reviews_and_ramblings | Holed Up by Hank Edwards

I was expecting for this novella to be pretty explicit, Hank Edwards is once again one of those authors like Ryan Field and Gavin Atlas from whom female romance readers like me dug out stories when we started to look around for more, we were eager, we wanted more than the market gave us, and we pounced upon those poor male authors asking for romance... but they are erotic authors, and erotic authors mostly for men, what did they know about romance? Now, now, don't get your boxers in a bunch, men can write romance, and also a good romance, but these authors have first in mind the erotic part of the story, and then, maybe the romance. And if you read this novella by Hank Edwards you will understand what I mean, the two characters first connect on a physical level, and also in a quite primordial way, and then realize that perhaps there is something more than sex.

Aaron Pierce, FBI special agent, is not at all happy to be assigned as babysitter for a important Homeland Security witness. Maybe to loosen up the tension before the mission, he decides to prowl the night clubs and takes home a young nice man for a bit of no strings attached sex. The young man is willing but a bit skittish... a good romance hero will woo him and maybe let him go... Agent Pierce (who BTW lied about his name), almost forces the man to bed. All right, the young man enjoys every minute, and he is also pretty easy and cool afterward, but still, I felt a bit of uneasiness. My gentle romance reader mind probably would have been appeased by a somewhat more tactful behavior of Pierce, and instead he is all for the attitude, big bam, good, all right, thank you. And poor young man is soon forgotten. At this point the romance reader thinks, well, why you presented him to me, if he is not the true love of Pierce? Ding dong romance reader, this is NOT a romance, this is sex, this is hot monkey sex behind the sheets, this is an alternative to Pierce to do an assolo under the shower... cute young man is NOT Pierce's true love.

Innocent romance reader is not so much convinced by the theory, but she continues to read. Pierce now meets Mark, the man he has to protect, and the trouble start from moment one. They have to run away, and they cannot trust no one, not even Pierce's FBI colleagues. Big bad special agent Pierce is in trouble, and cute and pretty witness Mark helps him: they can hide in Mark's ex-lover apartment, it's empty and his ex-lover is out of town. Mmm, don't know if in a real dangerous situation this could have been a good solution, but it gives to Pierce and Mark the chance to be in close proximity for a long period of time, and since it happens that also Mark is gay... but two factor prevent them to jump in bed as soon as they are alone (three if you count also the danger outside...): special agent Pierce has some reserves to be involved with a man he is supposed to protect, and Mark doesn't think that an handsome, strong man like Pierce is interested in him (yes, Mark sees Pierce in a different way than the romance reader... oh right, also Mark is a man!).

And so Pierce and Mark actually spend some time together talking and arguing, rather than having sex... and Pierce realizes for the first time that, maybe, he is interested in something more than sex! See?!? Romance reader is happy, it's a proof more than a bit of romance helps in life... Oh well, it's also true that the only thing that apparently Mark sees in Pierce is his handsome and big body (and big something else...), and it's not that they talk so much, but at least they end in bed AFTER sharing pieces of their life and not before.

Anyway, the sex is hot, very graphic and acrobatic, a lot of fluid exchange with hidden symbols ("I wanted to have something of you inside me when I left to get our food" there is something of primordial here...). So yes, Holed Up (even the title is all a plan...) is not for sure your pink glasses perspective romance, but I have to say that I liked it. It was a novella, so not so long, and its main purpose was to be sexy, but it has also a story, and Pierce has the chance to evolve, even that first anonymous sex encounter he had at the beginning, in the end served to its scope, it gives to Pierce a parameter to compare his new story with Mark, and it gives to the romance reader the chance to see the real Pierce, and to appreciate more how he will change.

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Amazon Kindle: Holed Up

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