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The setting is the same of a previous book by Angelia Sparrow, Nikolai, there is even a reference to a character in that book, but the feeling of this book is completely different; Nikolai was dark and gothic, I remember that I said it was not a romance. Instead Glad Hands is a classical love story with the nice add that one of the characters is a trucker, a profession that Angelia Sparrow knows well and so she describes it in a very accurate way. There is neither too much angst, an element that usually abounds when one or both characters are young.Chuck Hummingbird is a Cherokee and he lives in the Tribal Lands, an independent territory inside of what it was once the United States of America. Tribal Lands is quite a good place to live, the territory didn't go back in time like other places, there is more freedom for people to be as they like, as for gays that are recognized members of society, but more freedom means also more crime. But from living with a bit more crime and not living at all, since in the Confederacy of South they kill homosexuals, Chuck thinks he is pretty lucky. And with his job as a trucker and his chance to travel the country, he sometimes picks up stray here and there, mostly kids who were kicking out of their home.
Seven is one of those kid. He is not so young, he is 20 years old, but he went through a very bad experience; in Heartland where he lived, an uber religious place, they still believe that they can heal the gayness from their kids, and Seven was sent in an hospital to have his "therapy". Now he is scared and skittish and he has a tattoo on his hand that prevents him to find a honest job and start a new life. And so he is thinking to leave and like a knight in shining armor arrives Chuck on his truck.
Chuck and Seven go along well since the first moment; it's obvious that circumstances make Seven falls in love with Chuck: he is his savior and he is also the first openly gay man he has met; with Chuck Seven finds again the family he lost, and there is no way that he will let him go. I don't know if meeting Chuck in a different situation would have the same result, but probably yes, since Chuck is really a good man and also very handsome (I always have a fondness for long black hair Native American style).
The book is almost divided in two parts: the first one is a road story, with Chuck and Seven who are too busy to run away from hostile territories to indulge in more than kisses and something more, but it's also the time when their relationship cemented in something more than friendship. The second one is spent with Chuck and Seven trying to find a way to make things work between them, and doesn't matter if this is a futuristic tale, the problem they face are exactly the same of an ordinary couple with more the issue from being from different cultures.
There is sex, but not so much as you would expected from an Ellora's Cave romance; the sex is something nice that happen between Chuck and Seven but it's not something absolutely necessary in their relationship, and so when they can't have it, it's not the big problem that would be in so many other books that base their existence mainly on it.
The futuristic part of the book is not so heavy and if not for the prologue (that leads you think that the futuristic setting would be more important) and the way in which gays can live in Tribal Lands (probably an hope for the future), the story would have had not a problem to be a contemporary: there are no special effects, on the contrary, this futuristic world is almost gone back to the past instead of proceeding toward the future.
http://www.ellorascave.com/productpage.asp?ISBN=9781419919473
Amazon Kindle: Glad Hands
Reading List:
http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bott
The setting is the same of a previous book by Angelia Sparrow, Nikolai, there is even a reference to a character in that book, but the feeling of this book is completely different; Nikolai was dark and gothic, I remember that I said it was not a romance. Instead Glad Hands is a classical love story with the nice add that one of the characters is a trucker, a profession that Angelia Sparrow knows well and so she describes it in a very accurate way. There is neither too much angst, an element that usually abounds when one or both characters are young.