simonlorden's Reviews (1.38k)

What happens if you're hired to kidnap someone, but your employer and your target turns out to be the same? This, apparently. I loved this m/m sci-fi adventure, as short as it was. I especially loved Cael and his confidence - he's the type of character I like, and he reminded me of one of my own OCs. I also liked that the rest of Dalen's crew were aliens, although uh, the space bunny was a little hard to visualise.

One annoying thing was that I noticed several typos, which happens to everyone of course, but in a story this short it's pretty visible.

Eh. 2.5 stars, maybe?

This story is about finding life on Mars that is different from what we'd expect, but I really couldn't get into it. Most of the first half is just description of spaceships and I was waiting to get to the plot. I also didn't really like the solution in the end.

There was also a scene I had issue with in the beginning. The story starts with a group of unnamed tourists being annoying and careless, almost leading to an accident. I could live with this, since the harm tourists can do is very real, but the author specifically stated these were Asian tourists, and like... was that really necessary?

The father-daughter relationship was nice, and I wish there had been more focus on that instead.

This is a prequel to Talking in Code, a book with a m/m/m polyrelationship between three soldiers. According to the blurb, Talking in Code also heavily deals with PTSD.

"Revelations" is a series of short stories from the POV of the three men, describing how the relationship between the three of them started. Tim and Richard have been together for 20 years when they decide to include a third person in their relationship, 24-year-old Eric.

I love polyrelationships, I loved that it was an established older couple accepting a younger man as their third, and 90% due to Mass Effect, I also have a fondness for millitary settings. So by all means, I should have adored this, but I just... didn't. The writing wasn't really working for me and I found much of the dialogue cringy.

I'm considering picking up the full book (Talking in Code), but I'm not sure I'm ready to deal with the heavy themes the blurb describes.

Eh, this wasn't really working for me. I appreciated the action-packed beginning, but it also introduced too many characters too fast, and like, was I supposed to remember all those names? And the plot just didn't really grab me so far.

This is a story of a young man who is kicked out of home from being gay, and spends a few days with the other homeless people in his local park. It is a tragic story that is unfortunately reality for many people. What really got to me was that his mother and his little sisters clearly didn't agree with him leaving (they did what they could to give him money), but they couldn't stand up to his father, who insisted that Brig leaves and never comes back.

This is apparently a prequel to a standalone novel that is a m/m May/December romance with a happy ending. My TBR is already super long so I'm not sure I'm going to check it out, but it sounds nice.

This is an adorable f/f Christmas romance that I probably shouldn't have read in May, but hey, it's cute all year round.

This is a prequel story to a 6-book series with a mage protagonist. Rielle, the protagonist works together with her master (and lover) Leigh to save the viscount of a city, but then the paladins arrive - soldiers who are immune to magic, and aren't a big fans of mages.

I got some serious Dragon Age vibes from this story, but given that I love Dragon Age and I love mages, that is definitely a good thing. Rielle was a kindhearted protagonist that I think I would love. Leigh (and by extension the rules and philosophy of their employers) was pissing me off already in this short story, and honestly I could feel no romantic chemistry between the two of them -but Rielle stood up for her beliefs, and judging by the blurbs, she seems to have a different love interest in the later books? No idea what happens there.

In short, I loved this story, I loved Rielle, and I put the first book of the series on my TBR. It's pretty cheap on Amazon right now but I'm not sure if that's permanent or due to a sale or something.

I'm gonna be honest, I didn't expect too much from this story for several reasons, but it was a pleasant surprise.

This is an age-gap romance between a 20-something called Simon, and a 40-something called Gary. They both work at the same company, with Simon being the IT guy and Gary being the one who knows nothing about computers.

Their characters are actually somewhat cliché, and yet I still loved them both. Simon was an obnoxious and yet loveable protagonist with lots of relatable millenial quotes, and Gary's inexperience with gay relationship after repressing his sexuality for years was surprisingly well-written.

I commented on how the first sex scene read like bad porn, but then it turned out that this was actually intentional and a pretty clever way to show characterisation.

One of my only complaints is that this story only details the very beginning of their "relationship" - I would have loved to see where things go, but I suppose that wasn't the intention.

Notes:
- There is a brief fatphobic comment when Simon is looking at potential hook-ups at a bar
- Gary is married, but they are in an consensually open relationship with his wife, so there is no actual cheating involved in this story
- There are references to Simon's homophobic family that might be triggering

This was a lovely short story with a m/m romance between a dog shifter and a human. It's short, but it's gentle and sweet, and it actually wasn't as rushed as I expected because of the length.