Review: Sharing Secrets by Matthew J. Metzger

Adam has a secret. But maybe Charlie has a few of his own.

Adam’s got a secret and nobody knows.

He’s promised himself never to get into relationships and risk revealing it, but Charlie Fielding has a way of getting under one’s skin. One party, one kiss and Adam is faced with a horrible choice—tell Charlie the truth or keep quiet. And either way, lose the only friends he’s had in years.

But Charlie might have a secret, too—and everybody knows but Adam.

"Nobody knows."

Matthew J. Metzger is a MUST read author for me, he is absolutely amazing,  yet he's one that I don't hear enough about and that's a real shame.

This book, like many of Metzger's, is YA - but it's real. The characters aren't some polished Hollywood version of teens, they are teens I can relate to and understand (despite my teen years being a loooong time ago!) Real proper characters. Adam and Charlie are just two unique characters that sold me their story in the first couple of pages. 

Many of Metzger's novels feature transgender characters, and this one is no different; the ups and downs and secrets and hurt aren't how you think they're going to be though. It's not straightforward, and it's not easy, but it's also compelling to read. To understand. To think about things in a different way than before.

I really don't want to spoil the storyline, so I'm being very vague. okay, so the storyline is absolutely compelling reading. I personally think this is the type of book that should be in school libraries, it covers diversity and illness/disability in the way it should; with a normalcy sadly lacking in many books. Adam, Charlie, Phoebe and Ollie are still teens doing teen things with teen worries. Give 'em a few years and they'd be adults doing adult things with adult worries... they just have another aspect to them. Adam and Charlie's are mayhaps a bit larger to deal with. 

I love how Metzger writes this but I'm struggling to put it into words without sounding ridiculous. Everyone is different. Everyone has things to deal with. Some are harder to cope with than others, but the people (characters) are still people and Metzger nails that. There are no caricatures in his literature.

The small town setting - the families, school, secondary characters - they all worked together to support the MC's and their story. It is a fantastic piece of work.

I absolutely think everyone should read this author. If YA isn't your thing then pick up another of his novels, but whatever you do check him out. He's very talented and this book was - IS - amazing.

A copy of this book was given in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Volatile (Treacherous Chemistry #1) by Avylinn Winter

Like a depressed moth drawn to a wild flame, Chris hoped that flame would brighten his life, not burn him alive.

Chris Sinclair fades into a gray world after losing his mother to cancer. When forced to attend a concert as a last attempt to coax him out of his shell, he discovers that life might not be as bleak as he first thought.

Dante Heron holds the audience between the tips of his fingers and the delicate bow, playing the violin as if every heart is his to command. However, something darker brews behind the façade, and Chris is determined to solve the enigma.

When Chris is offered the job of traveling around Europe with the famous violinist, he surprises himself by accepting. With no idea what awaits him, he's thrown into a world where emotions rule and rules are bent.

They're a perfectly dysfunctional match, but then there's always calm at the heart of the storm.

I love characters that are dysfunctional and hurting or flawed in some way. I love healing stories (not ones about the magic power of a healing penis though, they get on my wick). As I read the blurb I was super excited because this book sounded exactly like my cup of tea. And you know how seriously us Brits take our tea...

I was, unfortunately, disappointed by this book though. However much I wanted it to, it didn't work for me. 

I think my main problem is that the author did too much telling for my liking. I didn't feel what the characters felt, not from their perspective, I was just told it. The telling was good, the author isn't a bad writer but there was just too much of it. Telling is needed but too much keeps from an emotional attachment and a book like this needs emotional attachment. The style of the writing meant I didn't get to know or grow attached to the characters. Without that I had no anchor to the story. I wanted to like them, I really did - Dante especially had so much potential for me, but at the end of the day I just didn't care enough. 

So, for me, this book didn't work, which is sad but that's how reading is. Definitely check out other reviews to get a wider spectrum of opinions.

A copy of this book was given in exchange for an honest review.
For more information see Goodreads.

Review: Spark to the Heart (Hearts of Parkerburg #4) by Havan Fellows and Lee Brazil

As a misguided youth, Rosy loved being that kid in Parkerburg—you know the one that everybody swears will end up in jail or comatose—until one summer day on the back roads of town when two lives came to a screeching halt.

Thirteen years later, Rosy owns the local pub on Maple Street and makes a good show of how he's recovered from tragedy. He even convinces himself…until he meets the new man in town and realizes just how okay he isn't. With the demons of his fatal past still stalking him, Rosy has no idea how to switch from simply existing to actually living.

Angus “Jet” Manheim—famous for his smooth, sexy voice and notorious for his hard partying ways—sped through most of his adult life on stage and in the recording studio. Sober and retired to the quaint New England town of Parkerburg, Jet’s ready to slow his soundtrack…until his compelling neighbor—a grumbling, muscular mountain of a man with an odd name—ups the tempo.

Frequently absentminded, Jet finds Rosy an easy object of focus, a solid center around which Jet hopes to build a future. But retirement isn’t easy. The entertainment industry doesn’t stop knocking just because you hang a do not disturb sign.

When Rosy’s and Jet’s pasts try to harmonize with their present, they might have to decide whether the chorus is worth repeating.

I enjoy coming back to visit Parkerburg whenever a new book is released in this small town series. I was looking forward to Rosy’s story because I’m a sucker for a grumpy bear with a heart of gold and I was all set for the opposites-attract thing I knew was coming in Spark to the Heart.

The story started out great, I loved where things were going with Rosy and Jet. It was sweet as the two danced around the flirtation, did a little dating and gave into their hornier base instincts. I knew there would be some angst coming, so the set up for some hurt/comfort was working for me. And it was working for me up until Rosy went from being “new boyfriend” Rosy, to “really bitter and angry” Rosy. And I understood it, I did, to a point, but his anger and reactions made me uncomfortable and turned me off to him pretty hard.

Rosy's a fixture in Parkerburg, he gives people second chances, I’m told repeatedly what a good guy he is and I totally believed it in the beginning, but when the guilt and anger come along I just couldn’t with him. He treated Jet like crap, he got violent with people who didn’t deserve it more than once and while I get he’s hurting, as a guy in position of some authority over employees and who holds respect with the townsfolk, putting your hands on someone or shoving innocent bystanders (even accidentally) while you’re in a huff is a no-go for me. When he did go to speak with Jet, from Jet’s (and my) perspective it turned into just an outlet for angry boning and I wanted more for Jet. Jet wanted more for Jet and props to him for putting the brakes on Rosy’s nonsense.

I think my problem was that it was too early in the relationship for this much trouble. I didn’t have a firm foundation in my head for these two yet. If I were Jet’s pal I would have told him to tell Rosy to hit the bricks and not waste his time and I shouldn’t be thinking that, I want to root for my MC’s even if I do want to throttle them now and again.

But Jet though, Jet was awesome. I love his hippy-dippy attitude that is surprisingly centered considering the life he’s led. I wanted to hang with him and Brian in Jet’s shop. I wanted him to be happy and be taken care of and it frustrated me that I couldn’t get behind Rosy more with an HEA for him and Jet for a while.

It’s Parkerburg though, and HEA’s are a given thankfully, so Rosy did manage to pull his head out of his ass eventually and realize he was in true danger of losing his happy if he didn’t make things right with Jet. I was happy for them, I was mostly happy for Jet though, because it was what he wanted. I wanted more groveling though. I needed more balance between dumbass-Rosy and good-boyfriend-Rosy.

I’ll be ready for more Parkerburg when it comes and what I really hope to read is some epilogue-y like love for Rosy and Jet. I really like Jet’s character and I want to spend more time with him. I want to like Rosy and see him evolve into the guy he’s supposed to be. I want to read some Parkerburg love for the next couple with more balance between the issues and the HEA.

**a copy of this story was provided for an honest review**

Categories: MM romance, contemporary, series

44,000 words

Publisher: Appleton Publishing Avenue

Cover Artist: Author Services

Exclusive excerpt:

Jet chuckled. “Yes, well… Sunday?”

“Oh, we’re still on for Sunday. I just stopped by for…” For what? What did Rosy expect to happen by impulsively dive-bombing his new neighbor? “A taste.” Oh! Good answer. He grabbed Jet and spun them behind the narrow width counter, using it as a pseudo-shield from the storefront windows. “Do you mind? Can I have a taste?”

Without waiting for an answer, Rosy pressed their lips together. The hell with it; if Jet didn’t want a tongue in his mouth, he could push Rosy the fuck away.

Didn’t happen. Jet wrapped his arms around Rosy’s neck and encouraged a deeper exploration.

But Rosy wanted more than this limited sampling of mouths. Breaking their kiss, he repeated his question, “Can I have a taste?”

“Yes…taste me.”

Sales Links

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06WGL6ZZ2

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/702729

iBooks: http://ow.ly/qwGn3098yIa

Kobo: http://ow.ly/RfPJ3098yJG

Authors

Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/crawlinbedwithlee/

Lee Brazil

Somewhere in a small town in up-state New York are a librarian and a second grade teacher to whom I owe my life. That might be a touch dramatic, but it’s nevertheless one hundred percent true.

Because they taught me the joy of reading, of escaping into worlds crafted of words.

Have you ever been nine years old and sure of nothing so much as that you don’t belong? Looked at the world from behind glasses, and wondered why you don’t fit?

Someone hands you a book, and then you turn the page and see… There you are, running from Injun Joe in a dark graveyard; there you are fencing with Athos; there you are…beneath the deep blue sea- marveling at exotic creatures with Captain Nemo.

I found myself between the pages of books, and that is why I write now. It’s why I taught English and literature for so many years, and it’s why my house contains more pounds of books than furniture.

If I’d had my way, I’d have been a fencer…or a starship captain, or a lawyer, or a detective solving crimes. But instead, I am a writer, and I’ve come to realize that’s the best thing in the world to be, because as a writer, I can be all those things and more.

If I hadn’t learned to value the stories between the pages, who knows what would have happened? Certainly not college…teaching…or writing.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lee.brazil

Blog: http://leebrazilauthor.blogspot.com

Goodreads: http://ow.ly/swgT3098yzs

Twitter: https://twitter.com/leebrazil

Havan Fellows

I annoy, love, respect, scare, seduce, hurt, anger, infatuate, frustrate, flatter, envy, amuse and tolerate everyone. I just do it better in writing thanks to a little thing called…edits.

Okay no, seriously…I'm a simpleminded person who enjoys the escape from real life through a book. I write with the group Story Orgy and hope to continue doing so for a long time. I also am privileged to be with the Pulp Friction writers, creating intermingling books in a world all our own.

Just like every other red-blooded human—I get a little bouncy when I get mail (any kind too…email, comments, private messages…you wanna do it, do it with me *winks*). So feel free to drop me a line—whether it's on my blog, twitter, PInterest, or you track me down on FaceBook or Google +…it's easy to catch someone who wants to be caught.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/havan.fellows

Blog: http://havanshawthaven.blogspot.com

Goodreads: http://ow.ly/4Dq13098yxF

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HavanFellows

Review: Scarred by Mia Kerick

From bestselling author Mia Kerick comes a New Adult novel of Gay Romantic Suspense that will keep you up reading all night!

Matthew North waited ten years to heal from the devastating wounds inflicted by the man who abducted and abused him as a child. Living reclusively on a tropical island—with no company but his four cats—he merely avoids the lingering pain.

Wearing twisted ropes of mutilated skin on his back, Matt struggles with a profound hindrance—the scars that deaden his soul. However, on the night he meets lively Vedie Wilson, a local restaurant busboy who expresses his gender by wearing lipgloss and eyeliner along with his three-day beard, things change.

Gradually, Vedie and Mateo unite in friendship. Through a series of awkward encounters, the pair learns each other’s secrets. Vedie learns that an angelic face can front for a scarred soul. Matthew learns that the line between one’s masculine and feminine sides is blurred. Can they embrace the painful stories behind each other’s scars if they’re to find everlasting love? Or will surrendered love come to be yet another blemish on their souls?

If you like a story with a cast of interesting characters, a bucket load of hurt and a couple of armfuls of angst then this is a book for you. Mia kerick has done a fabulous job with this story, taking two very different characters and showing that however hard the path they'd each travelled was, love can win the day.

Both of these characters were dealing with the pain of abuse. The sources of abuse were different and both were dealing with it in their own way - but there was a common understanding between the two that others couldn't get. Through the story we see Matthew and Vedie battling against the scars of both the past and the present to try and make something, anything, work.

I think Mia Kerick was very clever with her writing of this story. I think it would have been very easy to get caught up in the abduction Matthew suffered as a child and let this overshadow the rest of the book. Kerick was careful though, not to let that happen. We learnt about the abduction, we even had journal entries about it that Matthew had written after the fact, but it never became more than the story between Vedie and Matthew. Matthew's story was about the aftermath of the events from his childhood. How it affected him now. How it made him the reclusive cat lover we are introduced too. It was about his survival and how, with Vedie, he started to live again. 

Vedie seemed as opposite to Matthew as it was possible to get. Not just because of his gender-fluidity, but because, where Matthew portrayed as a colour would be a deep, calm blue, Vedie is a vibrant mass of eclectic shades that work together perfectly but can't fail to be noticed. He is so likeable. So strong and vulnerable. I would love to know him, to see the brightness in the world he sees, even though he has so much evidence of pain.

This story was everything I hoped it would be, and more. It focused on the two characters and how their own experiences guided the lives they lived. The lives they had lived and the way to move forward. There are many painful moments in the story, some in the past and some in the now. Of all the pain experienced, I have to say, for me, one of the most hurtful was Matthew's mother. I wonder if this is because I am a mother myself and I cannot, won't even try to, imagine the pain of my child taken from me. I felt enormous pain for her at the start.., but then, how she was with Matthew, with Matthew and Vedie made me so angry. I know if I'd been given a second chance with my child I wouldn't waste a second of it. 

A book that is well worth a read.

A copy of this book was given in exchange for an honest review.

For more information, see Goodreads.

Don't miss the Scarred blog tour + giveaway stop here!

Heart by Garrett Leigh Blast AND Giveaway!!!!

Cornish pastry chef Seb Wright dreads the summer tourist season. The cash injection to his artisan fudge pantry is more than welcome, the extra work, less so. Then one summer, a shadowy Good Samaritan catches his eye. Irish Traveller Dex is bewitching, a beautiful sullen enigma who turns Seb's world upside down until he disappears in the night, vanishing like a mystical summer rain.

Twelve months later Dex is in the midst of a dark storm. A slave to his master, 'Uncle' Braden, he spends his days cleaning caravans and his nights working in Braden's other businesses. His short summer with Seb seems a lifetime ago. Lost in the savage violence of the murky underworld, he doesn't dare dream he'll ever find his way back, until one night, a brutal crime opens the door for a chance escape. A new life beckons, old faces emerge, and immersed in the heady vibe of London’s East End, new love begins to heal his fractured heart.

Do y'all have ANY idea how excited I am for this story?? The first Garrett Leigh work I read was Gypsy Rain and I feel in love. Hard and fast, I fell in love. Many moons ago Garrett teased she was going to write about Seb and Dex again and it's HERE!!!!  Enjoy ALL the things here and thanks to Garrett for the wonderful stories, breaking our hearts repeatedly and making us fall in love with all her heroes.

Excerpt from Heart:

Seb took a drink of his beer and set it down again with undue care. “You can’t read, can you?”

“Can.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Dex slid off his stool and shoved his hands into his pockets. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected when Seb had ambushed him, but it wasn’t this. So what if he couldn’t bloody read? It wasn’t like he’d ever been to school to learn.

Seb caught his arm. “Don’t go, Dex. I’m sorry, okay? I won’t tell anyone. I promise.”

Seb’s hand engulfed Dex’s wrist, his touch as charged and heated as it had ever been. Dex felt his resolve melting, ebbing away until it was all he could do to fall back onto the bar stool. “I can read some,” he said mutinously. “I can read numbers, and names. Knew the name of your shop, didn’t I?”

“Can you write?” “Never tried.” Dex looked down. Lying to Seb felt all wrong. He’d heard the name of Seb’s shop on the street, and the only name he could read was his own.

Seb was silent for a moment, then without warning, Dex felt his fingers brush through his shower-damp hair. “It really is brown. I thought it was just wet.”

Dex fought for the strength to shy away from the soft gesture, but nothing happened. “The bleach grew out.”

“It was dyed?”

“Couldn’t you tell?” Dex had forgotten his brief stint as a blond was all Seb had ever known of him.

“No, not at all. You look totally different now. Not sure I would’ve recognized you without the scowl. You just about shocked the shit of me. I… I thought I’d never see you again.”

OH MY GAWD RIGHT?!?!?!

A little info on Garrett and where to get your copy of Heart:

Author Bio: Garrett Leigh is a British writer and book designer, currently working for Dreamspinner Press, Loose Id, Riptide Publishing, and Black Jazz Press. Her protagonists will always be tortured, crippled, broken, and deeply flawed. Throw in a tale of enduring true love, some stubbly facial hair, and a bunch of tattoos, and you’ve got yourself a Garrett special.

When not writing, Garrett can generally be found procrastinating on Twitter, cooking up a storm, or sitting on her behind doing as little as possible. That, and dreaming up new ways to torture her characters. Garrett believes in happy endings; she just likes to make her boys work for it.

Garrett also works as a freelance cover artist for various publishing houses and independent authors under the pseudonym G.D. Leigh. For cover art info, please visit blackjazzpress.com

Author Contact:

garrettleighbooks@gmail.com
https://www.facebook.com/garrettleighbooks
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Garrett-Leigh/484336074987986?ref=aymt_homepage_panel
https://twitter.com/Garrett_Leigh

Get your copy of Heart here! from Dreamspinner

or from Amazon Amazon, Amazon UK, Amazon CA

ON TO THE GIVEAWAY . . . . 
 ENTER HERE TO WIN A COPY OF HEART!!!

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Review: Complementary Colors by Adrienne Wilder

My sister Julia manipulated my life into a prison to keep me silent about our dirty family secret. Her greed made me a slave and circumstance left me with no way to escape.

Trapped, the only way I could silence the nightmares driving me to insanity was to wrap them in color, hold them with shadow, and stitch them to negative space with line.

But no matter how bright the pigments, no one could see my confession.

Except for Roy Callahan.

I thought he was just another nameless one-night stand in a long line of many.
But I was wrong. Roy could see past the façade of my life and through the veil color over the canvas. He could see what the world couldn’t.

And with him I’d find the courage to tell the truth about the boy.

The boy who kissed me.
The boy who loved me.
The boy whose name I couldn’t remember.

"What would life be like filled with simple moments like this? For time to be measured in heartbeats and exhales rather than seconds and minutes?"

This book. Oh my god, this book. I loved it. Hurt and angst and pain are books I read sparingly. Sometimes I can find books featuring disabilities or PTSD or mental health or abuse issues very manipulative. Manipulative in that parts of the story seem to there just for the sake of being there, to add trauma and not a natural part of the story - formulaic maybe. This book though was not at all like that, not one little bit. It was written with beauty, a beauty that shone through even the ugliest parts of the tale.

Paris is the MC and it is through his eyes that we see this story unfold. It's his emotions, actions and broken memories that we are witness to and I have to say I was so drawn into his story that when I fell asleep reading it at stupid o'clock, I found myself waking up an hour later and carrying on into the middle of the night. I felt every single bit of Paris - the parts he exposed and those he tried to hide.

Paris is an artist and I ADORED the way Adrienne Wilder used colours to explain his feelings, his emotions...or I should say, how Paris used the colours. His brain was so full of his half remembered childhood that there weren't always sufficient words to say how he felt...oft times he didn't know how he felt, it was all colour to him. The good times and the bad. Adrienne has a beautiful, descriptive way of writing - poetic really.

"Morning turned the kitchen into gold, and dust motes dance and twirled in the sunbeams. A door slammed somewhere, and a woman yelled. An infant cried for his mother. Then someone turned up their radio drowning out the sounds of urban poverty under a steady bass thump."

Along with the wonderfully broken MC, the author managed to create some vivid characters. Part of me felt almost shocked at how nasty and manipulative Julia was, not I think because she was female, but because she was his sister. Malignant from the inside out, she terrified me and I truly did not know how this story would end. Roy. The saviour really, I will always have a soft spot for Roy from now on. I Love characters that protect, characters whose love means more than their own life.

I think that really this story is a love story. It is the love between Roy and Paris but it is also Paris learning to love himself. It is not an easy book to read, you will be dragged down and up again and then back down. It will get you in its grasp and you won't be able to stop reading. You'll need to know just s little bit more, just a little bit more. I would totally recommend this book to everyone, though those who find abusive stories a trigger will want to avoid it. A fantastic book written with depth, feeling and understanding.

An arc of this book was given in exchange for an honest review.