Really enjoyed this.
I'm clearing drafts from On Top Down Under. This review was written in February of 2019 but never published on the site. I'm publishing it here instead.
Long review for LONG book, sorry.
James, a thirty-three-year-old banker, goes to the casinos every couple of weeks with his three best friends. Those weekends give all the guys a break from their mundane and sometimes stressful lives. One runs a coffee shop, one's a security guard at James' bank, and the other one is a teacher at a private school. They each have their reasons for wanting to get away a couple of times a month.
James, the only gay man of the four, is lonely. It's been a long time since he's been with anybody and he's finding himself having some pretty hot fantasies of handing over all control to another man. The fantasies are pretty vivid. During one of the casino weekends with his buddies he sees somebody across one of the crowded casinos who takes his breath away. This isn't just some nice looking guy. It's somebody who has James almost making a fool of himself to try to get to. When he loses him in the crowd he's convinced he'll never see him again. That changes hours later when James sees the same man outside through his hotel window. He rushes downstairs and does meet the guy, but it doesn't quite go as James hoped. They crash into each other, with James ending up on the ground with a hurt elbow. The other man is rude to him and they go their separate ways.
You'd think after that particular encounter that James would forget his little fantasy of knowing the guy, right? Wrong. The next week he can't stop thinking about him. It's almost to the point of obsession. Instead of taking the following weekend 'off' from the casinos as he'd normally would, he books a room strictly so he can try to find the young man again.
Yes, it was bit creepy and on the stalkerish side.
They do meet again when James comes up on him being hassled for standing outside a restaurant. James swoops in and saves the day, and ends up taking the man, who calls himself Lucky, to dinner in the same restaurant. Of course, Lucky is convinced that James isn't doing it out of the kindness of his own heart. He's been on the streets for a couple of years and has seen it all. If a man is doing something nice for him they're usually expecting a blow job or more in return. Not James. James just wants to help him even if he does have a major crush on Lucky.
After spending hours with each other - with Lucky waiting for the shoe to drop - James takes a chance. He asks Lucky to come home with him. He'll have a bed, three meals a day, and a home for the first time in a couple of years. James knows it could be dangerous - he knows literally nothing about Lucky other than he's homeless - but he can't stop himself from making the offer. He just knows he can't let him go. Surprisingly, though it may sound like it, none of it is written where James comes across as a pervy creep.
Lucky (Lucas, Luke), takes James up on his offer. He's not had a real home since he was forced to run away from his father and new stepmother two years before when he was seventeen.
James finding out that Luke was only nineteen went about as well as could be expected. James started feeling like a pervy creep.
James was more than a little naive when it came to Luke. He knew absolutely zero about him yet he invited him into his home. This could've ended so badly for him but it's a romance so there you go. :)
Luke doesn't sit around doing nothing while James works all day. He takes on projects around the house and keeps himself busy while also doing it as a thank you to James who has been nothing but kind to him. Each day, they get closer. It eventually turns sexual and James is finally able to confess his need to give up control. Luke has no problem jumping right into his role and taking charge.
A lot happens in this book - it is over 500 pages - but it's mostly watching the two men as they slowly become a couple, even if James is weird about the age difference. There's also Lucas meeting James' family and Lucas dealing with his own family issues. I liked most of the secondary characters but I wasn't a big fan of James' friends. They often came across as selfish and inappropriate.
I adored James' mother and other family members.
Luke's story comes out little by little and the reader is able to see why he ran away at seventeen and never went back. There's some drama at one point with his jerk dad, but it was necessary for the story, and didn't last too long.
Lucky/Luke/Lucas never came across as needy. He was proud and wouldn't accept help without being able to give something back in return and I'm not referring to sexual favors. I liked James well enough but he often came across as a lovesick puppy.
I love books with characters who have big age differences. There are 14 years between this two. But... normally if there's a teenager with a 30-something man I find the teen to be a little whiny and immature. That wasn't the case with Luke at all. I did kind of feel it with James though, which surprised me a little.
The sex, though it's not on every other page, was written well. I eventually saw these two as a couple, not just one man helping another out in other ways.
I can't say I really had any issues with this book other than maybe the length, but I did find it odd that Luke seemed really experienced when it came to sex with James if he'd never been with a man before. I also ended it curious to know how Luke was able to survive during the two years he was homeless.
There's a short epilogue that takes the reader down the road a little bit. The epilogue was necessary.
I liked how the author wrote Luke's homelessness. He was sensitive without it being too much.
Overall, a nice read. Long, but still a good story.
I love the cover.