First things first, I’m a little bit reluctant to call this a mystery/suspense romance – I guess being a HUGE mystery/suspense genre fan, I thought this one emphasized more on the romance part than the mystery part. Sure, we had a young man being a murder victim, however, it stayed pretty much in the background. Neither Sam nor Adam are in the front line of the investigation, although since Sam is the forensic pathologist, he does offer his findings to the detectives in charge.
That set aside, I really enjoyed this. It’s only my third Cate Ashwood’s book, and it is definitely my favorite so far. Despite the animosity that happened between Sam and Adam during their high school years, the chemistry was definitely high this time around. While I might have skipped all the sex scenes, because, well, it’s my thing, I thought the sexuality was simmering between the pages and it was pretty alluring.
Another thing that I loved was that Sam never pushed Adam to come out of the closet for him. It has become one of my pet peeves in MM romance, whenever someone thinks that it’s for the best to push their lovers to just come out. Coming out is personal business and nobody has the right to tell one when or how they should come out. Although it isn’t fair for the lover involved, I believe this is where compromise comes in and the couple should work things out by communicating.
Anyway, I was rambling … but yes, I loved Sam for that. I thought the progress of them becoming lovers and later on when facing with the problem of Adam’s in-the-closet status, felt natural. I did wish that Adam kicked his homophobic partner to the curb much sooner, but I was enjoying Adam’s inner conflict too. So I couldn’t really be angry at him for making the story much believable for me (laugh).
There was quite a lot of action in the end, which amped up the thrill a bit. And the ending was … well, hopeful. No, not hopeful for our MCs … hopeful for a mystery fan like me. Because I’m hoping that there will be more investigations in the next book, and I want to be more ‘involved’ with finding out who is responsible for the murders.
The ARC is provided by the publisher for an exchange of fair and honest review. No high rating is required for any ARC received.
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