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A Little Bit Country

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Rock singer, Ash Ivers, and country music star, Jackson Abrams, have intense passion that brings them together, but will they be able to overcome all their differences when Jackson's career is threatened?

Ash Ivers says and does what he wants, and with being the lead singer of the world famous rock band, From Ashes, he gets away with both. Three years ago, his mouth got the better of him, and he started a media feud with county music star, Jackson Abrams. When they’re both booked to play a charity concert, he sees his chance to finally confront Jackson in person. Though, he’s uncertain if his anger will hold against his attraction to the singing cowboy.

Jackson Abrams is the darling of country music. He’s polite, charming, handsome…and he has a secret that he fears could jeopardize his career. When it comes to the cocky rock star, Ash Ivers, he’s infuriated and intrigued by him. He wants their feuding to stop, but he also doesn't want to lose the attention it gives him from Ash.

As Ash and Jackson meet, the heat of anger turns to passion. But when Jackson’s world starts crumbling around him, will their differences make them stronger, or drive them apart?

***Author's Note***
This is the expanded, full-length novel. The original novella, "A Little Bit Country", was approximately 28k. This book is approximately 60k. It takes the original novella, and where it ended, this one continues on to complete the story.

188 pages, ebook

First published July 9, 2011

6 people are currently reading
525 people want to read

About the author

S.J. Frost

44 books572 followers
S.J. Frost resides in Ohio with her family, pets, and horses. Her short stories have been featured in several erotic and romance anthologies, and her novels are published through MLR Press. Rock stars, vampires, fantasy heroes, and more, she enjoys dabbling in many different sub-genres in gay romance, but no matter what she writes, love and passion are the driving forces in every story.

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5 stars
217 (29%)
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327 (44%)
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152 (20%)
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 122 reviews
Profile Image for Exina.
1,276 reviews418 followers
January 10, 2020
I've read only the original novella published in Don't Read in the Closet anthology (Volume One), so my review is only for the novella. I'm planning to read the whole story soon.

Ash Ivers is a rock star, Jackson Abrams is a country star. Although they never met, Ash started a media feud between them that has been running for three years now. On a charity concert they finally meet, and they are both determined to end this pointless, baseless rivalry. But the inexplicable tension between them makes it really difficult. After many mistakes and misunderstandings on both parts, they finally manage to create a balance.
“I don’t get it with you two. You cross words constantly, but you’re both fans of each other’s music. You meet in person and fight, then share a beer. Fight, have a few laughs. Fight, and… well, that blank still needs to be filled, but you get my point.”

What I loved the most is that A Little Bit Country doesn’t want to provide a whole love story from beginning to end. There is no insta-love, no hasty ILYs, no rushed coming out. Instead, it gives a promising, wonderful beginning.
“I wish I could find something to tease you about, but you’re so damn perfect.”

Ash is a temperamental, passionate musician. He is hot-headed, but he can be reasoned with quickly enough. Jackson is calmer, more composed, but he sometimes he can’t control what slips out of his mouth. They are very explosive together, so they have to work hard on communication.

The chemistry between Jackson and Ash is incredible and intense.



A Little Bit Country is a very enjoyable story with great writing style and excellent humor. Recommended!
Profile Image for Ami.
6,262 reviews489 followers
August 18, 2013
In 2011, during "MM Romance Group's Hot Summer Days" event, S.J. Frost came up with 28k freebie entitled, A Little Bit Country. I really loved that story -- I enjoyed Ash and Jackson's bickering before they finally succumbed to the fact that word-war was a perfect kind of foreplay . However, I also felt their story wasn't finished and was grumbling with how it ended.

Now, two years later, Ms. Frost finally added more than 30k words to make it a full length novel. For those who hasn't read the original novella, no worries, it is included in this novel (the original novella is the first 10 chapters). It definitely helped people like me as well, ones with sucky memory for details.

At first, I was a bit concerned. Because as I re-read the novella part, I wondered if the extended length would make this felt like a case of insta-lust. Because it made their first sex scenes quite early in the game. I wondered if it would be better if the story was expanded from before Ash and Jackson met face to face.

However, as the story continued, I could shed my concern. Because I still loved it. One thing I truly appreciated was how solid Ash and Jackson were, during the 'problem' introduced in the middle, when Jackson was outed by another country artist on live television interview.

I loved how Ash stood tall by his man, being protective of him, even as Jackson's agent, band members, and label all turned their backs on him. I loved how Ash's own band members form another kind of support for the two men, in addition to Jackson's family members and best friend.

In a sense, it made the story rather low on angst, because as Jackson lost some friends he quickly gathered another. It was indeed bordering on the sappy side of romance. But it worked really well for me. I wholeheartedly enjoyed the country setting, Jackson's talks about ranch life, even the part where he showed his talent of roping cows. I loved the sappiness of these two men and the love they have for one another. Yes, the love come quickly for Ash and Jackson, but they practically had their foreplay in the media for three years already.



So thank you completing their story, Ms. Frost. ALTHOUGH, I still grumbled over the fact that you didn't write the scene where Jackson's mother making a tux measurement for Ash *pout*.

An enjoyable cozy romance read, most definitely.

---

PS: This was the only second story of S.J. Frost that I have ever read. I know that she had written several others, but I never felt the push to read them. Maybe I should give them a try one of these days.

PSS: One of the very few MLR covers that I loved, by the way.
Profile Image for SheReadsALot.
1,861 reviews1,268 followers
April 27, 2014


(May)Book of the Month

"How to Make A Little Bit Country Pie"


- 1/2 metric ton of sugar

- 1 very forgiving guy who is the Country to His 'Rock & Roll'. He also wears a cowboy heat pretty much EVERY WHERE that I'm surprised he did not wear it while having sex.

- 1 rocker big mouth diva who wanted to be the pretty princess in all the land and never got to wear the crown. And tantrum it out for the first half of the half of the book and then stole the attention for the second half. He fucks decent though. I give him that.

Also, I pictured Ash to be a mantrum having/ attention seeking version of:

- 1 shady queen aka jealous country music star that can talk a whole lot of shit behind closed doors but is too chicken shit when it comes to saying it to your face. Ugh, the shade of it all!

- 1 gang of ever positive sidekicks that are always friends, always positive, always have your back, always travel to remote locations to find you to have your back and defend you against the world. Their life revolves around your being coupled. They revolved around you before being boyfriends too aka they have no life other than to please you. And will move to wherever you move to keep the positive/have your back/sidekick ring alive.

- 2 1/2 bottles of country cliches

- 5 Mantrums from not listening to your crush's full sentences and/or not stopping to FUCKING THINK BEFORE YOU HAVE A FIT.

- 1 parallelogram full of fluff (Size may vary)

- 2500 Gasoline Tankers filled with liquid sugar

- 1/4 bucketful of my eyes rolling

- Add near equal parts of decent writing in between the rough patches

- 2 drops of hot sauce (The sex was good but nothing I'm going to remember after the next 2 books I read. Hell, maybe after the next one. *shrugs*)

- 1 Countrified Cotton Candy HEA where NOTHING GOES WRONG. I'm sure even the cow dung in the barn is smelling like roses.(Gag me with a Spoon, please.)

- 1 pie crust

- 1 powdered sugar doughnut (For color)



Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Grease pie pan evenly. Sprinkle granulated sugar before adding pie crust to pan.

In a bowl large enough, mix the ingredients together for 2 minutes. Mixture should not be smooth, expect lumps.

Pour mixture into pan. Sprinkle with brown sugar heavily.

Bake for 2 hours or until golden brown.

Cool for 15 minutes. If the fumes don't give a diabetic coma for 15 generations, garnish with buttercream until the pie does so.


This book is not bad, it might work more for fans of sugar or a read after something that was dark/angst-ridden/put you in a bad place. Maybe I'd have rated higher if my last read had done so.

Maybe not. We'll never know. *shrugs* I'll round up to 3 Stars. I do like this author's paranormal work. She's written one of my favorite vampire MM stories. I'll try another of the contemporary. If it's fluff, I'll just stick with the vamps.

So now I'm going to continue singing "Just a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down..." since it's been stuck on replay in my head after finishing this book.
Profile Image for Gigi.
2,149 reviews1,069 followers
August 23, 2013
I really enjoyed this tale of two musicians, a rock star and a country western singer. I usually stay away from this genre, but the reviews talked me into reading this one and I'm so glad I did. The MCs were delightful and the sex was hot as hell. There were deep emotions, which I LOVE and pushed this book up a star since the music business doesn't really interest me.

Absolutely recommended for all M/M romance lovers who love some good sex, heavy on the emotion. *dreamy sigh*
Profile Image for Jenni Lea.
801 reviews302 followers
May 6, 2014
UPDATE 5/6/14 - Come check out our Happy Hour Chat on the blog. Just a warning though. Shenanigans abound!



UPDATE 4/25/14 - Buddy re-read with my fellow unicorns. :D

1st Read 10/5/13 - Awwww. What a sweet story. Other than the fact that Ash is basically the same person as Jesse from her Conquest series, this was a great read. It was sweet but not saccharine, humorous but not over the top silly. Very enjoyable.
Profile Image for Trisha Harrington.
Author 3 books144 followers
August 18, 2013
I never read the short story by the same name, so when I started this, I had no clue who the characters were. I know a lot of people had been waiting for this, and so was I. But I wasn't one who had some knowledge about these characters and the basic plot. I'm glad that I hadn't read the short story because I went into this reading a new, fresh, book. And I loved it!

A Little Bit Country, A Novel might be deemed as too sweet for some readers, but as most people know, I love sweet books. It has elements of enemies to lovers even though the two MC's hadn't met before. But I liked that about this book, it was nice that the MC's knew of each other before the book began.

Jackson and Ash were a really cute couple. They bickered and the made up and it was super lovely. I loved both of them as individual characters and as a pair. They had great chemistry. Even when they were fight in the beginning I loved their chemistry. During their arguments, I could see the sexual tension leaping off the page. Of course, with Jackson being in the closet it added a teeny bit of drama to the story, but the story was generally an easy read.

Some of the secondary characters were great. Ash's bandmates and Jackson's family as well as Elizabeth, Jackson's best friend. With the good there is always the bad, but Clint was like a fly, he was swatted away and we didn't have to deal with him afterwards.

A lot of people would have preferred more angst. This book had them as a couple pretty quickly. But I, for one, am glad that it wasn't a major issue. There was no cheating or big break-up's for unnecessary drama. It had it's drama, but it stayed as an easy read that was enjoyable, memorable, and damn adorable. I couldn't have asked for a better book to put a smile on my face.

I can honestly say, I would recommend this book to fans of the author, musicians, or people who want a nice read in general. It's a great book.
Profile Image for Kol Anderson.
Author 38 books377 followers
August 16, 2013
I literally have like TWO fluffy books on my fluff shelf and this is one of them :P I love this chick's writing and her characters and I enjoy the sex scenes so damn much! Ashton was my favorite amongst the two and Jackson made a very sometimes-annoying cowboy who is incredibly hot ;) Watching Ash and Jackson go back and forth was very, um, interesting.
Profile Image for Sunny.
1,012 reviews126 followers
February 26, 2015
Aww...I liked this story! And I wasn't sure I would, because that beginning? I didn't like it at all. Ash was an ass. He'd be decent, even sweet, for a bit, then he'd be an ass again. I hated the constant back and forth. And Jackson wasn't much better with his snide comments. The constant digs, comments really irritated me. Enemies to lovers is not my thing, because I hate the whole enemies thing.

Also, at times the dialogue was off...odd, awkward, something. Other times it was very well done. That goes for the writing in general, too. Sometimes it was stilted, with too many simple sentences...subject, verb, object, over and over, and other times, the words flowed beautifully. So, an uneven read for me in the beginning.

Once I got past that, though, I enjoyed the story quite a bit. The writing flowed better, and the characters stopped acting like immature brats. It was sweet, and I smiled a lot at the banter between Ash and Jackson, and the members of the band. Did things wrap up a bit too neatly in a fairy tale fashion? Yes, but I didn't care.

Side notes:
I loved the piercings.

When Jackson got a little assertive? That was hot :)

We'll be discussing this book at our next Happy Hour Chat for BMBR. More crazy times, I'm guessing, because you never know what the unicorns are going to say. I'm pretty sure we'll be discussing those piercings, though ;)
Profile Image for Simsala.
524 reviews58 followers
dnf
August 17, 2013
DNF 35%

DNF isn`t quite right - like with most of the other books from the author I tried in the last years I wanted to finish, but I couldn`t.
Reading this felt (for me) like lying lazily on a comfy deck chair on a gently rocking boat - impossible to stay awake.

I don`t have any niggles I could come up with, this simply is a case of
author-and-reader-don`t-match.

I`m saying goodbye to S.J. Frost now, but I`m doing it with a hug.:)
Profile Image for Ann.
1,452 reviews136 followers
April 26, 2014
One I've been wanting to read forever and for whatever stupid reason I just hadn't. I do have some awesome unicornian friends who kick me in the ass when necessary and so a tip-o-the-horn to my most awesome peeps.

I loved Ash, even while douchey, his self perceived awesomeness cracked me up and Jackson's humble, gosh-golly-darn southern charm was swoony. I liked Ash mostly when he was recognizing his own faults:

"I have a tendency to explode over little crap . . . and big crap, too. Well, pretty much any kind of crap."

It made him a perfect fit for Jackson's more serious nature.

The love was fluffy and sweet and considering the pretty big deal surrounding Jackson's future with his career, the angst was minimal and the potential seriousness was glossed over with a candy coating. But, I love a good Hallmark moment as much as the next gal, so I was able to roll with it and enjoy the lovey love and the sexy sex.

Looking forward to chatting piercings, blue hair, tats and cowboy hats with the UM. Plus, BIG thanks to S.J. Frost for being our next author of the month. You are brave and we are grateful :D



Profile Image for Wminbc.
1,153 reviews82 followers
November 4, 2013
Sexy smooth talking cowboy falls for mouthy, wise ass rocker...loved it!

I don't generally read MM books, but I love cowboys and I love rockers. So I saw this one on the feed and looked into reviewing it. Then I read the except and I went straight home and paid the money (7.74$) for this baby!

Money well spent, my friends. I loved Jackson right from the get go, but I have to say that I loved Ash too. They were just the right mix of country and rock 'n roll! They also talked to each other and worked out their issues as they arose...and golly, did these two men arise often!

Loving was plentiful, but also tasteful and loving. They were falling in love, building a monogamous relationship while forging a true and lasting friendship. Simply put, a wonderful love story! Enjoy!!!

Jackson: the handsome, sweet talking cowboy
description

Ash: the lean, mean, sexy roll and roll machine
description
Profile Image for Lauren.
647 reviews29 followers
August 24, 2013
4.5 stars - This was really lovely. I really liked the short story version, and when I saw that a novel had been released I was so excited to read it! The short story was really fabulous and had actually been one of my favourites in the Hot Summer Days event of 2011. Part of me did worry that the novel version would be disappointing but I really shouldn't have been worried at all. This was a really entertaining and sweet read. I actually ADORE Ash, even if he is a pain in the arse sometimes! He really made me laugh out loud in places. The romance between Jackson and Ash was surprisingly tender and sweet, which was so nice. I'll definitely be re-visiting this story, very cute!
Profile Image for Tina.
1,783 reviews1 follower
October 1, 2013


Woohoo! Rock-n-roll meets country! :)

Well written romance about a country music singer falling in love with a rock star.

After years of trading verbal insults through the media Ash Ivers and Jackson Abrams finally come together at a charity event where both are performing. The sparks fly and they realize nothing is as is seems...

It's a sweet and wonderful love story and I had a great time reading it. :)
Profile Image for Candice.
932 reviews
August 18, 2013
I don't know how I missed the first one when it came out, but really glad that I got to read when it was now a full story. I really loved this one and the characters. Yes, for some people this would probably be considered a sappy little story. For me, it was a fluffy, angst free story that I really enjoyed.
Profile Image for Taintedskyee (Books Books&More Books).
538 reviews63 followers
November 30, 2014
I love music,be it Country or rock or any other.So a story about stars of music always have a soft spot for me.When I read this blurb I was excited to find two lead characters Rock singer, Ash Ivers, and country music star, Jackson Abrams grabbing each others throat,I was hooked and another reason I was excited to read the story.It was a great entertaining read and I liked it.
Happy readying:)
Profile Image for Hey Hey.
1,031 reviews4 followers
October 29, 2013
Honestly, it was hard to picture Ash as his own character. He's Jesse's doppelgänger for sure.

I liked the country star vs. rock star battle.

I have a thing for a hot gay cowboy. Yum. Jackson and Jesse. Oh. Wait. See. I mean Ash were polar opposites. I wish we would of seen more to that effect. They went from almost hating each other to cozy and in love with hardly any bumps.

This story is about Jackson getting outed and his world as he knows it disappearing. But From Ashes is there to help him.

I liked the band mates. Wouldn't mind reading another from this series.

I for one am probably the only one who hadn't read the story this originated from. I think I'm gonna go hunt it down if I can find it. :)
Profile Image for Jenn.
438 reviews233 followers
August 26, 2013
Sugar puff fluff that I preferred as the short story. Still a totally nice story, likable characters, and nothing truly bothered me. The parts where they were at Jackson's ranch were much stronger than the L.A. parts or any of the press situations.
Profile Image for ♥️Victoria ♥️ ♥️love books♥️.
837 reviews69 followers
February 15, 2017
Overall book rating: 4 Stars
Audio book: n/a
Book Cover: 4 Stars
MC1: Ash
MC2: Jackson


To be honest and true to myself, I struggled with the first part of this book even though it made me giggle and I kept picturing Adam Lambert with a yellow Mohawk with red in between. (Like Jackson likes to put it a hotdog stand). The main reason I struggled was because of a previous book hangover and that was unfair of me, after a serious conversation with myself (yeah I do that a lot - I know crazy hey?)

After my mindset was back on track I must admit I loved this book it was sweet as candy and full of love and understanding. I adored all the characters except for Clint that guy was a real dirt bag, I absolutely LOVED Elizabeth that's what you call a lady kicking some butt!! I loved how the Rock and country collided

" Ash focused on Jackson. " you're not saying anything. What do you think?" Jackson slowly lowered his gaze from Ash's hair to meet his eyes. "Well, I've never fucked a Smurf before, so if nothing ells, it'll be a first." Laughter erupted from Jeremy, Devin and Chad. Ash chuckled softly with them and walked to ward Jackson. "The smurfs' skin was blue. Not their hair."

Profile Image for Traci.
424 reviews26 followers
August 27, 2013
Love it! So glad we got another book from this author! This book is about a country singer, Jackson and a Rock singer, Ashton (Ash). They have had a 3 yr rivalry through the media. They finally come together at a charity event where both are performing. Once anger subsides, passion overrides. There is instant chemistry that has been brewing for over 3 yrs and they finally recognize it. Jackson is still hidden in the closet with his fans, band, label and manager. Ash and Jackson learn how to deal with their attraction, passion, and dwindling anger by going to Jackson's ranch in Texas and then Ash's home in LA. While in LA, a jealous country singer (jealous of success), Clint, outs Jackson in an interview or eludes to it. The next part of the book deals with losing his label, manager, and band (Fans stay) while working through his new relationship with Ash. Ash, his band, Ash's manager, his great friend Elizabeth and Jackson's family rally for support and come out on top. Ash's band goes back to Texas to hole'up and confront the media on his own turf. Ash shows wonderful support and friendship. Nashville Star's (which made Jackson famous) asks him to come back on the show to perform even with the media hype. He gratefully agrees and then asks Ash's band (from Ashes) to be his backup band for the show. They "rock" the show and confidence starts to build back into Jackson. The president and CEO of another famous label picks up Jackson and things finally star looking up.

I love these two characters! Fell for both of them, couldn't help it. If you love The Conquest series, you will love this book. I have already started reading it again. It obviously has a HEA ending, but the story is well developed, plot is different than others I have read and I had to sit and finish it in one read!!! Enjoy!
Profile Image for Salsera1974.
226 reviews39 followers
November 8, 2013
3.75 stars

This enemies-to-lovers story of a bad boy rocker and a down-home country star is easy, pleasant, and very sweet.

At the beginning of the novel, Ash (our rocker) and Jackson (our country music star) have been sniping at each other through the press for the past three years, but they have never met or spent any time together in real life. That changes during a music festival, when they realize that the media feud covered a real desire to know each other in "the Biblical sense." They meet, the sparks fly, and pretty soon, they've hit the sheets. Beyond that, though, they realize that their attraction isn't just about fighting and fucking (as various people suggested was their likely future pattern); they like each other, like each other, and decide to stay together after the festival ends and see if they can work things out.

The book isn't heavy; it's just a nice bit of fluff to help you while away an evening. There are hot musicians, homophobic jerks, deep friendships, and dilemmas about coming out, and anchoring all of it is the love story that never sees any serious angst once it is off the ground and running. This novel won't make you run out to all of your friends and insist that they read it, but you'll probably recommend it when they bring it up with you.
Profile Image for Kaje Harper.
Author 92 books2,732 followers
February 20, 2014
I really enjoyed the original short story about the meeting of rockstar Ash, and country star Jackson, which opens this book. I was pleased to see it expanded into a novel. The longer format allows for more fleshing out of some of the secondary characters, and a view of what happens as the relationship between the two men progresses. It's a fairly sweet, low-conflict opposites-attract story.

Ash enjoys his bad-boy persona, and has been out as a gay man from the start of his career. Jackson is quieter, a courteous and popular country singer whose private life remains private. They've been feuding in the media for a while, striking verbal sparks off each other. When they finally meet in person, the heat between them is quite a different kind. Ash and Jackson find that despite their contrasting exteriors, they have some very important things in common.

There was a fair bit of heat, a little humor, and a warm relationship. The general progression was smooth and sweet, and despite a few minor quibbles and a wish for a bit more angst, this goes into my comfort reads.
Profile Image for DaisyGirl.
1,206 reviews68 followers
November 30, 2013
2.5 Stars

Two music superstars from different sides of the track go from friends to lovers. Rock singer, Ash Ivers, and country music star, Jackson Abrams, go from feuding to f*cking after their first face-to-face meeting. While Ash is out, Ivers is not and their story takes a turn when the media gets wind of their love affair.

This story was alright. At first, Ash was just a dick. Then he wasn't. I enjoyed the relationship building between he and Jack but it got a little dull around the 65% mark. Everything was so sweet - sickly so at times. It left the emo in me gagging.

Plus, I thought the agent and Opry Star got off way too easy. Bigoted bastards.

Bottom-line: Entertaining but super sweet, too much so IMHO.
Profile Image for Rissa (an M/M kinda Girl!!).
1,139 reviews11 followers
September 2, 2013
*Awesome!!*

Ash & Jackson are two of my favorite musicians (I had already met them back in 2011 during an M/M write event)..I love the country & rock combo that they got goin on.

Two alpha male musicians who like to get under each others skin..all thru the media. When they finally meet they realize that they have a bit more in common than they thought.

Story was fun, secondary characters were lovable (well except one.) and the sexin was smokin' hott!

I really hope that these guys get another book so we can see how they are doing down the road.

Profile Image for Lori.
Author 2 books100 followers
May 9, 2014
This was a buddy read for the BotM at BMBR. I'd read the shorter version prior to reading this and I enjoyed it. I didn't love it but I liked it a lot. I think the same can be said for this book - it was good, the characters were great, the story line fun. Rather than writing a long review here I'll put a link to our our monthly book chat

http://boymeetsboyreviews.blogspot.co...

and you can read what the unicorns thought collectively. (Or collectively thought...whaatev's, you know what I mean!)
Profile Image for A.E..
Author 48 books3,237 followers
August 25, 2013
Wow! Wow! Wow! Read it all in one sitting. I'm a huge fan of Frost and was not disappointed again. I skipped an outing to finish this all in one sitting. Thanks so much for listening to M/M fans and wanting to see rock-n-roll and country come together in a fury of feud, fire, passion, angst, and erotic romance. And Oh-Man the sex scenes. Whoa! So damn hot and crazy. Loved it! Its a must M/M readers.
Profile Image for Jo * Smut-Dickted *.
2,038 reviews520 followers
October 6, 2013
Loved the original story for the MM Group event - and this was a wonderful enhancement to it. I liked how we got to get additional background and we got to really see the ramifications for Jackson after coming out. I did think it got a little bit drawn out towards the end - but getting all that closure was really nice!
Profile Image for JJ.
779 reviews33 followers
December 31, 2014
Sweet story, but it was just ok. It passed the time, but I wasn't very into it and I'm afraid it won't stick with me. Plus side is that finishing this book means I've completed my 2014 reading challenge, yay!
Profile Image for Shelby.
3,383 reviews93 followers
February 11, 2014
I really enjoyed this story when I read it as a short awhile back; the original version, of course, being written for the MM Romance Group’s “Hot Summer Days” event. Now in it’s expanded version it’s even better. I loved the combination of Ash and Jackson in the short and seeing them work through everything together was fabulous!

Ashton “Ash” Ivers is the lead singer of the uber popular rock band From Ashes. He’s loud, more than a bit wild, and openly gay. He’s been out his entire career and is proud of it. Now his band is getting ready to play for a charity event near and dear to his heart. It’s an event in support of HIV/AIDS and he’s been looking forward to it. That is until he finds out his arch nemesis country music star Jackson Abrams is also going to be playing. Though the two have never met their rivalry has been in place since their first year in the business. Both men’s careers took off the same year, and the sniping back and forth in the media since has never stopped. Their feud has pretty much reached legendary proportions.

Jackson Abrams is the sweetheart of country music and despite Ash’s antagonism in the media Jackson has always attempted to maintain a little civility in their dealings. Now they’re finally going to be playing the same concert and meet each other face to face. Jackson really wants to take the opportunity to bury the hatchet and move on. He’s always enjoyed From Ashes music and figures the rivalry has gone on long enough. He isn’t quite prepared to face the other reasons he wants to bury the hatchet. The edge a little to close to the secret he’s been keeping for years. Of course meeting Ash for the first times cause sparks to fly in all directions and more than a few flames to burn.

First of all Ash and Jackson are HOT DAMN SMOKIN’ HOT together! Tattooed and pierced rockstar getting it on with sexy all American country boy…I mean really did you have to dig into my all out fantasy drool worthy dream duo! I’m a huge fan of both genres of music and listen to both avidly. I loved how much respect both these guys had for each other’s music. So many guys I know in the business have a very similar take on things. Of course all those differences are going to make the sparks fly something fierce between these two.

Everything everyone thought about what was going on underneath between these two’s antagonism for some many years just had to be the case. You’re going to snipe that much it’s only because you’re jonesing for something more and covering it up big time. I loved how it took them some time to get their gut reacting out of the way and really get to talk to each other. And I adored Ash’s band’s reactions to everything. Such a crack up! There was so much smoldering tension under these two at first that settled into the perfect opposites attract scenario that just plain worked.

I have to say I loved the added portion to this story. It really fleshed out Ash and Jackson’s relationship and really dealt well with the reality of what coming out would do to Jackson. Sure this is a story of all’s well that ends well, but first everything had to come crashing down around Jackson’s ears. I ADORED how supportive Ash was at the scenario Jackson found himself in. I think this story felt so much more complete seeing how things worked out even over this short term time period. It really left me feeling like Ash and Jackson could make it and the changes going on for both of them were all for the positive.

Sure there’s not a ton of angst in this story, but you know what I just don’t care. This is a wonderful happy read that flows brilliantly. I could re-read this over and over again. This takes me into a world I adore and with fantastic characters I want to indulge in more and more. I loved how Jackson and Ash’s two worlds blended together with Ash learning about Jackson’s family and living on a ranch, and Jackson being taken in by Ash’s band. Somehow what shouldn’t all work together does. I don’t want to call this story light and fluffy because there are some deep emotions being dealt with, but everything is told with such a warmth and you just know it’s all going to come out right. Sometimes reading that is exactly what you need.

A+++ for me! Simple fast read that I know I’ll love for ages to come. :D
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