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March Came Roaring In Like a Lion and the Week Ahead in Reviews

Remember last March in Maryland?  The sun was shining over plants newly emerged from the ground,  our temperatures hovered in the high 70’s after experiencing absolutely no winter at all.  Birds were nesting, the butterflies were flying, and thoughts of picnics and outdoor barbecue dinners molded our grocery lists.  Even now I can bask in the memories….

Now switch to present day and the snow flurries I saw swirling around in clear defiance that it was March.  It was cold and dark clouds made sure the sun never made an appearance.  I stopped to look at the pansies with their smiling faces at Good Earth and thought “not in a million years am I hanging around outside to plant you so bugger off”,  channeling some Brits I know.  Those of you in the middle of huge snowstorms or still in recovery from the same are probably wanting to smack me over such piddling weather.  Me too.  I do realize it could be so much worse but this dang climate change has upped our expectations for March beyond all reasonability, hence the whining.

On the other hand, it does give me time to spend with plant catalogs, and go to a whine oops wine and cooking demonstration like I did  yesterday.  Had the weather been gorgeous, I would have been outside and missed a Mahi Mahi cooked in a buirre blanc sauce to die for, a lovely Coq au vin and a porc du rose, just a lovely 3 hours spent with nice people, great wines and food and a very funny Chef Read.  So highs and lows, cold and hot, one friend moves away and I get the chance to meet others. Life, the weather and changing climate keeps springing changes upon us whether (ha!) we are ready or not, usually mostly not.   Hmmmm,..rambling here again.

So where were we? Ah yes, the week ahead.  Hopefully that will see the Caps win, the Nats all heathly and happy in Florida, honestly don’t care what’s going on with the “Skins, and new recipes to try out.  I will be finishing up the Cambridge Fellows Mysteries series this week and it will be sad to say goodbye to Jonty and Orlando.  Look for a post full of Q & A with Charlie Cochrane to post the day following.  She was wonderful in answering all the questions that kept popping into my brain as I finished All Lessons Learned.  We have a mixed bag of new and familiar authors here, something for everyone I believe.  So here is the way it is scheduled so far:

Monday, March 4:                     Spot Me by Andrew Grey

Tuesday, March 5:                     Wake Me Up Inside by Cardeno C

Wed., March 6:                           Velocity by Amelia C. Gormley

Thursday, March 7:                    Lessons for Survivors by Charlie Cochrane

Friday, March 8:                         A Cambridge Fellows Q & A with Charlie Cochrane

Saturday, March 9:                     His Best Man by Treva Harte

So there it is, a really good week ahead.  Now if just those blasted snow clouds would go away I might just think about planting some pansies….

Review: All Lessons Learned (Cambridge Fellows Mysteries #8) by Charlie Cochrane

Rating: 5 stars

“He’s at the end of his rope…until fate casts a lifeline.”

All Lessons LearnedWWI has ended and Dr. Orlando Coppersmith is back at St. Bride’s College, after being freed from a German prisoner of war camp.  The cost of the war is all around him but the deepest, most traumatic blow is the loss of his lover and companion of more than a decade, Dr. Jonty Stewart, killed in action in the Somme.  Orlando is consumed by his loss and going through the motions of his previous life when unexpectedly a case arises to take his mind off his desolation.  A mother is sure her son did not die in battle and wants Orlando to find him or the truth whatever it may be so her mind can be at ease. The pursuit of that truth will take Orlando back to places he wished he could forget and times of untold horror and pain.

But on the French seafront at Cabourg, Lavinia Stewart Broad and her family are taking a walk on the sands when she comes across the last person she ever expected to see, giving her hope and joy for the first time in ages.  The impact of the war that has been left behind on those who fought cannot be lessoned in a day or even month.  And not all the pain and scarring left is visible on the outside.  Nothing in Orlando’s intellectual framework has prepared him for what comes next and it will take everything he has to grasp on to this new hope and hold on through to a future he thought was gone.

From the opening sentence we are audience to a sorrow so profound that you will be weeping within minutes.  I don’t think there is a more powerful symbol of love that can grip you except its absence after having found it and that is Orlando Coppersmith at the beginning of All Lessons Learned.

This is how we find him:

“The twelfth day of the eleventh month, 1918.  Orlando Coppersmith stood outside the prisoner of war camp and listened, almost unbelieving. No distant guns. No shouts or cries. No whinnying of frightened horses. Somewhere a bird was singing—two birds—and a distant dog barked. It felt unreal, as if this were a dream and the memory of the last few years the reality to which they would wake.”

The first world war has ended and its impact is hitting home as the men who survived WWI return back to their lives. Those that don’t return lie dead on foreign soil or have fled, marked as cowards, some because of what we know is PTSD, a concept so foreign that is was mocked as an excuse of cowards instead as the very real condition we know today.  Charlie Cochrane brings the reader the horrors that WWI visited on all involved by making it personal with its impact on characters we have met and come to love in the Cambridge Fellows Mysteries. In the opening pages, we find out that Dr. Peters, the Master of St. Bride’s College has died.  Also gone are Mr. and Mrs. Stewart, Jonty’s parents who also became the same to Orlando over the course of their relationship.  Jonty has been killed during fighting on the Somme and with them everything central to Orlando’s happiness and contentment , the core that made his life worth living is shattered, leaving Orlando adrift, tethered to life by a promise, Mrs. Sheridan nee Peters, and Lavinia Stewart Broad and her family.

I can think of no better way to visit the horrors that war can impart than through the eyes of a beloved character and Cochrane pulls us into Orlando’s memories with a gritty harshness not found elsewhere in the series.  This is a much changed Orlando since last we saw him.  No longer does this vaunted mathematician see the world in black and white.  Time, loss and his experiences on the front and in a prisoner of war camp have changed him forever with one exception.  His love for Jonty is as strong and final as it ever was, and now he is trying to continue living as he promised and falling short.  That changed man, more than anything else Cochrane could have done, tells us how much the world has altered in order for that to happen.  Have the tissues at hand, because this is going to hurt and hurt deeply.

Another fine element of this novel is the subject of what today we know as PTSD and veterans.  Then it had different names, shell shock for one, neurasthenia for another, the last being an ill-defined mental illness that encapsulated everything from fatigue to irritability and mental instability.  That is when it was believed in, for some doctors and the public, it was just an excuse for cowardice under fire. Here is another passage when Orlando is interviewing someone about MacNeil the man he is trying to locate:

“Orlando wouldn’t use the word “desert”. He’d heard too much rubbish spouted about men who’d lost their nerve, especially from people who’d been no nearer the front than the promenade at Dover.”

Those words might just have easily come out of the 60’s, or 80’s or even now.  While the weapons and locations may change, the impact of war upon people’s minds and bodies does not and here we see the results in Orlando and many others he comes across during his investigation.  Through recounted memories or more accurately nightmares, we hear the constant pounding of exploding munitions and the whistling of the shells overhead, the empty sleeves and missing legs of the remnants of the men who made it back, and the holes in the lives left behind of those that didn’t.  This is a grim and necessary element of All Lessons Learned and its impact upon the reader tells you exactly how well Charlie Cochrane did her job in making it real to us too.

There are also some wondrous moments in this story that will make all the pain and tears worthwhile.  They will come not with great shouts of joy and fireworks but quietly, with subtly and that’s as it should be given the nature of the couple at the heart of this series. One of the elements that made Orlando’s grief worse was that he could not mourn the loss of his lover the same as any other “widower” for that was indeed what he was.  Orlando’s grief had to remain hidden from all but a few who knew the couple and their true relationship.  And that isolation of his grief made a deeper cut than if he might have been able to mourn with the countless others at the time.  Orlando Coppersmith is a complex man and brings those same complexities of nature to everything that happens to him, good, bad or miraculous.  So the events that occur later on the story won’t surprise anyone who has become familiar with his character.  Somethings are truly fundamental and that is reassuring too.

This is not the end of the series, although I suspect at the time Charlie Cochrane intended it to be from the epilogue here.  One more book was written.  And that prompted a number of questions I had for the author.  I hope to have my review and the answers to those questions  posted for you sometime soon.  But in a way this does provide a sort of ending because the world and these men were never the same after WWI.  Changes start to happen rapidly throughout the world and the gentler time of the first seven books is forever vanished.   This series has become dear to my heart and we have one more visit to go.  I hope you will stay with me to the end.  For those of you for whom this review is your first introduction, please start from the beginning.  Take your time getting to know these remarkable men, delve into life and times of England in the 1900’s.  It starts out with all the joys of a slow promenade and then picks up the pace with each succeeding book.

It is an extraordinary journey. Dont miss a page of it.  Here are the order the stories were written and should be read to fully understand the relationships and events that occur:
Lessons in Love (Cambridge Fellows, #1)

Lessons in Desire (Cambridge Fellows, #2)

Lessons in Discovery (Cambridge Fellows, #3)

Lessons in Power (Cambridge Fellows, #4)

My True Love Sent To Me

Lessons in Temptation (Cambridge Fellows, #5)

Lessons in Seduction (Cambridge Fellows, #6)

Lessons in Trust (Cambridge Fellows, #7)

Once We Won Matches (Cambridge Fellows, #7.5)

All Lessons Learned (Cambridge Fellows, #8)

Lessons for Survivors (Cambridge Fellows, #9) – released by Cheyenne Publishing.

For free stories in the Cambridge Fellows Mysteries universe and more about the author, visit the author’s website.

 

Review: Adding to the Collection (A Roughstock story) by B.A. Tortuga

Rating: 4.25 stars

Adding To The Collection coverCloseted rancher Derrick Stahlman has always had a thing for professional bull riders.  Once a year he treats himself to a small vacation to watch the PBR Finals in Reno and get himself laid in the process.  This year Derrick has a chance to watch a young bull rider he has been following on the circuit, Stone Haverty.  Everything about that small firecracker of a man turns Derrick on like nothing in recent memory.  And a specific kind of memory to take back to the ranch and keep him warm is just what Derrick is pursuing.

Stone has been doing well this year and his rides have put him in the money and top 20 rankings.  Stone also happens to be gay, although quiet about it because of the PBR sponsors.  When he spots that handsome rancher cheering him on from the fan seats in the stadium, he recognizes a kindred spirit, and a big sexy one at that.  The men come together for a couple of days of white hot sex and major snuggling before parting ways with a quiet “come see me if you are in the area” from Derrick.  And then at Christmas time, Stone appears at Derrick’s ranch and Derrick has some big decisions to make and maybe make his dream come true in the process.

First a little bull rider history.  If you aren’t familiar with PBR (here that doesn’t stand for Pabst Blue Ribbon but Professional Bull Riders, Inc.) then you are missing out on a wonderful group of athletes often overlooked outside certain sections of this country.  A professional bull rider is someone who has to remain on the back of a bucking bull for 8 seconds.  Within that 8 seconds, the rider will be judged on control and rhythm in matching the movements of the bull,  and at the same time, the bull is equally being judged for their performance. their athletic ability to buck off the rider with high jumps and unexpected  twists.  It is athlete versus athlete, rider versus bull but here the riders average around 5’6″ and a hundred and more pounds versus these amazing bulls weighing in at  close to a ton or over.  Needless to say, it is the bull rider who often comes off the worst in this contest of skill, will, and might, hopefully walking away with no more than a bruised ego and behind to show for a ride lasting less than 8 seconds, sometimes much worse happens.  Not surprisingly, this is a young man’s sport with the average age being in their twenties.  Countries like Canada, Brazil, Australia, and Mexico each have their own PBR tours and bull riders from all over the world come to participate in the World PBR Tour.

B.A. Tortuga knows her bull riding.  B.A. Tortuga also writes some of the best regional voices in the business.  Her characters conversations are flavored with  colloquialisms that never fall over the edge into parody.   It certainly helps that she knows her roughstock and bull riders like the back of her hand too.   Here is her description of Stone Haverty:

“Short, lean, but not bird-like, Stone was a little nut-brown dynamo with a pair of blue eyes that looked like lasers, glinting from under the brim of that straw hat. That callused, scarred hand worked resin into glove and rope, up and down, mimicking an action that made Derrick’s mouth dry.”

Two sentences that so fully describe this man you could pick him out of a crowd.  Here is Stone’s first impression of Derrick:

“Solid and broad, with hands that would be rough and hard on a man’s skin…This one looked like he didn’t get to town much. Oh, the boots were clean, and the hat was obviously expensive, but the guy scanned the crowd like he was starving, like he had a powerful itch.”

Derrick is a lonely, closeted rancher from California who collects bull riding memorabilia on his annual trip to the PBR Finals in Reno.  He accepts that his lot will be that of a man lacking a real romantic relationship in order to live the life he has on his ranch, although he dreams of much more.  I loved solid, grounded Derrick and wanted much more of his backstory.  Stone too only gives us hints as to what drives him.  He comes from a huge family and is the baby of a family of eight brothers but you get the feeling that there is much more to his story than is revealed here.  We get realistic glimpses of the hardships that come with competing on the circuit too, the lack of insurance and rootless existence can mean in the long run.

The sex scenes are hot, desperate in their need,  funny and totally realistic.  I mean you are laughing along with the men as pants get stuck on boots and clothes refuse to fly off the way they do in the movies. And you will hurt with them too as the injuries arrive.  These men breath and bleed, laugh and hump so authentically that you expect them to climb out of the pages.

My only quibble with this story is the length.  It just cries out for a much longer version so all the requisite back history of these men and their journey to this point in their lives is layered into this story to finish it out.   At 60 pages, it is just enough to “wet our whistle” as it were but not enough to fully satisfy.  I hope B.A. Tortuga revisits this couple and lets us in on how they are faring.  I loved my short visit with them and am ready for the rest to follow.

Cover: Cover illustration by BS Clay is lovely and pertinent to the story

BA Tortuga. Adding to the Collection (Kindle Locations 83-87). Torquere Press.

Review: Life, Over Easy: Fragments Book 1 by K.A. Mitchell

Rating:  4.25 stars

Life Over Easy coverJohn Andrews life was all planned out, had been since he was young and entered the pool for the first time.  His life revolved around his diving.  He was tutored at home and on the road,  his social circle extended out only as far as his  teammates and diving competitors, even the most normal rites of growing up passed him by, no dances, no television watching or movie going, nothing but diving and diving competition.  Even after winning two Gold Olympic medals, that didn’t change.  John was on target to repeat or perhaps exceed  his goals at the next Olympics until a accident during training changed his life forever.  Now he copes with brain damage, blurry sight, vertigo, and life with a cane as a college freshman, on his own for the first time in his life.  But the place inside of him that used to be filled by diving is empty and John doesn’t know how to fill

One accident six months ago changed Mason’s life forever.  One deer in the middle of the road, one car crash later and everything he loved and thought he would have forever was gone.  Now its Jim Beam and sex that Mason uses to fill the emptiness inside of him, crawling into bed drunk with any number of nameless guys to the consternation and disgust of his roommates and friends.  He needs to concentrate on his school work and project but it seems impossible.

Two men, damaged by life’s accidents.  When John turns up at the wrong house for a party, they meet and while their first encounter isn’t promising, John and Mason are drawn together even as they hide secrets from each other.  John can see auras around peoples heads and he sees two over Mason’s.  And Mason?  He is seeing and hearing his dead lover.   Can both men over come multiple obstacles, including one not of this earth, to find the love both need and deserve?  Life is never easy, but this is ridiculous.

I love K. A. Mitchell.  She is a “go to” author for me and this book demonstrates why I grab up every book she writes.  The characters are unusual to say the least.  John Andrews stands out because he is different on so many levels.  First of all, he is that driven individual who has been pursuing a specific goal since childhood and succeeding at it.  Young athletes are in a category all their own.  They deprive themselves of a normal childhood, delaying or denying all together many hallmarks of growing up in order to pursue their dream, whether it be  that of an Olympic high diver or other sport.  They create a tunnel of efforts, so focused and driven that they seem almost innocent and guileless outside of their sport.  Take that goal, that lifestyle away and you have a person adrift in their own life, no  longer tethered by long term goals.  We see that happen to so many athletes once the Games are over.

K.A. Mitchell takes it one further.  John has had an accident that makes him unable to compete.  From a finely toned athlete, he now copes with a brain damaged during a 2 story fall.  He has vertigo, blurred vision, and  has a condition called Synesthesia, a neurological condition where “one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway.”  Colors can be associated with sounds or words, or music is combined with sounds or specific sights, etc.   Mitchell’s vivid descriptions gives us a intimate look at how it must feel when even a short walk turns into an overwhelming cavalcade of colors and sights.  John has to deal with the loss of his life’s goal, his new disability, life as a college student, and all the while he feels empty inside because that one feeling of being “airborne”, floating in space as he dives is forever gone.  Mitchell makes us feel that loss as acutely as John does.  And then she brings it crashing up against an equally deep cavern of loss and pain that is Mason’s.

Most of us have not lived John’s life but I would bet that we all know someone like Mason or lived through a similar trauma.  Mason is easily the most identifiable and recognizable of the two men.  We can connect with Mason who is drowning in the loss of the man he thought he would marry and spend the rest of his life with.  Booze and sex are the fillers of choice for Mason, and we get that.  His friends (wonderful characters in their own right) feel helpless to stop the downward spiral, some have given up all together as Mason lashes out at them in his pain.  This is all very authentic in the emotions radiating off the characters and the pages of this story.

But then Mitchell takes it an additional step further, journeying into the paranormal.  John’s condition lets him see people auras, he knows what they are feeling by looking at the pulsating colors above their heads.  And Mason’s dead lover hovers over all the proceedings, alternately angry and amused by being “stuck” to Mason.  I have to admit I wish that this element has been left out of the story.  It was terrific with just the obstacles they were already facing but then you add ghosts and “auras” and we start tipping over the edge.  It is too much for this story to handle, there is just too much to do justice to all the elements involved.  Then at the very end, one final piece is added.  Mitchell throws in BDSM at the last minute into a relationship that had not previously explored this type of sexuality.  It just seems very awkward and out of place.  I could see where she was going with it, and that made sense but it really needed to be introduced much earlier in the book and in their relationship. But as it was I just thought it was a tad strange for them to take it to that level at that time.

So those were my quibbles with this story.  Too many ingredients to give this a 5 star rating.  It was almost there too.  Do I recommend this book? Absolutely, these are wonderful characters and their stories are compelling.  I wish Mitchell would bring out another book in this series because I like where it is going.  Life is never easy, this book reminds of us of that fact.  But there are solutions and answers for everyone, and Life, Over Easy reminds us of that too.  Pick it up and let me know what you think.

Cover by Natalie Winters, interesting but not as interesting as the story within.

Mitchell, K.A.. Life, Over Easy: Fragments, Book 1 . Samhain Publishing, Ltd..

Review: Blood Red Butterfly by Josh Lanyon

Rating: 3.75 stars

Blood Red Butterfly coverHomicide Detective Ryo Miller is furious when his murder case against criminal Mickey Torres is derailed by an alibi he just knows has to be fake,  especially when the person vouching for Torres is none other than manga artist Kai Tashiro.  Ryo is familiar with Kai, having mentally nicknamed him the “Ice Princess” after having been rebuffed by the artist every time Ryo approached him in their local gay bar.  He just cannot believe that Kai would ever go for a thug like Torres and that something else must be going on.

After consulting with his partner who thinks they should abandon the case, Ryo decides that he must bust Torres’ alibi by any means possible, and if he has to take down Kai to do it, so be it.  But there are more depths and secrets to Kai Tashiro than Ryo is aware of and soon Torres’ obsession with Kai becomes his own putting his job and everyones life in danger.

As far as I know this is  Josh Lanyon’s first effort since his return from sabatical and his intention was to write a story that included elements of yaoi as well as contemporary fiction.  It certainly looks that way from the cover and from many of the elements Mr. Lanyon folded into his story.   As the author of Come Unto These Yellow Sands and the Adrien English mysteries, Josh Lanyon is a “must read” for me.  His stories are fascinating constructions full of marvelous characterizations and intriguing plots.  His fondness for police detectives or special agents can be found in more than one novel, including one of my favorites, Fair Game.  So it was not surprising to find that one of his main characters here is a somewhat surly, overworked, Homicide Detective named Ryo Miller.

The Japanese or Yaoi influence is highlighted by his use of characters of mixed Japanese ancestry and he has certainly done his research with regard to the types of classes Japanese american families send their children to in an attempt to keep their culture alive in their kids.  From ikebana classes to attending Nihonjin gakko schools for Japanese immersion studies, from the specific names  given to each american generation of youth (Ryo’s third generation is Sansei, Kai’s fifth generation is Gosei), we are enveloped in a cloud of elements to help us understand what it is to be a person of Japanese-American heritage.  This is all very beautifully done and adds a very authentic color to the narrative.

I also liked the way the author used a manga story written by Kai called Blood Red Butterfly to mimic the actions between Ryo and Kai with Torres being the incendiary element whose actions can’t be predicted.  These are all terrific facets of Blood Red Butterfly that I enjoyed immensely. But ultimately, it was the characterizations themselves that left me unsatisfied throughout the story, and I am not sure if that is due to the yaoi influence or not.   The characters of  Ryo and Kai just did not have the depth and dimension I have come to expect from Josh Lanyon.  I never bought into Ryo’s obsession with Kai, perhaps it was the story length that did not allow it to fill it to its complete development.  Torres’ fascination with Kai? Yes, I got that but not Ryo’s to the extent that he would detonate his life,including a job he loved, over him.  That case was never made.  As to Kai himself?  I liked him and what we knew of his backstory but again there was too much missing to really ever connect with him fully either.

So for me this story works on several levels but not enough to connect me with the characters and make me care about their fate. I can’t determine whether this is due to the influence of manga yaoi or not.  Hybrids can be tricky things and everything must work in harmony to pull it off and this story falls short of that goal in my opinion.  But I am enthused to find Josh Lanyon writing again and hope his time off has recharged his creativity and his enjoyment of his craft.  I can’t wait for the next story to come.  If you love Josh Lanyon and want to see what he has been working on and enjoy yaoi, then this story will be of interest to you.  But if you are new to Josh Lanyon and his stories,  then I would start elsewhere to make a start with his stories.

Cover by KB Smith

Cover Art by Faith L.

Cover photo by Reinekke and licensed through Shutterstock

Josh Lanyon’s website

Review: Lessons in Trust (Cambridge Fellows Mysteries #7) by Charlie Cochrane

Rating: 4.5 stars

Lessons In Trust coverIt is 1908 and Cambridge Dons Jonty Stewart and Orlando Coppersmith are attending the  Franco English Exhibition in the White City when their vacation is interrupted by two events, one a murder case and the other a personal mystery whose impact is devastating to the couple and their family and friends.  A young man they had spied earlier at an exhibition in the White City turns up dead.  When the local constabulary rebuffs all their efforts to become involved, to Orlando’s and Jonty’s consternation, they proceed to investigate on their own. Then a letter arrives informing Orlando that his beloved grandmother has died, and her death releases Jonty from the promise he made to her and he tells Orlando the truth about his grandmother, his father and his lineage.

When Orlando finds out that everything he thought he knew about his family and himself was false, including the fact that their name is Coppersmith, he is devastated and falls into a deep depression.  His uncertainty about his family background and his own identity is made untenable in Orlando’s mind when placed next to his lover’s noble and long established family. So distraught in fact that without informing either Jonty or the Stewarts, Orlando leaves their home to launch his own investigation into his past on his own.

Now Jonty is frantic to find his lover and still mired in confusion over the mistaken identities of the dead man from the White City. Unable to locate Orlando, Jonty continues to unearth clue after clue on the original murder, further infuriating the police over his involvement in a case he and Orlando were warned off.  Orlando, meanwhile, is struggling without Jonty and his depression is making him his own worst enemy.  It will take both men, reunited once more to solve both mysteries, one that threatens the very heart of their relationship if exposed and the other Orlando’s sanity if not solved.

With Lessons In Trust, once more Charlie Cochrane plunges the reader into a story that resolves around personal identities and trust and does so from two different perspectives.  When Jonty and Orlando see a young man snoozing near an exhibition hall, they have no idea that he is in fact not only dead but has been murdered.  The local police, an Inspector Redknapp, not only don’t want their help in investigating this crime but actually makes comments that let Jonty and Orlando know that the Inspector thinks very little of their investigative powers.  So they take matters into their own hands for the first time and proceed to find out that no one in the case is as they are presumed to be. Once identity after another is found false, mudding the trail to the murderer.  Charlie Cochrane is setting the stage for an even larger case of mistaken identity here, that of Orlando himself.

In the last book, Lessons in Seduction, we learned that Orlando’s grandmother had his father out of wedlock and was disowned by her family, a fact she kept from her son and grandson.  Mrs. Coppersmith only told Jonty when she knew she was dying, making him promise to hold off informing Orlando until her death.  Orlando’s family history is one of angst, suicide and depression, making him grow up socially isolated, withdrawn and prone to depression himself.  One truth he held onto and that was his name.  And with one revelation, that is gone as well, his identity in question along with his lineage.  The author asks that we remember how important family names were at the time by contrasting Orlando’s family with that of Jonty Stewart’s, a comparison not lost on Orlando or the reader.  And we know before it happens, just how badly Orlando will receive this information.

There are so many powerful elements at play here.  Not only are Jonty and Orlando facing questions about his identity but the murder case they are still pursuing keeps turning up false identities as well, highlighting how tenuous a hold a name can have on your own identity without you even realizing it.  And Orlando’s family history of depression rears its head again as Orlando spirals downward, unable to stop his depressive state from taking over his mind and his heart.  There is a blackness to Orlando’s family, his father having slit his throat in front of his son at a young age and much about his actions are finally explained here.  Orlando’s depression makes him doubt everything around him, including his trust in Jonty and the Stewarts to understand and continue loving him.  Powerful stuff indeed. Complication after complication follows our couple, even as they try to unearth the motive and murderer of the man they found at the beginning.

When Orlando flees the Stewart London home in desperation and panic, he leaves behind a confused and fearful Jonty. Jonty’s own issues of trust and pain start to resurface with the loss of Orlando and everything both men have come to hold dear and worked hard to establish is in danger of being destroyed by their actions and fears.  The author brings us into the turmoil of Orlando inner thoughts as pain and anger has him lashing out against his family and even himself in punishing detail.  But she also ensures that we feel Jonty’s fear and anquish over the safety of his lover as acutely as our own. And throughout all these events, there is a darker thread that runs subtlety through the narrative, that of continental unrest and spies from abroad appearing on English soil, a precursor of the war looming over the horizon.

As I stated in my previous blog on the Franco-British Exhibition, Charlie Cochrane’s stories are also a thing of personal delight because of the new information she imparts and the manner in which it is done.  I found The Flip-Flap ride to be as irresistible as Mr. Stewart does.  And I dearly wanted a ride in Jonty’s new Lagonda car, goggles firmly in place, face caked with dirt and full of adventure.  I truly understood Orlando’s jealousy and wanted to give it a crank myself.

But the real beauty here is the foundation of this series, the creation of Jonty Stewart and Orlando Coppersmith. Cochrane has slowly introduced Jonty and Orlando to each other and the reader and made us all fall madly in love over the course of seven books.  We now know these characters intimately as we do our closest friends.  And it is because of this connection that the author is able to build such suspense within the reader for Orlando’s safety and their love. The author does provide some lightness to offset the darkness occurring within Orlando by bringing in Jonty’s sister, Lavinia and her husband, Ralph.  They have a major problem with their marriage and a resourceful Jonty has just the answer.  This is a sweet, funny and endearing section of Lessons In Trust that still manages to address the issue at hand, that of trust within a relationship.

We are almost done, the end of the series close at hand.  The next book was the last until the author added one more.  So the next up to be reviewed is All Lessons Learned, the penultimate book in the Cambridge Fellows Mysteries and by far the most powerful in the group.  War is upon our boys and the impact as devastating as we can imagine.  Keep those boxes of tissues nearby, they will be needed.  See you back here soon.

One last look at The Flip Flap ride:
Here are the series in the order they were written and should be read to understand character development and the series events. Links to my reviews are included:

Lessons in Love (Cambridge Fellows, #1)

Lessons in Desire (Cambridge Fellows, #2)

Lessons in Discovery (Cambridge Fellows, #3)

Lessons in Power (Cambridge Fellows, #4)

My True Love Sent To Me

Lessons in Temptation (Cambridge Fellows, #5)

Lessons in Seduction (Cambridge Fellows, #6)

Lessons in Trust (Cambridge Fellows, #7)

Once We Won Matches (Cambridge Fellows, #7.5)

All Lessons Learned (Cambridge Fellows, #8)

Lessons for Survivors (Cambridge Fellows, #9) released by Cheyenne Publishing, buy link here

Visit Charlie Cochrane’s website for free stories and more information about further works from this author.

The Week Ahead in Reviews

Well, I hate to throw this out there but this coming week is full of things I don’t like to talk about, mostly doctors appointments.  I would much rather dwell on things like the arrival of Spring, plants I want to establish in the gardens, the latest antics of my terrors three, and what knitting projects are in the pipeline. But sometimes I just have to face up to the fact my health takes priority, even over the Caps and the Nats. So if things don’t exactly arrive as scheduled, this is the reason.  Just saying.

I want to finish out Charlie Cochrane’s Cambridge Fellows series over this week and the next, so grab onto that box of tissues and be prepared. I also have the latest Josh Lanyon book he self published after his year off.  This week I am also posting books from favorite authors like B.A. Tortuga and K. A. Mitchell that were reviewed for Joyfully Jay’s Jock Week.  I know you will enjoy them as well. So here is the schedule as planned.

Monday, Feb. 25:              Lessons In Trust by Charlie Cochrane

Tuesday, Feb 26:                Blood Red Butterfly by Josh Lanyon

Wed, Feb. 27:                     Life, Over Easy by K. A. Mitchell

Thursday, Feb. 28:           Adding To The Collection by B. A Tortuga

Friday, Feb. 29:                 All Lessons Learned by Charlie Cochrane

Saturday, Feb. 30:             Scattered Thoughts On Authors, Conventions and Hurt Feelings

 

In the meantime I have become familiar with the music of Kaija Saariaho,  In “Lonh”, a work for soprano and electronics, Saariaho combined a medieval love poem with bells and bird song to arrive a composition both memorable and eerie.  What do you think?