RATING 5 out of 5 stars
Thomas, an older gay musician living in a small Southern town, is ready to start a family. He fosters Jeremy, a special needs boy with no arms, and teaches him to play the drums so Jeremy can realize his potential to do anything he wants. Though it takes time, Thomas’s closeted boyfriend Randy steps out of the shadows to be part of what Thomas is working to build. With the advent of marriage equality, it’s a different world in the Deep South—one where the three of them have the chance to be a family.
Yet no one said it would be easy, and they soon learn the foster care system is far from perfect.
Just as Jeremy begins to settle in and thrive, his biological father reappears, demanding custody. Thomas and Randy know the man is unfit to care for Jeremy, but the law says otherwise. It seems they’re the only ones looking out for Jeremy’s best interests, and they face an uphill battle if they want to keep their new family together.
Nick Wilgus is one of my favorite authors, I’m not sure how many times I said it in the reviews of his previous releases, but I’m never tired of his works. Each time he breaks my heart with his stories, and each time I love his writing more and more.
This new release, Ringo and The Sunshine Police, was no exception. I cried a lot of course, it was really inevitable to not fall in love and suffer with the little Jeremy. I supported Thomas and hoped for Jeremy to find a family till the end, I hurt when Thomas was missing Jeremy so much he couldn’t find the strength to help Derek, another boy who desperately needed a new family. I wasn’t a huge fan of Randy, maybe I wasn’t able to know him very well. In fact this is a story focused not on the usual male/male couple, this is a story focused on Thomas and his strong will to have a family and most of all to adopt children with special needs, the same children no one wants. Randy has not a huge role in Thomas’ plans of the future, especially at the beginning of the novel, where Randy is still in the closet and a man in the closet can’t really play a role in what Thomas wants. Instead I liked Thomas from the start, he is a great man, the love he has and wants to give to Jeremy is bigger than himself, he was overwhelmed by it when he lost Jeremy but too powerful to forget.
Ringo and The Sunshine Police is not for everyone, all of the stories Nick writes are not for everyone, the subjects he speaks of are important, cruel, too strong, and when they are paired with children they become too hard to read. These themes could be a trigger for some reader, so be careful. If you’re looking for a light story, Nick Wilgus isn’t what I can recommend, at all. But if you’re looking for an emotional book, with characters that will stay with you for days, you can’t go wrong with any story by this author.
The cover art by Garrett Leigh is well done and fitting and I particularly like its brightness.
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BOOK DETAILS
ebook, 300 pages
Publication Date: February 24th 2017 by Dreamspinner Press
ISBN 1635332893 (ISBN13: 9781635332896)
Edition Language English
Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 