Dark Horse by Kate Sherwood

[reviews_and_ramblings]

This is an highly emotional novel and I’m still a bit unsure on my feelings after reading it. BTW it’s also a very long novel, more than 350 pages, so it’s hardly something you can read en passant and forgot soon after.

The novel is divided into two parts. Even if at the beginning it seemed that the story was moving on a pretty physical approach, it was soon quite clear that indeed sex was not the main element of this story, so much that you need to read more than half of it to find some. Dan is an horse eventer trainer and he is working for the family of his lover, Justin; the situation was idylliac until the day Justin was in an accident one year before and now he is in irreversible coma. Despite the desperate situation, Dan has not given up on him and their love, and one year later he is still hoping in a miracle.

Maybe due to Dan’s attachment to who is now only the memory of the man he loved, when Evan and Jeff enter the scene the contrast is pretty harsh: multimillionaire 26 years old pretty boy Evan and struggling artist playing daddy to pretty boy Jeff have what you can define an open relationship; both of them travel a lot, and when they are far from each other eyes don’t see, heart doesn’t suffer. But when they are together they seem the perfect couple, the difference in age and wealth (all in favor of Evan) is balanced by the clear need of Evan to have a fatherly figure to whom he can rely on.

At first Evan, but then also Jeff are attracted by Dan, and Dan sincerely doesn’t like to be in the middle: despite Evan being younger and richer, Dan actually seems to prefer Jeff, and even if he says he doesn’t want to ruin Evan and Jeff’s relationship, I think that deep down himself he is hoping for Jeff to realize that his relationship with Evan is not long-term and that Dan is a better match for him.

Sincerely I’m not sure who is right or who is wrong in this story, or if there is a right or wrong side at all. From Evan and Jeff’s perspective, they have a perfect relationship, but indeed as soon as it’s tested, it starts to crack: Evan is fine with Jeff having an affair only when he doesn’t know it; Jeff, even if with words is saying the contrary, I think he feels overwhelmed by Evan’s wealth, and as Dan noticed, he grew used to it, and in a way he is disappeared into Evan’s world; last, but not least, even if I mostly like Dan’s behavior, when he pratically asks to Jeff to choose between him and Evan, he is not exactly behaving like the good guy of the story.

It’s quite a complex story, and even in the end, it was not completely clear if these three men will ever find a way to be together.

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Comments

[starsinshapes.livejournal.com]

Thank you :)