary! Psht!

Rewarded I did get. Although I have to say that one of the sex scenes made me raise my cyber eyebrow. You see, it included a bar of soap going a place where I think bars of soap aren’t supposed to go. And then it was used as a lubricant too? Ick! Seriously? Believe me, the last thing I want to do is chat about rectal suppository’s here, but they kind of illustrate that everything you put in there is absorbed by your body reeeally well…and I don’t think your health will benefit from soap much?

Weirded out. Yeah, that’s what I was. Weirded out that apparently no one of the mentioned beta readers and editors climbed on their soapbox because of this scene.

Something else I didn’t like were the numbers. It’s likely that it had something to do with the fact that Sam turned 30 and his kid 15, that emphasis was put on every single number in the text, by making it bold and 3 times bigger than the normal text. But the joke got old fast. And during certain scenes (if you get what I’m getting at), bold, inflated numbers have no business popping up. I suppose you can ignore them fairly easily though. Or crack up about them. Maybe it’s just me thinking it was a lame trick.

All things considered, bubble-baths are pretty damn wonderful every now and then. And this one in particular will definitely put a smile on your face.

Katinka’s Rating:

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Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

Check out all our recommended books in Sid Love’s eBook Store:
Recommended Books

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Book Review: Claimings, Tails and Other Alien Artifacts by Lyn Gala

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Claimings, Tails and other Alien Artifacts
AUTHOR: Lyn Gala
PUBLISHER: Loose Id Publishing
LENGTH: 104 pages
BLURB: Liam loves his life as a linguist and trader on the Rownt homeworld, but he has ignored his heart and sexual needs for years. He won’t risk letting anyone come too close because he won’t risk letting anyone see his deeply submissive nature. For him, submission comes with pain. Life burned that lesson into his soul from a young age. This fear keeps him from noticing that the Rownt trader Ondry cares for him.

Ondry may not understand humans, but he recognizes a wounded soul, and his need to protect Liam is quickly outpacing his common sense. They may have laws, culture, and incompatible genitalia in their way, but Ondry knows that he can find a way to overcome all that if he can just overcome the ghosts of Liam’s past. Only then can he take possession of a man he has grown to love.

REVIEW:

More fascinating than I had expected! Not that I had a list of expectations, but as soon as I read that Claimings, Tails and other Alien Artifacts involved aliens with tails, my mind sort of went into a frenzy and fed me “Oh no! Not smutty tail action… and..tentacles? Oh please, not suction cups and slime!” red alerts. I shouldn’t have worried. Although there’s more than enough to enjoy if funky appendages going dark places is your kink, please don’t let that tail on the cover put you off! The aliens in this book, Rownts, don’t have the bodies of purple painted stockphoto models. More importantly, they don’t have spiky, finned tails. This is not torture porn.

Quite the opposite actually! It’s a gently flowing angst-free story, with an exotic touch to spice things up. Exotic comes in the form of an unconsciously dirty dub con talking alien, who develops an interest in a human male: Liam. As a linguist on the Rownt homeworld, Liam’s able to read and translate the expressions on the Rownt’s reptile-ish faces and is one of the few who understands the finer nuances of the alien language. This makes him an excellent trader. Unfortunately, Liam’s talent doesn’t protect him from his new asshole commanding officer, who plans on making his life hell. Something his favorite Rownt trader, Ondry, doesn’t fail to notice…

And then Liam suddenly wakes up groggy and finds himself chained to Ondry’s bed, a nest.

“I have to call base.”
“You are not theirs anymore.” (…)
“They gave me to you? For how long?” Liam asked. There had be a way to fix all this.
“You are palteia,” Ondry said that as if it explained everything. For a Rownt, it probably would.
“So you keep saying . The problem is that I don’t understand that. I’ve never seen the word. I don’t know any stories with palteia. How long am I supposed to stay here?”
“A palteia is always a palteia.” Ondry started to pale.
“Oh fuck. Forever. You plan to keep me forever.”Pressing his eyes closed, Liam let his head fall back against the wall with a thunk.

To Liam, palteia at first is just another word for screwed. For me, it was the beginning of a compelling take on D/s dynamics through the eyes of an alien race. Since the Rownt and the human race are sexually not compatible (these aliens don’t do sex for pleasure, which is pretty damn good news for Liam, but you’ll figure out the ‘why’ yourself), it’s intriguing to discover how things play out between Liam and Ondry. The cultural and social differences between their races are enormous. Even a talented linguist can’t completely bridge that gap. For instance, when Liam is manhandled and bound by his alien, the sexual subtext is completely lost on Ondry, but not on Liam… Which leads to amusing – and pretty exciting – situations.

“It’s an erection,” Liam explained once he caught his breath again. This was beyond embarrassing, and still he was hard.
“Really? This is long enough to reach the female reproductive tract?” Ondry’s eyes were wide with disbelief or maybe just curiosity.

Dissed by an alien. Gotta love that, ha!

Anyway, although I loved the focus on the racial differences and the fact that these aliens are and remain truly alien throughout the story, I wish there was a little more to the characters. Liam in particular never really came alive for me. If he had borrowed only an inch of personality from Dark Space’s Brady Garrett, I would’ve been happy! It’s possible that due to this ‘distance’ I felt, Liam’s sudden ‘feelings’ came as a bit of a surprise. This being a novella, you may be left wanting more and wondering about things that were only lightly touched on. I wouldn’t mind a sequel at some point.

But hey, time to admit that you want to find out if (and how) a human male and a reptile-ish, sexually incompatible alien with a tail can be a match made in space! Claimings, Tails and other Alien Artifacts didn’t bore me for one second. I’d definitely recommend this fascinating, kind of sweet and quirky book.

Katinka’s Rating: 

BUY LINK: Book Store

==================================
Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

Check out all our recommended books in Sid Love’s eBook Store:
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Book Review: Shepherd, Slave and Vow by Lyn Gala

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Shepherd, Slave and Vow
AUTHOR: Lyn Gala
PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press
LENGTH: 64 pages
BLURB: Bored with the privileges and duties of a member of the first family, Ferro finds himself in the slave tents as a consequence of his antics, knowing he’ll be rescued before long. At least, that’s the way it’s always worked before. This time, though, Ferro finds himself sold as a sheep-tender along with an intriguingly mysterious slave called Lisias. For the first time, Ferro’s met someone who seems immune to his wiles, and he’ll soon learn that Lisias has more to teach him than just shepherding.

REVIEW:

Oh Ferro! If he had lived today, his champagne parties in private jets would be featured on Rich Kids Of Instagram. In a worst case scenario, his parents would try to nip his brattiness in the bud by sending him to a prestigious boarding school abroad.

As it is, the good looking, privileged man lives in an ancient fantasy world with strong elements of Greek mythology. Mind you, that doesn’t make him any less obnoxious, but it does have an effect on the type of punishment he receives from his parents. Instead of boarding school they tend to send him to the slave markets every time he misbehaves. Little do they know that this is the only place where Ferro is free from the stifling protocols of the first family he belongs to. And as long as he avoids being sold, he’s always collected by one of his father’s men after a while.

Unfortunately, this time he hadn’t counted on meeting the mysterious slave Lisias.

Lyn Gala, she sure knows how to write aggravating characters. It’s probably because I know that she can do worse, that I didn’t mind loose cannon Ferro that much. Besides, the rich kid deserves to be cut some slack for reasons that will become clear. And truthfully, his expressive personality makes it all the more interesting to discover how the dynamics between him and the strong and silent Lisias will play out. Is this powerful looking man with his amber eyes truly only a tender of sheep? Or could he be exactly what Ferro needs?

This is a pretty marvelous story. In only 40 pages, Shepherd, Slave and Vow still covers most of what I consider important in my reads. The characters, especially Ferro, are distinct and developed enough to intrigue. Although you could say that the plot serves as a vessel to get to the sex — and dammit, you won’t be disappointed! — Gala sprinkles enough interesting details and pieces of world building over the pages to give this book a bite. And then there’s the D/s dynamics which are…simply precious!

“Now you know what it is to want, Ferro. Have you ever wanted anyone before?”

So if D/s, gags and bondage are just your thing and you have a little time to spare, you have found your next read. Personally, I also dig it when my MC’s get all furious and manhandle each other, until one of them ultimately bites the dust and the other claims his ‘price’. Muah! And guess what, Gala happens to rule at writing those red hot fighting scenes!

Nibbles? I did have a few. In general, the length of the story wasn’t entirely satisfying. I would have loved a somewhat slower build up and more prolonged action scenes. The story could have benefited from several more pages, to ‘flesh out’ Lisias some more. Finally, as naive and desperate as Ferro may be, I still feel like THAT was a whopper of a magic peen trope! And I’m curious to hear your take on this, because I wasn’t sold on Ferro finding his ‘life-calling’, meh. (“meh”? Ooooh, come tend to me shepherd! :p)

All things considered, definitely make sure to pick up Shepherd, Slave and Vow if you’re in for a little D/s hotness against a mythological backdrop. Or if you think obnoxious rich kids deserve to be gagged and bound, of course!

Katinka’s Rating: 

BUY LINK: Dreamspinner Store

==================================
Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

Check out all our recommended books in Sid Love’s eBook Store:
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Book Review: Truth and Roses by Veronica Sloane

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Truth and Roses
AUTHOR: Veronica Sloane
PUBLISHER: Torquere Press
LENGTH: 23 pages
BLURB: High in the trees of a dense forest rests a bower made of roses. It stands as a delicate fortress around the Prince, a magician and ruler of the surrounding kingdom. Given the choice, he would stay there forever, but the world outside makes its demands in the form of a dragon and a persistent amnesiac young man, whose only desire is to serve his Prince.

REVIEW:

They say the Prince had eyes of steel that could see through the uneven pleats of time, and hair made of smoke that snuck into other people’s minds to wrap around their thoughts. Some say he was a foundling, others a changeling, and still others that he was born of a woman who beheld her child and promptly died of shock.

I think I will just imagine that this Prince looks like the Goblin King from Labyrinth. If only because everything is always better when you add some Bowie. With 15 pages, this is a super-short high fantasy tale about a mysterious prince and an ordinary man who does a very unlikely thing; he decides to visit the Prince in the woods one day. In the tradition of classic fantasy stories this story includes talking wood creatures, dragons that need to be slain, magic and a dash of instant love.

In so few pages, there’s not much room for depth and character motivation, so when the ordinary stranger decides that all he ever wanted is to love and cherish the Prince, I guess you will just have to take his word for it. Only in fairytales, right! For a similar reason, it’s difficult to say truly meaningful things about Truth and Roses. What I can say is that I enjoyed the crafty, somewhat flowery writing style of the author. It provided the story itself, which was somewhat stiff and formal, with a rich atmosphere that I thought fit the genre like a glove. Though I would probably have to read something a little longer to be able to tell if Sloane can write a well-plotted story with three-dimensional characters as well.

One day in the warm, wild spring, a young man from the southern reaches of the Prince’s domain approached the ancient stand of trees that the Prince called his palace. The man had ordinary brown hair and ordinary brown eyes and he wore ordinary clothes. “What are you doing here?”a sparrow asked from a low-hanging branch. “I’ve come for the Prince.” The ordinary man smiled. “Is he at home?”
“No one visits the Prince,” a chipmunk said at the man’s feet. “He lives alone. Stays alone. His people wait for him to visit them.”
“Is that so?” The man looked up at the bower so many feet of the ground, then shrugged. “Not me.”

I do wonder if these mini-stories by Torquere Press are the best way to offer new, promising authors exposure? Personally, I’d include these snippets in the form of a bonus story in books of bestselling authors instead. There are tons of fabulous and free stories out there in the m/m genre, some of which have beautiful covers too. It would be a shame if readers therefore let these teasers pass, because I think this author deserves to have more people sample her work.

Truth and Roses would probably be a great addition to a book with bundled fairytales. Since there’s only a little, chaste romance in it, it could even qualify as an adventurous bedtime story for children. After all, sometimes princes do not wish to kiss fair, helpless maidens but young, handsome men!

Katinka’s Rating: 

BUY LINK: Torquere Store  ::  Book Store

==================================
Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

Check out all our recommended books in Sid Love’s eBook Store:
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Book Review: Storms and Stars by Neena Jaydon

Reviewed by Katinka C.

TITLE: Storms and Stars
AUTHOR: Neena Jaydon
PUBLISHER: Torquere Press
LENGTH: 247 pages
BLURB: It’s lonely at the top for Commander Villam Elding, who has always ranked loyalty to the empire and career ambition over romance. He finds it easier to love ideas than people; without military life, he’s lost. Even so, it’s his close relationship with Kardiell, a popular officer, that tears him from his life. Those with competing ambitions try to take Villam hostage to leverage Kardiell’s soft spot for him. In the struggle, Villam crashes the small spacecraft he’s riding. All hands perish except he and Luke, his kidnapper.

Luke Sicinik travels the galaxy performing dirty missions for money to send home. Born on a desert colony abandoned by the empire, he has no love for imperial soldiers. He spent his childhood in a monastery which taught the evils of anything impractical or sentimental. Yet when he crawls from the destroyed spacecraft, his first instinct is compassionate: he drags Villam’s unconscious body free of the wreckage.

Stranded together on a wild planet, Villam and Luke know that survival means cooperation. A truce becomes trust, and trust turns to passion, as they struggle to find a new life together — just the two of them against an entire world

REVIEW:

Boy, did I ever have a difficult time making up my mind. Which seems fitting enough in this case, because Storms and Stars seems to suffer from a similar problem. There’s no point in beating around the bush: this book was a bit of a challenge for me. At the same time, there was something about this science fiction meets Robinson Crusoe story that managed to capture me enough to want to check out this author’s other work. But I’ll get to the good and the bad in a second.

Firstly, the story! Villam is a loyal servant of the empire. He works as a commander on one of the many star ships in its fleet. Then one day, he finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time, in a transfer vehicle that has been taken over by rebellions who have somehow managed to penetrate the empire’s defenses. Villam senses the danger and launches an attack, but can’t avoid getting shot with a tranquilizer gun. And the last thing you want, is ending up unconscious and injured in a craft of which you have just taken out the pilot. The space vessel spins out of control in the blackness and is then sucked into the gravitational pull of an uninhabited planet, where it crashes. Much, much later, Villam wakes up and finds that only one of the aggressors has survived: the Sigliuk monk Luke. This provides him with a shiny new mission: making the young man pay.

If any of you have seen the film Cast Away, you know that this is probably not the smartest move when you’re stranded on an uncolonized planet with only one other human being. Before you know it, you start talking to a volleyball. And who to have sex with indeed? Luckily, Villam follows a similar train of thought. Meaning that we get to read about two sworn enemies who are suddenly dependent on each other for survival. I know I was rubbing my hands in sweet anticipation, realizing that starting points seldom get much better than this!

He noticed that Luke was watching him. The young man’s expression had returned to its default neutral state. He blinked slowly, his green eyes measuring something in Villam. It was a boyish face with a mature expression, built of handsomely curved cheekbones and a rounded jaw line, accented by eyebrows that moved in a firm line to a sharp turn downwards. It was the only face he would see for the rest of his life. (…) Villam scratched at his chin, blinking. “You’re not going to tell me that no one ever gets physically intimate on Siglidunn.”
“To have children! Anything else is just frivolous — wasteful.” The last word was spoken like a curse.
“Luke,” Villam said patiently, “it’s only the two of us. There will be no children.”

But although you could consider this to be the main storyline of Storms and Stars and, quite frankly, the only truly interesting one, the author also has inserted numerous chapters that cover the spaceship humdrum. I was optimistic at first, thinking this parallel storyline would provide me with a good dose of political intrigue and the necessary background to Jaydon’s universe. When I found that these chapters didn’t offer anything in terms of worldbuilding, nifty scifi ideas or excitement, but instead introduced a ton of irrelevant POV’s for side characters with funky names (Kardiell, Fulgur, Urma, Dorges, Hije, Shpate, and the list goes on…) I began to despair. So I might as well admit what I did: skim these chapters and stick to the stranded men’s adventures instead. This turned out the be a good bet, when I discovered that this storyline wasn’t even part of an ingenious, spectacular climax. Especially since Storms and Stars is very slow paced and of considerable length, I wonder why no one thought; “Hey, all those chapters may not be working in the story’s favor!” Of course, it’s a possibility that the author felt that dropping two men on an inhabited planet wouldn’t offer enough of a bite and spectacle in space to her readers?

Something else I struggled with were the peculiar style choices. The story is written in the third person perspective and focuses on one POV, but still allows the thoughts of the other characters as well. The focus switches to these other POV’s all the time, in the same paragraph even. On top of that, you will also get big chunks of text in italics from the first person perspective; to make sure that the thoughts of the MC’s are constantly on display. Are you still following? Because I sort of…didn’t? Let’s just say it isn’t the most clear and crisp style I have come across.

I quite enjoyed the romance though! The slow burning love was drawn out well. The progression Villam and Luke made in trying to overcome their differences was believable. Along with that the survival trope was interesting. Would they manage to survive winter? Would they be forever stuck on the little green planet? In general, I was taken with Jaydon’s writing style, that was evocative at times. She took her time to introduce us to the strange planet, and incorporated the men’s surroundings nicely in their lives.

Luke examined the moons, then knit his brows and glanced at Villam. He was bleached by the silvery light, his eyes left deeply green in contrast. Villam reached out with one hand to clasp him between neck and shoulder. Smiling, he stepped in closer and ran his other hand down Luke’s warm, soft, lightly stubbled cheek. The moon prodded him not to linger, and he didn’t, dipping in to touch his mouth to Luke’s. Less pure urges than love of the cosmos made him grip Luke’s narrow waist, tug him close, and press apart his lips with his own.

This is apparently Jaydon’s debut novel. For her future books I wish her an editor who isn’t afraid to tell her to ‘kill her darlings’ and opt for one style choice for the sake of an enjoyable reading experience. But despite the book’s flaws, I’m impressed with her writing in general. Very promising.

Katinka’s Rating:

BUY LINK: Torquere Press  ::  Book Store

==================================
Katinka C. is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.

To read all her reviews, click the link: KATINKA’S REVIEWS
=====================================================

Check out all our recommended books in Sid Love’s eBook Store:
Recommended Books

(Support this site and buy the books from my A-store)