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Best Bisexual Novel: Down in Cuba by Vincent Meis
VIncent Meis is not known to write linear stories, actually at the third experience with one of his stories, my feeling is that if there is a common trend is that he tends to have quite a complex storyline paired with complex and full-dimension characters. As the story isn't simple, so are the characters, who tend to avoid being tagged as gay or straight or bisexual, they are all and nothing, living in the limbo of sexuality.The description of the Cuban culture and setting is vivid and alive as I imagine to be the real deal: I was never in Cuba, but I have the feeling it's a mix of color, hot and shadows, a feeling that was confirmed reading this novel. The passion of the author for the setting, and I suppose the country, is clear in every page and character, so much that, even if I don't approve some of their behaviour, I nevertheless had the impression it was a more than possible development. And even if I didn't like some of their actions, they were in any case taken out of passion, love or maybe just desire, in a case or the other, something real and deep.
It wasn't an easy read, something that, again, I experimented with this author. I don't exclude that is due to my not being a native English speaker, but that doesn't mean I cannot appreciate the story, and above all, its protagonists.
Paperback: 342 pages
Publisher: Fallen Bros. Press (May 4, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0615812201
ISBN-13: 978-0615812205
Amazon: Down in Cuba
Amazon Kindle: Down in Cuba
More Reviews by Author at my website: http://www.elisarolle.com/, My Reviews
I have to be truth, I picked up this book as soon as it was out cause I wanted to read a good mpreg story, and that is not easy to find. While the good part was there, there isn’t much of the mpreg, I think that, being this a series, most of it will be in following book.
A sweet, almost old fashioned romance, this novel follow spaceship captain Jason falling in love for Ferran, a young alien. Ferran comes from a matriarchal society, and since he is sterile, he was destined from birth to be, more or less, a male housekeeper. He has a docile streak, breed in him since he was born, and as usual among his people, he is very sensual, they see sex like an ordinary expression of deep feelings. Jason in comparison is more reserved, maybe even a bit aloof, very much in line with his Eastern world roots, but it is impossible for him to resist Ferran, even if they know their love is doomed by the impeding due of Ferran: go back home and marry a woman chosen by his mother.
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I went back to read The Good Fight after I read the sequel, The Fight Within, so I already knew what it was supposed to be of Jerry and John. That gave me the chance to concentrate on them as a budding couple, how they met, how they fell in love..jpg)
The story is a frighteningly possible apocalypse now future; or at least it was considering the devastation the AIDS plague brought to this world. In a future society, people tested positive to the homogene, mind you that doesn’t mean they are homosexual, but that they have a specific gene believing to determine homosexuality; consequence is that even men who are not homosexual, but married (and in love with their wives) and fathers are confined in isolated camps. For the last 7 years they are captives of machines, since prison officers are now substituted by robots and only one or two men, tested negative to the homogene, can control an entire prison.
I was almost used to an Andrew Grey’s novel, setting in a pretty small town or in an old fashioned ranch, that this new series caught me by surprise. The Fight Within is almost entirely developed in a Native American reservation, and this alone gained major points from me since I have always been interested in those reservations and the today life. You have a lot of historic essays and even some novels, but current life is often overlooked in favor of old notions.
A strange, and oddly, funny book about a young Tarot reader and his discovery of true love. While reading this book, a sometime even complex book, mostly played inside the mind of Brent, I had this idea of the author, a retired archbishop who writes explicit gay romance novels, in a committed relationship since the 1990s: I was imagining a good-tempered, kind man, in body and mind, and then I turned the last page and saw the picture of a long-haired blond Viking, better suited for a novel about pillaging than a new-age story like this one. But even if it sounds strange, that gave me a new perspective on the novel, making it a little more biography than pure fiction.
A quite “classical” paranormal romance, even if this is book 7 in a series, I decided to read this one since I was fascinated by the character of Dagus, an African-American blind man who is the mate of Brad, a polar bear shifter.
My first question upon opening this book was: is it a gay novel? Eddie, the gay character who with all rights make this a work of gay fiction, is already dead. All the words we heard by him are through the journal his brother Dave is reading to help him understand why his more than beloved brother is dead. Eddie’s is dead but is voice is strong through all the novel.
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Easily Addicted (Working Man) by J.M. Snyder
Lunch Break by J.M. Snyder
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On the Job by J.M. Snyder
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Pleasure Cruise (Working Man) by J.M. Snyder
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I have to admit that cop novels are not usually my cup of tea, even if I can sympathize with the imaginary seeing a cop like a perfect lover. But this cop in particular, Cristian Flesh, or simply Flesh, is at the opposite of your common idea of a police detective: unapologetically gay, and that is the point I liked the most, he is also pretty open on what he likes and doesn’t like; he likes sex and more is good, and so, probably for the first time in a novel, I found a detective that slept at least once with co-workers, victims, suspects, defensive lawyers… in a way the reader could guess who was involved in the plot by the fact that Flesh has slept with him. 
Maintaining the light BDSM tone of all the series, and maybe exaggerating a bit in having gay cops all in the same family and working for the same department (but that is also the nice side of this novellas series, you start to have a lot of familiar faces around), Kim Dare adds a little bit of introspective plot with the story of Ed Rawlings, who is so good in doing his undercover job that he is losing his same self in that. 
Hands up: this story by Kiernan Kelly was born by a specific request I did in a chat almost two years ago. Sheikhs romances are my kink, dating back when I was still reading Harlequin Presents, and I so wanted to read a story with a young and handsome sheikh in it; the obvious counterpart in this type of romance is the innocent virgin, but giving the modern time, where you can find a completely innocent boy to fit the dress? Of course in an Amish community! And so here was the very high level plot bunny, a romance between an Amish boy and a sheikh. That night, during the chat, I think we agreed the only obvious place where these two completely different men could meet was in front of the United Nations in New York City, and so from there Kiernan Kelly developed Cornfed. 
Dharma in Eight Lessons is another little jewel by Sarah Black; you don’t expect much from these short stories, if not a brief break between other more important things, and so I’m always surprised when I realized that I have probably just finished to read something very important, something that is probably too big for the small space that is a short story. 
Faceoff (Playing The Field 1) by J.M. Snyder
Tee'd Off (Playing The Field 2) by J.M. Snyder
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Another hint that basically this is an erotic romp, and not a sweet romance (if sex in the shower, on the couch, on the kitchen table is not enough...), is that Sean's attraction for Cordero is very much physical; Sean doesn't even know what Cordero is studying, what he likes, what he wants, he at first doesn't even know if Cordero is gay, but despite all of this, Sean knows that he wants the man; Sean likes African American men, he even tries to melt with the slang, that is not his own, to have better chances at success. So Sean is more attracted to what Cordero represents than to who really Cordero is. But as I said before, for a sexy romp without expectation to be more, this is more than enough and leads to very naughty and enjoyable sex scenes.
Sometime reading this book I had the thought swirling in my mind, wow, isn’t it a bit too much? Too much instant-love, too much sudden passion, too much feelings, too much romance… and then I realized I was slightly complaining of what I usually complain is overlooked in the romance genre. Maybe my odd reaction was due to the fact that the two main characters are both hot and hunky men, and then I realized that I was a snob: why hot and hunky men can’t be overly romantic? After all, that was the same first reaction I had to a G.A. Hauser’s book, and we well know how she became an icon of the M/M genre, and so my advice is, if you like her genre, probably you will like also this novel. 
The first book I read by this author was a paranormal fantasy about some mythological scottish creature. Even if I was surprise by the quality of the book in comparison to the publisher (now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that publisher is not good, I’m saying that usually they point to a more fast-written/fast-read target), I was not so surprise by the detailed setting and characterization, after all the author was English, and so, in a way, she had maybe a vantage point in accessing such knowledge to make the story believable, even if it was a paranormal setting. 
It’s easy to like, and love, an hot macho man but caring Marine, not so easy to love him when he shows you his human (not so macho) side, and that he, as a man, make mistakes. 
When David’s life seems to crash down he has only one place where he wants to go, Stanley, inside the Sawtooth Wilderness. In that place, when he was only a child, David was happy, and he felt at home, and he felt loved. Quanah Parker Running Bear was the one who loved him, the Native American boy next door, who fed David’s mind up with stories and stories, the same stories now in the first poetry book he wrote. 
In the recent polemic of who is writing for whom, most of Stormy Glenn’s books are probably aimed more to a female target (and I think that you all know that for me this is not a negative point).