I initially downloaded Sommer Marsden’s Beast In Me from the Amazon free list. When I could never catch the prequel, Lion Hearted, free I gave up and bought it.
Description of Lion Hearted:
Tryg Avondale is the muscle for his pride, and when he’s called upon to hunt down two missing teens, he sees the job for what it is – a chance to give his pride a break from him and his “nature”. Tryg is a gay lion and it’s not something his “family” seems to embrace.
He takes with him Luke Dorchester – an empath and the perfect travel companion. Luke can feel and soothe every emotion that coils deep inside Tryg, and the sex between them is the hottest Tryg has ever known. Tryg has no intention of letting his emotions go any further when it comes to this brand new man. But he also has zero intention of letting him go. What follows is a road trip from campground to campground, hot nights in hotel rooms and close encounters spent together as they follow the scent of the two abducted shifters. A scent that takes them to Divination Falls, a haven for shifters and associated magical folk; a place where an old evil will surface and Tryg will learn just how far his love for lion-hearted Luke must take him.
Review:
I’m a bit torn on this one. In some ways I thought this was a fairly middling read, enjoyable but nothing to sing about. In other ways, I found myself surprisingly happy with it. I thought the plot was ok. I thought the characters were ok. I thought the sex was ok. I wasn’t displeased with any of it, but I didn’t find myself falling in love with any of it either.
However, somewhere in there, among the shallow character portrayals and weak plot, drug out over 100+ pages by copious amounts of sex (there is A LOT, so much that I thought the guys could probably have rescued the girls a lot sooner if they’d stopped shagging and got on with investigating) I found a series of touchingly romantic moments. Yes, almost all of them occurred in the middle of a sex scene and there is a bit of a sex=love correlation going on that I find a little disturbing. But regardless of their literary surroundings, I found Tryg’s slow change of disposition sweet, for lack of a better word.
Since there was sooo much sex, I should probably talk about it. None of it was overly graphic. It didn’t foray into kinky territory or anything. It was all fairly straight forward. My only real comment would be on the ridged roles. This never used to bother me. I came to reading M/M by way of yaoi manga, where I would call it the norm rather than the exception. But the more m/m I read the more often I find myself bothered when there is no flexibility in who gives and receives, asks or demands, etc. And I found it particularly notable here. It was emphasised and I found myself uncomfortable with it.
Speaking of uncomfortable, I didn’t care for Tryg calling Luke ‘boy’ all the time. Luke’s 25 to Tryg’s 32, so there’s no pedophilia or anything, but the use of ‘boy’ or, even worse, ‘the boy’ in sex scenes just felt hinky. Plus, it just seemed to be one more way to emphasise the power disparity between the two of them.
Lastly, I want to address the cover. I know this may seem irrelevant, especially since covers can so easily change, but this one hit a pet peeve of mine so I’m going to indulge myself by griping about it. If a book is going to have one of its characters on the cover (a dangerous proposition to start with), every effort should be made to ensure that the picture used matches the character it’s representing. As an example, I once read a book in which the main character was meant to be a natural blond and the bleach blond on the cover had an inch and a half of dark roots–obviously not natural then. (I can’t be the only person who notices this kind of thing.)
Here the narrator goes to some effort to describe the way Tryg keeps his hair short and his face cleanly shaven to avoid the cliché lion-headed appearance (which is probably exactly the impression this particular picture was going for). This means he would likely be displeased with the very image used to represent him on the cover and if the character would be irked by it so am I. Mostly, however, I find it disruptive to look at a cover and be forced to notice discrepancies instead of consistence with the story. The cover is still part of the book, after all.
Description of Beast In Me
Weather worker Cameron Bale rolls into Divination Falls after being prompted by Spirit and Brother Lighting. He discovers that the small, hidden town full of shifters and magical types is suffering a series of unsettling events. There’s speculation from the town seers that he could be the answer they’ve been looking for. Cameron’s willing to try and help: he’s got nowhere to go and nothing to lose. His life is simply about loneliness and it turns out that Trace, a grumpy wolf with stunning eyes, knows just what that feels like. Cam finds himself wishing maybe they could be alone … together. Oh yeah, and battle whatever evil it is that still lurks in Divination Falls.
Review:
While this wasn’t a horrible book, it wasn’t all that great either. I’m really glad that I got it for free. It certainly wasn’t as good as book one. I think the best way to describe it is clumsy and abrupt. The writing is clunky, with pretentious descriptions of emotions substituting for solid, believable emotional developments.
What I mean is that Mrs. Marsden uses heavily evocative language to create artificially poignant responses in the reader. I call it artificial because the plot didn’t allow for the characters to develop the feelings the reader is told they suddenly have for one another. But contradictorily, we’re hit with some lovely imagery that if placed within a more thoroughly and patiently established story could have made for a gripping read.
This is a serious case insta-lust, moving to instant ‘I want to support and heal him’ as step one of insta-love. It’s that second one that really drives me crazy. Insta-lust I can handle. Insta-love I don’t like, but I’ve learned to accept. (They’re shifters after all.) But the whole idea of instantly knowing, trusting, and seeking to meaningfully support another is just too much for me and my distaste for sappy hearts and flowers in general. It’s wholly unsupportable in a plot.
Seriously, this instant connection between the two starts before the two men have even seen eachother’s faces. It’s so abrupt that that the book just feels like a listing of emotions, events and sexual positions with no real story attached.
What’s more, the weak attempt to provide a mystery as a plot was essentially a failure. Seeing Cameron go around and listen to everyone’s stories, when the information could have just been recapped for him, felt like filler. Then he suddenly and almost miraculously knew what to do, with no evidence of an impetuous to his sudden insight. Isn’t that convenient for him?
Add to that so much sex that it actually started to feel redundant and I’m bound to lose interest. (And for the record, I love me some smexy yum-yum. But too much is too much.)
Lastly, and I know this sounds ridiculous, but the whole thing kind of had a bit of a YA feel to it. Cameron went around and met a variety of different shifter and a lot of time (that the book really couldn’t afford to dedicate to such distractions) was spent describing them and their quirks. It gave the whole thing a bit of a Hogwarts/Harry Potter-like feel. By which I mean a ‘lets go see some strange and marvellous mythological creatures just for the amazement factor.’ It didn’t contribute anything to the story and IMO detracted from the already lagging attempt at a plot.
Additionally, Cameron’s tendency to just say anything with no filter and to space out easily and repeatedly, gave him a childlike quality. When paired with the litany of fairytale beasts I’m reminded of young adult (or even middle grade) literature…except for the sex, of course. Lots and lots of sex. It wasn’t a successful combination for me.
Final thought…Ms. Marsen can write. She proved that more book one of the series than here, but she’s proven it. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m a huge fan of what she writes, or rather the relationships she chooses to create. (This is another completely inflexible top/bottom, dominant/submissive pairing, for example.)To each their own, of course, but it’s not topping any of my favourites lists.