Chase in Shadow by Amy Lane

[reviews_and_ramblings]

Chase in Shadow was almost an essay on the pornographic pay per view field. Now I’m not saying I didn’t know anything about that field, but Amy Lane didn’t shy away from even the more specific details, giving a realistic glimpse in a world that often people think as perfect. But now don’t get me wrong, she didn’t even make it gritty and dirty, Chase and all his “johnnies” friends are also family, and John, the owner, sometime is also like a father, worrying yes for a good business, but also considering his boys like real people, with their troubles and their need.

Chase is in full denial, he knows he is gay but even if his best friend since high school Donnie had the courage to come out, Chase is in a more complicated situation. Chase is trying to be the perfect son, and in the picture is contemplated a wife and a son or two. Mercy, Chase’s best friend in college is the right candidate to complete that picture and she is really a nice woman, supportive and warm. Mercy is a very nice female character and she will prove it throughout the novel, nothing that will happen can be frame to her, and even when she would have been the right to be upset she is always able to react in a positive way.

When Chase has some minor money issue, and a friend suggests, almost as a joke, that he can audition for Johnnies, a gay porn pay per view website, Chase launches himself into it like a fish out of water who sees a lake. Here he meets Tommy, a guy who has his own troubles, but at least he is fine with his homosexuality, fine enough not only to admit he is attracted by Chase, but also to accept being his “little” secret on the side. For one year Chase not only hides to his girlfriend that he is working as a porn start but that he is also cheating on her with a man. As strange as it sound, maybe right since Mercy is a good girl and in a way I think that, if Chase was sincere from the beginning, she would have understood him, it didn’t feel really like a cheating, and, even stranger, I didn’t take any side, not Mercy, not Tommy and not Chase. Tommy and Chase are the item and I was only waiting for Chase to find the courage to put his life in the right track.

It’s a dramatic event the one that will force Chase to face the truth, but it was probably necessary. Again, the author didn’t shy away from the reality of that, and Chase’s breakdown rang true and the climbing up from hell slow and painful. But the prize was a right incentive, and again, I was sure Chase had all the cards to win this bet.

Chase in Shadow is a sexy, sometime even cute, read, but it’s not light or shallow. I think this was a good intake of the gay porn industry and of what could be the life of those pretty boys you see smiling on the promo pictures.

http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=2781

Amazon: Chase in Shadow
Amazon Kindle: Chase in Shadow
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press (February 24, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1613724217
ISBN-13: 978-1613724217

Reading List: http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle