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spirit

Book Review of Spirit, by John Inman

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Spirit

I bought a copy of John Inman‘s novel, Spirit.

Description from Goodreads:
Jason Day, brilliant designer of video games, is not only a confirmed bachelor, but he’s as gay as a maypole. One wouldn’t think being saddled with his precocious four-year-old nephew for four weeks would be enough to throw him off-kilter. 

Wrong. Timmy, Jason’s nephew, is a true handful. 

But just when Timmy and Uncle Jason begin to bond, and Jason feels he’s getting a grip on this babysitting business once and for all, he’s thrown for a loop by a couple of visitors—one from Tucson, the other from beyond the grave. 

I’m sorry. Say what? 

Toss a murder, a hot young stud, an unexpected love affair, and a spooky-ass ghost with a weird sense of humor into Jason’s summer plans, and you’ve got the makings for one hell of a ride.

Review:
I thought that this was really quite cute, funny in a clever sort of way and suspenseful. It was also well written and well edited.

Yes, the precocious four-year-old was far too clearly communicative to be realistic. He was very adult sounding, in fact, and that annoyed me a bit. I wouldn’t have wanted baby talk or anything, but no four-year-old has that much reasoning power or clear, concise, grammatically correct speech. It was distracting (but maybe that was exaggerated for me since I have a 4 year old). Similarly, and possibly as a result of the adult toddler, the interactions between the Jason and Sam and Timmy were unrealistic. (Along with Jack, Paul and Sally, are those not the most boring American names the author could have chosen?)

And yes, despite generally loving Jason, I thought he was so camp as to be a cliché. Not so much because he listened to show tunes or used concealer on his acne, but because of his constant need to talk about things being butch or that he might not be manly or macho enough to do whatever—lift a suitcase, swing a sledgehammer, face a spider, etc. It was just a constant attack on his status as a man, as if to say, ‘I’m gay so I obviously can’t also be strong, or brave, or handy with a hammer.’ Certainly, Sam had no such compunctions. Some of this wouldn’t have bothered me (it’s his personality, after all), but he never missed an opportunity to remind the reader. 

The relationship between Sam and Jason also felt a little convenient, but the plot couldn’t have happened without it, so no real complaints. I’m not sure how I felt about all the aiming for the face and licking the leftovers in bed, though. I’m really just not sure. I didn’t necessarily dislike it, but I couldn’t decide if this was supposed to be a little kink thrown in or if this was supposed to be (or maybe is, what do I know) a normal, everyday practice.

All in all, I had a few niggles but for the most part I laughed a lot, nibbled my lips in anticipation, sighed at the romance and generally enjoyed myself with this one.

Book Review of Zero at the Bone, by Jane Seville

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Zero at the Bone

I borrowed a copy of Zero at the Bone, Jane Seville. (Thanks, M.)

Description from Goodreads:
After witnessing a mob hit, surgeon Jack Francisco is put into protective custody to keep him safe until he can testify. A hitman known only as D is blackmailed into killing Jack, but when he tracks him down, his weary conscience won’t allow him to murder an innocent man. Finding in each other an unlikely ally, Jack and D are soon on the run from shadowy enemies. 

Forced to work together to survive, the two men forge a bond that ripens into unexpected passion. Jack sees the wounded soul beneath D’s cold, detached exterior, and D finds in Jack the person who can help him reclaim the man he once was. As the day of Jack’s testimony approaches, he and D find themselves not only fighting for their lives… but also fighting for their future. A future together.

Review:
I’ll admit I expected a lot from this book. People seem to love it. There are tons of raving reviews out there. Plus, well, it claims it name from a poem by Emily Dickinson, for crypes sake. I mean, that’s got to count for something, right?

And I’ll also say up front that I didn’t necessarily dislike it. This is one of those books that I think is designed to make women go weak at the knees; watching a big, tough, emotionally closeted man break down for that one special person and rejoin the human race. This is a theme that really seems to work for a lot of us, my self included. So, it did resonate with me. Don’t think otherwise.

I even liked the characters. D was one of those growly, silent types that pushes all my buttons and Jack seemed to be a smart, capable man who I also liked well enough, even if he did become progressively more twink-like as the book progressed, making his character feel a little inconsistent. (Another reviewer likened him to a teenage girl, and while I think this is an exaggeration, there is definitely a degeneration of his adult maleness as the book moves along. The book starts to feel very het-like by the end.)

However, despite being attracted to the basic type of mm romance this is and actually liking the characters themselves, the book wasn’t a huge success for me. The main reason is that it felt…it seemed…hm, well let me just compare two rivers for you as an illustration.

On a normal, day a river might flow tight and contained within its banks. It’s easy to walk up to the edge and say ‘this is where the river starts, that over there is where it ends.’ Past which, might be forest or fields, whatever. And within those craggy, debris strewn parameters, the water flows at its natural rate, accommodating whatever boulders or fallen limbs might be under the surface. Fine.

But after a heavy rain, that same river will flow over its banks, spread out into wide marshy swaths of ill-defined wetland. It’s hard to know when your foot’s going to leave dry soil and become mired in mud. There is no obvious edge, no obvious ‘here it starts, there it ends’ and everything beyond what you think might be the borders is absorbed into it.

This book is post-flood for me. Its plot seemed to spread and spread and spread. It’s not that I didn’t like the plot, I just kept waiting for the end, only to be given more. Only to see that bank surpassed and spread to the next copse of literary trees.

What I’m trying to say is that the book was long. I mean really, really long. The internet says that the paperback is only 295 pages, but I have a hard time believing it. It just went on for bloody ever. I thought it might never end, what’s more it felt like it wound down about a dozen times, only then to pick up again with yet another swell of action. I like action and all, but it started feeling like 15 epilogues instead of a smooth continuation of the story.

Even though there seems to be a lot of love for this book, there also seem to be a lot of readers that were annoyed (some enraged even) by D’s speech pattern. It didn’t bother me. Maybe ’cause I grew up in the South, where it wasn’t that unusual. What did bother me was that as the book went along, the originally very proper doctor started picking up D’s verbal habits, making them harder and harder to tell apart.

I was almost driven to distraction by all the internal dialoguing though. And oddly it is dialogue. Each character seems to have an alter-ego they can converse with. It was nice to know their private thoughts, sure, but there was so much of it that it really broke up the story. Plus, we were often then told that all these lengthy internal feelings were communicated in a look. Really, in a look?

I did appreciate that D and Jack didn’t have a fairytale happy ending. It was happy, but they were having to realistically learn to live together, instead of a seamless transition into perfecthood. I also like that there was a little flex in their bedroom play. The two have a lot of sex. It would be unimaginably boring if they never changed things up a bit. (Though I won’t credit it with much realism…or even much sexiness.) I loved X and I’d be interested in reading more about D’s task force, if the story could stay focused on it.

So, there are things I liked, not least of which was the actual writing. And as a story, I have few complaints about it. As a book however, as a book that doesn’t seem to know its own limits and reasonable constraints I was well ready for the silly thing to end.

All Kinds of Tied Down

Book Review of All Kinds of Tied Down, by Mary Calmes

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All Kinds of Tied Down

I borrowed an ecopy of All Kinds of Tied Down, by Mary Calmes. (Thanks, L.)

Description from Goodreads:
Deputy US Marshal Miro Jones has a reputation for being calm and collected under fire. These traits serve him well with his hotshot partner, Ian Doyle, the kind of guy who can start a fight in an empty room. In the past three years of their life-and-death job, they’ve gone from strangers to professional coworkers to devoted teammates and best friends. Miro’s cultivated blind faith in the man who has his back… faith and something more. 

As a marshal and a soldier, Ian’s expected to lead. But the power and control that brings Ian success and fulfillment in the field isn’t working anywhere else. Ian’s always resisted all kinds of tied down, but having no home—and no one to come home to—is slowly eating him up inside. Over time, Ian has grudgingly accepted that going anywhere without his partner simply doesn’t work. Now Miro just has to convince him that getting tangled up in heartstrings isn’t being tied down at all.

Review:
Ok, so I’m a fairly new Calmes convert. I’ve had mixed results with what I’ve read so far. I seem to really like or dislike a book by her. There is very little middle ground. And while those I dislike I can tell you exactly what it was that put me off, those I like just kind of fill me with a vague unnamed warmth that I can’t very clearly communicate. 

I suppose this could be called a purely emotional response, because, lawdy, it can’t be the complexity of the plots or the depth of the characters. Neither are extensive, the plot is basically a series of events allowing the characters time to work their feelings out (ok, so there basically isn’t one) and the characters could be called well fleshed out only if they were, in fact, 12 year olds. As true adult males, they lack a lot. Nor can it be the realism. Seriously, bones knit in weeks instead of month and apparently every other law enforcement agent in American is openly gay and the remaining half are all open and accepting of sexual diversity. It can’t even be the consistency, since the scene that ostensibly gives the book its most obvious title actually breaks the pattern set throughout the book, going against character for at least one of the men.

Regardless, this book is no exception to my obvious preference patter and it falls on the warm fuzzy, I liked if for unknown reasons, side of the equation. I can objectively tell you it was full of cliché characters. The über alpha that secretly just wants to submit, the fashion conscious gay man and fashion oblivious ‘straight’ guy, yep I’ve seen them all before. What’s more, it’s full of cliché Calmes characters. The names change from book to book, but the characters remain largely the same. The thing is that they apparently work for me. 

I keep thinking, ‘this should be a crap book. It’s completely formulaic. In fact, even having only read a fraction of Mary Calmes vast collection, I’ve still read what could easily be mistaken for this book already.’ I keep thinking that, but then I think, ‘yeah, but can get another one, please.’ 

So, I duck my head in shame, but I admit it out loud; this book is simplistic, cliché, predictable and my god the sap at the end is enough to suffocate me (honestly, this I could do without) but I liked it. I just can’t help it. Whatever alchemic hormone mix is secreted into my bloodstream as a result of reading this particular combination of man on man action is a win, even when I don’t want it to be.