Missing the Ocean (Moment of Truth 3) by A.J. Wilde
With the third chapter in the Moment of Truth series, the author almost made me think that I didn't understand anything of the story... the second book ended with Gary who confessed a betrayal to Dan, he said that there were someone else. Dan stomped out of their home to drawn his sorrow in the alcohol, but he receives the advice to not let it go. Meanwhile Gary was again thinking to suicide, but this time he is stronger and he is able to weight the good and bad side of life. When Dan comes back to him, Gary is also able to let Dan understand that it's not only his fault if their relationship is having trouble, and that Dan has to take upon himself his responsibility.Now if you haven't read the story and don't like to be spoiled, stop to read NOW.
If not, please continue... at the beginning of the relationship Gary was straight; he was a former abused child, and he denied his homosexuality. In fact he acted as and more than a normal straight man, he had girlfriends and he was quite popular. Then he met Dan and thanks to his love for him, he was able to consider a gay relationship. As often in a "gay for you" themed book, Gary has no interest for other men, he is in love with Dan, and only due to that love, he can have also a sexual relationship with a man. But basically Gary never stopped to like women. And Dan had this fantasy to see him with a woman... it was like putting the straw near the fire! Now Gary has feeling for a woman, and Dan has to decide if he loves enough Gary to share him with another person, a woman... or maybe he has to decide if he loves Gary so much that he can't even consider to share him. According to you, what Gary wants? For someone who doubts to be a good partner choice for anyone, he would prefer that Dan accepts to share him, or he, instead, would like to hear from Dan that he can't share his love? Dan is facing a test, and the more romantic readers just know the answer to the previous question.
http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1877
Series: Moment of Truth
1) To Serve and Protect: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/56010
2) Choosing the Light: http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/675731.html
3) Missing the Ocean
Reading List:
http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bott
When I started this book I wasn't expecting to find romance in it, since it was presented as an old classic sleuthing novel, and so you can imagine my surprise when the hero, Elliott, not only has a romance, he has THREE romance, two of them at the same time, and he is not even a slut ;-)
At first Freeman comes out like one of those characters from an old noir movie, a man tired of life with nothing or noone of important in his life, who tries to drown his sorrow in a glass of spirit. And so at first Freeman comes out also older and disenchanted; when he meets Kit, it's like an old lion with a young kitty, Freeman is all low growls that never turn in real danger, and Kit is like a burst of energy, like a bouncing ball that Freeman has no more the energy to follow. And so at first I didn't like Freeman, since Kit was obviously in danger and Freeman seemed to care but really he didn't do nothing to real help him: Kit entered and exited Freeman's house, and when he was there he was safe, but when he went out, we knew that he was in danger. We even witnessed to a very sad scene, through Freeman's eyes, and we had to turn the shoulders to that scene since Freeman turned them. It was not exactly what I would like to see from an "hero", but Freeman is not an usual hero.
Love relationship between cops, more when they are partners, are always more intense, probably since to the bond of love it's added also the bond of being colleague and responsible for the well-being of your partner. The "gay for you" turn of one or both of them is usually also justified by that bond, since no one more than you partner can comprehend you and so the step between friendship and love is short. But usually the two men are strong characters, men who take everything inside, that never let it go, if not maybe at night, in front of a beer and in the relative safeness of their partner's company. Oh yes, maybe they have some hidden secrets in the past that are eating them alive, but to the outside world they are strong and invincible.
All right, this book is quite a challenge for various reasons, and so you are warned, don't continue to read if you don't like spoilers, since I probably am not able to explain all this book left to me without using a bit of them.
Joe is flying from Los Angeles to Chicago to help a friend he hasn't seen in 20 years and talked to more or less the same time. Back in their native small town, Joe and Israel got along at first as best friends and then as lovers. But it was always their secret, the small towm was too small to allow them something different, and then Israel was born on the wrong side of the street, he was a love-child of mixed origins, probably with African American blood, but his mother never told. Anyway with the courage that always have kids, Joe and Israel dared their parents and friends and tightened a bond that seemed impossible to break... and instead it was too simple to. Joe went to College, Israel didn't have the means, and after a year Joe stopped to write and then... life happens. This is probably the part I don't like very much, for sure it's not a good image what we have of Joe, a man who practically dumped his lover without a real reason if not that he grew old of his feelings. Or maybe Joe is in denial, even if he is living out of the closet in L.A., he is actually doing so far from his hometown, and far from who really knows him; in this way, he is still in the closet, since he shut out an important part of his life; he conveniently forgot of Israel's existence till the day he read about him on the news.
Usually I don't like to give up a story, but in this case I'm allowed... First time I heard of latino man Antonio and his blind lover Gabriel was perhaps two years ago. I read a short story by Laura Baumbach, South of Border, no more than a scene in an hot tube, but really hot (as most of Laura Baumbach's books). I don't know, probably it's a fetish, but I always am fascinated by love stories involving a blind partner... there must be a lot of trust on one side to allow someone near you when you are blind, but if you find the right partner, I believe the resulting feeling are much more intense. And so I was waiting for the longer novel the author was writing with the same pair.
Gym Dandy is a story that has many surprises, mostly good surprise. Victor is a personal trainer in a not so good gym; an old and decaying building, not so nice work colleague, it's not wonder that Victor seems not to like too much his work. I realized after finishing the book, that I haven't a clear physical perception of Victor, other than he should be fit, due to his work, but not so handsome: a man who arrives where he wants thanks more to his attitude than to his look. And even if Victor has an ex-wife, he is quite openly gay, even if it's not the first thing he says as presentation. And so when he meets for the first time Doug, new customer at the gym who paid for personal lessons, and Doug gives him some mixed signals, Victor is ready to jump in for an enjoyable adventure, since even if not so fit, Doug is really handsome and cute. But even if he is not disgusted by the kiss Victor gives him, Doug is firm in his claim that he is straight, and that he wants only friendship from Victor.
The story is set in London in the '80 of the last century. I wondered on the reason for choosing that period, and apart the fact that it was a period in which police stories were pretty famous (at least in television fiction...), it's also before the AIDS plague, when the danger on being gay arrives only from society and not also from the love act itself.
This one was a certain to-buy-book: first it's a may/december relationship and I love it, second it's a Loose Id LGBT book and with rare exception I buy all of them (but this doesn't mean that I read all of them...), third it has a young character, probably virgin, and I'm very naughty about it... Plus, and I'm sincere about that, after deciding that I would buy it, I discovered that it was the first book of one of my LJ friends (I recognized the cover) and so one more reason, since I followed all the gestation (how I missed that it would be out with Loose Id, I don't know, but my brain sometime lose a chip here and there).