reviews_and_ramblings | It Takes a Man by G.A. Hauser

I’m a long-time fan of G.A. Hauser, and To Have and to Hostage is still my favorite, but I have to tell that this is probably the best novel I have read by her on a wide target basis; I love G.A. Hauser faulted hero, but sincerely it’s a forbidden pleasure: her men are always too much, too much hot, too much horny, too much gay… and their life are sometime more a soap-opera than your next door guy. But that is the reason why I like them, they are unrepentantly handsome, like some villain you cannot not love since they are so fascinating.

Gino and Colby are hot and very much gay, no doubt on that, but sincerely they felt more real than any other previous hero by G.A. Hauser; Colby is a former army officer who was discharged (at least honorably) for the “Don’t ask don’t tell” policy. He is not bitter as people could expect, he is basically sad: he has always wanted to be a soldier and not that this is forbidden to him, he doesn’t know what to do with himself and his life. He has for sure issues to discuss his problem with other people, it’s enough that he sometime discusses it with his army psychiatric.

When the story starts, Colby is in a 5 months long relationship with Gino, but they are almost fallen into it, there is not a conscious decision from both of them to start it. That is the second nice and original point: it’s not Colby, with his tough aurea and military past that has issues in externalizing his feelings, it’s Gino, that, even if he doesn’t want to admit it, has prejudices.

Gino is an Afro-American youth counselor; he thinks a lot of himself and he wants to be a “liberal”. He comes from a pretty conservative family, dad former army officer and lawyer, brother a cop, I think he wanted to distinct himself from them without actually breaking the bridges. Gino’s family is indead really good, accepting of him and his “rebellion”. That is, I think Gino is playing the role of the rebel, and a boyfriend like Colby is ruining his image. But at least Gino is not mean, and even if he doesn’t accept easily their relationship, he is trying, and night after night he comes back to Colby, who welcomes him open arms.

Until the day they are both faced with their fear: Robbie (and Dave from Naked Dragon) does a cameo appearance and with his psychic ability creates a bit of turmoil in Gino and Colby’s relationship; they need to really accept each other, not only as sex partners, to be able to build a real relationship together.

I really liked both characters, Colby for his sincerety and openess, something that clashed with his rough exterior, and Gino with his hippie freak exterior, that really felt as a way to disguise the real him.

The ebook I have, the first release, has a free novella by Ryan St. James, Pole Riding, about a cop who falls in love with a lap-dancer. The story is both sexy than tender, Chad, the cop, falls in love at first sight with Kevin, the lap-dancer while he is on the job; he has to expose possible prostitution in the club where Kevin is working, and Kevin is one of the guys who is suspected. But he is also a foster dad of a very scared 17 years old boy, and even if a lap-dancer, he is also an old fashioned man, who will have sex only for love not for money. Of course the happily ever after is a certainty.

Amazon: It Takes a Man

Amazon Kindle: It Takes a Man

Series:
1) Naked Dragon: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/154905.html
2) It Takes a Man

Reading List:

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