Needful

Remastering Jerna #3

by Ann Somerville

A perfect storm of unfortunate events - a sick child, schoolyard bullying, malicious gossip, and the interfence of a former lover - are driving Jerna and Ria apart. But as they struggle to keep their relationship alive, Ria's old friend, Orlan, becomes a murder suspect, and Jerna, Ria and Sila must put personal needs aside to clear Orlan's name and stop more women being killed.Illness in Jerna's family has put his relationship with Ria under massive strain, but just as he hopes to rebuild things, school bullying threatens both his older daughter's happiness and his precious time with his lover. Ria struggles to understand the needs of a father and his children, but when Ria's former lover, Orlan Gomici, turns up, his mischief making puts Ria's relationship with Jerna under even more stress.Annoyance turns to anxiety when Orlan is suspected of multiple murders, and his newest lover - Sila - comes under attack too. Jerna, Ria and Sila must put personal needs aside and work together to clear Orlan's name and stop more women being killed.This work is a sequel to "Games & Consequences", and is the third and final book of the "Remastering Jerna" series.

Genres: M M Romance, BDSM, Erotica, LGBT, Romance, Adult Fiction, Mystery

262 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Ann Somerville grew up in one of Australia’s prettiest small cities. In 1989, she left Australia with a BA and a burning ambition to see more of the world and its people, and to discover this ‘culture’ thing people kept telling her about. In 2006, she returned home to Southeast Queensland with two more degrees (this time in science and IT), an English husband and a staggering case of homesickness, vowing never to leave Australia again.

Her long, plot-driven fiction featuring gay and bisexual characters has been published by Samhain Publishing and elsewhere.

Reviews

[Emma Sea · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oh, sad :-(

I was so excited to get this book, but I didn't even like it very much (actually if I'd read book 2 before I ordered this I probably wouldn't have bothered).

Jerna is out of prison, but I wished he was back in, as he is now merely holier-than-thou and annoying. He's in this whole TPE ship with Ria, but ignores him and makes Ria feel not just unimportant, but in the way.

Jerna needs to read some texts on 'good enough' parenting. You can't teach children to be whole, happy, healthy adults if you spend your own adult life pretending to be someone you are not.

This is another whodunnit, without sex. How can this be a followup to Remastering Jerna when it's so completely different in style and content?

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, just as I always do Ann's writing. I can understand some of the other reviewers disappointment on it not being like Remastering Jerna, but that didn't bother me at all. I enjoyed seeing what all my favorite characters were up to. I found the lack of sex refreshing. It seems almost all m/m I read these days throw in gratuitous sex scenes that serve no purpose. My only complaint was Jerna being completely unfair to Ria in the first half of the book. Even with all that was going on, it seemed a disconnect from what we know of his character in the past books. Still, by the middle that was all resolved. And the mystery part was a little predictable, but fun to read nonetheless.

[Michael Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

This third book in the Remastering Jerna series doesn't quite live up to the first two, but it is still a pretty good mystery, despite a few flaws.

The full review can be found at my blog.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ok read

If you’re looking for a sequel to Remastering Jerna that explores further that world and culture this isn’t it. This is more like a crime mystery set in Jerna’s world with many of the same characters. To be honest it’s not my favorite genre and focused a lot on new characters i felt were kind of “meh”. Also, o new world building of note.

Not saying it won’t appeal to others more. As always this author has her writing mechanics down. Just disappointing to me.

[Jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slash Readers : Alright, so my first though upon seeing the cover more closely is that I don't think the cover goes at all with the book. The knife doesn't appear until the very last couple chapters of the book and the rest... (not to mention can I say Joker? That's what first popped into my head with the makeup) Anyway, one more example of a book that feels like the artist designing the cover had no idea what the book was about. Though it does make for a creepy cover. This book was not overly creepy, truth be told.

This story focus on the main characters from the previous novels with Sila making appearance as well as one of Ria's old lovers Orlan Gomici. I honestly still can't decide whether I like Orlan or not. There are moments where I thought he had hope and others where... but then again since I like Jerna and Jerna dislikes Orlan, I suppose I was a little biased against him.

I felt like this book was not quiet as neat as the last two books. In some ways this one had a lot more parallel's to the second book. The first and second books worked well together, the third one made the wrongfully accused, set up and framed plot feel a little over used. I did enjoy the problems and watching Jerna and Ria work through their personal issues and family issues. Though--I can't believe I'm saying this--but I wish there had been a bit more spice there, a couple of sex scenes.

Still on the whole, the book was not bad and I did read in two days to find out what was going to happen. Most of what I said in the terms of the over all for the last book still applies. But it was fun. If you like the first two books, this one is worth reading but then I get hooked on characters and want to read everything that has anything to do with them... so. *shrugs*

I hope the weekend treats you all well.

[Isabel · Rating 3 out of 5]

got mixed feelings about this trilogy. It starts with the life of a submissive that gave up his BDSM life in favour of the woman he loves and later his children.

All based in a fictitious world with a similar technology and more suppressive laws, where a person loses all human rights once goes to prison.

Jerna actually goes to prison after being falsely accused of paedophilia by a 17 years old pupil. From there is a trip through the inhuman prison system, which he avoids becoming a whore in a exclusive brothel.

Then he is hired by Tolomi, a Dom who doesn't have a clue about what D/s is. All of this on book one. Once his relationship with Tolomi becomes a proper D/s interaction, we follow both of them with their lives. Jerna being bisexual, is not ready to sacrifice his wife and children, but neither wants to lose his Dominant lover.

The series are a bit misleading. We get nice scenes on book one, barely a few on book two, and none at all on book three. As more characters appear in the books, their stories take over Jerna and Ria's and at the end the series don't have any similarities with the beginning, which is disappointing as I was looking forward to the BDSM side of Jerna and Ria's relationship, which is nonexistent in book 3.

I also found the whole thing too naive, characters very two dimensional, lacking some kind of depth in them. Here people actually are 100% good or 100% bad, which turns to be boring.

Despite all of this, I kind of enjoyed it as I would enjoy comfort food, just following a straightforward plot with good and bad people who never deviate from their goodness/evilness, it's like playing pac-man after having a 6 hours raid with other 10 people in World of Warcraft.

[Tamela · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a little harder to read because Jerna and Ria were having problems. Jerna's home life was causing him to have to spend more time at home with his girls. His youngest was recovering from cancer and so he was feeling guilting spending time with Ria when his family needed him.

Ria was feeling like he wasn't really needed at all. That he was just there on the fringe of Jerna's life and didn't really belong anywhere.

When his old friend and lover, Orlan, turns up and begins causing trouble I feared that it was cause a breach but Jerna finally really looked at what was happening to Ria and took the time to reach out.

The trouble this time falls on Ria's friend and everyone works together to try and solve the horrific murders and the assault on Sila.

I also began to feel very sorry for Warim as it seems that his lovely hotel was being pulled into each of these cases and this time was one of the reasons for the problems between Orlan and his wife.

[Sam · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was not for me, but don't let that stop you.

I liked Remastering Jerna (1) a lot, so I guess I got dissapointed at the series continued; I just don't like Police dramas, so it just failed to convince me.
I just got bored, although it was a decent book and I liked the characters very mad.
It was not for me, but don't let that stop you.

[Page Crusherz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maybe it was reading it too soon but I had to finish. Same as the last, I felt compelled to read the series, but I didn't enjoy it. Again, not because of the writing, but I didn't care for all of the characters.

[Roxana Rangel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just love it. The triology is amazing. It is not only about M/M romance its more, have drama, romance, tragedy, mystery. A must read without a doubt.

[France-Andrée Lafrenière · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't understand the bad comments about this book. I think it was a great conclusion to a very good serie. I loved it, loved to have Ria's point of view. I loved Jerna's universe.