Category: MLR Press

A Lucy Review: Coming Out In The Art by J. Sanders

 

Rating: 4 stars out of 5

Jacob Carlson is a medical transcriptionist who works at home, pretty much hiding out from the world except for his best friend, Chris, and his cat, Sebastian.  An accident in his senior year caused a fire to burn the right side of his face and body.  The reactions he got from his friends and still gets from uncaring people have turned his view of himself monstrous.   His one link to the outside world is Chris, an amazing and loyal friend from before the accident who works to make sure Jacob is not alone.  It is through Chris that he has a meeting with someone (Tristan) who makes him long.  “It’s just…he sometimes wonders what it would be like to have someone – other than a doctor or nurse – actually touch him.  Because they want to. Because they like him.  Because they want to make him feel good.”  This boy, he grabbed my heart.  He gives people the cold shoulder so they don’t have to deal with his face.  Sigh.

Tristan is on the Council for the Arts and a knows Chris.  It is at a party that Jacob reluctantly attends with Chris that Tristan shows he’s a good person.  He talks to Jacob even when Jacob is being pretty cold. When Jacob shows the scar, “…his ace in the hole”, Tristan just keeps talking about Jacob’s job and math and finally, art.  That’s where Jacob finally joins the conversation and the two of them begin on a journey of getting to know you and maybe getting to like you. 

Let’s put it right out there:  Jacob has scars from a fire.  He is not monstrous.  He is lonely and lovely.  The way the accident happened, the timing of it, just made my heart ache for him. He’s spent ten years hiding himself and it’s very difficult to change that, particularly when rude people react badly.   He’s now not sure how to act when someone might be interested. “The scarring from the accident makes him a freak and it’s ten times easier not to have to explain or deal with the pitying looks he gets.”  Notice, he says “makes him a freak”, not “makes him look like a freak.”  He’s so self-loathing.

When he and Tristan begin to be friends, Jacob opens up a little.  Sharing the how of the fire doesn’t make Tristan eye him with pity, just sympathy.  Their first kiss was perfect.   Tristan’s way of making Jacob feel important and his attitude that only Jacob’s opinion matters about Jacob was so vital to making Jacob feel better.  Not to say Tristan is always serious.  As they begin the “Tristan and Jacob Text Discussions of 2017 ™”, Jacob gets “Horseradish is a very underrated condiment or For some reason  I have always like the smell of gasoline.”

I’m sure somewhere Tristan has some flaws but I didn’t seem them.  Or maybe I did and didn’t care because I liked them both so much.   He sings Afternoon Delight (yes!) and is patient with people and kind.  He is kind when Jacob is so very brave and for the first time, takes his shirt off in front of another man, a man he cares about. “You humble me every time we’re together.  Your strength is so incredible.”  These two, they work.

I knew something was going to happen to mar Jacob’s happiness but when it happened it came from an area I wasn’t expecting and I was pretty pissed about it all.  People can suck.   Despite that, this is very low angst story.   I thoroughly appreciated that the characters, including Chris, were good people and I was pulling for them.  As a former medical transcriptionist, I could empathize with the unintelligible doctor voices too!  I would recommend this book without reservation.

The cover art, by Winterheart Designs, didn’t work wonders for me.  The model wasn’t Jacob, because there is no scar, yet I couldn’t see it being Tristan either.  The model is very brooding, while Tristan is known for “…the smile – wide and open and happy..”  The background is arty and perfect but then the title is difficult to read.  All in all, not really a fan of the cover.

Sales Link:  MLR Press | Amazon

Book Details:

ebook
Published March 22nd 2018 by MLR Press
ISBN139781370547876

A MelanieM Review :Explore with Me (With Me Series #2) by Kris Jacen

Rating: 4.25 stars out of 5

Can two coming from such different backgrounds and points in their lives find a balance to explore together?

The Army is the only thing that First Sergeant Danny Glenn has known in his adult life. From the age of nineteen on, he’s worn a uniform every day. He’s seen so much in his twenty years but the last deployment did something to him. Danny’s begun to wonder if he can’t do more good helping people in the US instead of other countries but to do that he’d have to get out.

Doctor Liam MacNamara is finishing up the last of his residency in Emergency Medicine. Now’s the tough part, which offer to accept. He could stay in New Orleans where shifts are never dull or choose to uproot and experience somewhere different. College followed by medical school and then residency are the only things he’s known since he was eighteen. There’s got to be more out there, right?

Can a retired first sergeant and a brand-new doctor balance each other enough to explore their options together?

I so glad Kris Jacen went ahead and wrote another story in what became a series because it’s wonderful.  Explore with Me continues in the same universe and with the same characters and heptad as the marvelous Wait for Me. First Sergeant Danny Glenn is another member of the heptad that I fell in love with in the first story.

But the author removes him from that close-knit group and their support system by placing him in New Orleans.  I have to admit I missed them but they all will show up later.  By isolating him, cutting him away from his heptad, the focus is again primarily on him, his issues, and the problem at the moment, the one the places him at the hospital.    His doctor, Doctor Liam MacNamara, happens to be the baby brother of Mackay…yep  the same Master Sergeant Jeff “Mackey” MacNamara of Wait for Me.  Lian is also at a crossroads in his life, needing to figure out where to go next now that his internship is done.

Two men, one major attraction, close ties between them,  and both at crossroads in their lives. All you need for a wonderful, emotionally charged story and Jacen gives us that.  And she does so within the framework of the military she knows so well.

The members of the heptad (the group of soldiers that serves together and support each other) don’t have to be physically present to be a strong presence here.  No, they appear via  phone calls, texts, what have you.  And then of course, they do come when needed. They are family. All the nibbles and squeakers (the children as they are called), the dogs, the spouses (men and women)…everyone is here.  I love that about these stories.  Kris Jacen makes it clear that a soldier cannot be a soldier within their support system, their military heptad family which includes their actual ones.  That important message comes through strongly here for the readers and Danny.

The buildup to a relationship is slow and realistic.  I liked that too.  In fact I loved everything about this except maybe I wanted a little more at the end.  Maybe the author will give it to us in another story.  Plus there’s a certain soldier May that now needs his story told as well.  I hope they have a part to play in his.  This is a terrific series that I can see going on for some time.  It’s rich and full of love and wonderful people.  I can’t wait for the next one to come out.

I highly recommend this story and the previous one. It helps to have read Wait for Me to understand all the characters you meet here.   Take this soldier and the whole heptad into your heart today.

Cover art: Jared Rackler. I love the cover for this book.  Attractive and the colors are striking.

Sales Links:  MLR Press | Amazon

Book Details:

Kindle Edition, 1 edition, 127 pages
Published February 8th 2018 by MLR Press
Original TitleExplore with Me
ASINB079Q4BCCZ
Edition LanguageEnglish