Why I read it: Some of my Goodreads friends liked this one. It sounded more genre romance than my earlier foray into this author’s work, so I asked for a review copy from the publisher so I could try it too.
What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Deacon Miller never had it all—he never really believed he could. Growing up in a broken home with an alcoholic mother and a revolving door of truly pathetic father figures taught him to keep his expectations low. Now at twenty-seven, on the night before Christmas Eve, his life is turned upside down yet again; his boyfriend has dumped him, he just fled the holiday family reunion from hell, and now to top it all off, a blizzard has left him stranded in an airport hotel.
Steve Steele has spent the better part of his forty-four years living a lie, ignoring his attraction to other men in an attempt to fit into the mold of the man he thought he should be, instead of living life as the man he knew himself to be. Recently divorced after coming home from work one day and coming out to his wife, Steve has floundered over the past year, desperately attempting to wade through the guilt and find the courage to start again.
That’s when a chance meeting in a hotel bar brings two lonely men together… and what should’ve been a one night stand turns into something much more than either one ever expected.
What worked for me (and what didn’t): I had a bit of a love/hate relationship with this book. The premise grabbed me because I do like an angsty story and I liked that there was a reasonable-sized female cast in the story, only one of whom was a witch (Deacon’s mother). I felt that there was some attempt to explain Patty’s despicable attittude to Deacon – she had a back story and it was clear that she blamed Deacon for all of her woes (completely unfair of course, but there was some method to her madness, at least). The other female characters were either sympathetic (Ashley, Clarissa, Steve’s mother, without being perfect) or positive (Mrs. Garibaldi). The main part of the book was about Steve and Deacon which is what I want in a romance, so I’m fine with the secondary characters generally serving the story – but I liked things like that Ashley wanted to sneak out to a party after the prom and, generally, that Steve’s mother was supportive of Steve while not completely understanding him. To me, that showed that some thought went into the characterisations and I liked that they weren’t one note – even Patty had more substance to her.
