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So Hard: m/m first time erotic romance
Saying goodbye is just so hard...
Barely an adult, Evan has one more night left until he hops on a plane and moves to England, where his life as a university student will finally begin. There's just one thing holding him his best friend Eric. Ever since they kissed on a dare, Evan hasn't been able to get the athletic, charming Eric off of his mind. Now, it's the night of his own going-away party, and Evan has one last chance to tell Eric how he feels. All he has to do is be honest. After all, Eric is his best friend, and saying goodbye with words just won't be enough...
Barely an adult, Evan has one more night left until he hops on a plane and moves to England, where his life as a university student will finally begin. There's just one thing holding him his best friend Eric. Ever since they kissed on a dare, Evan hasn't been able to get the athletic, charming Eric off of his mind. Now, it's the night of his own going-away party, and Evan has one last chance to tell Eric how he feels. All he has to do is be honest. After all, Eric is his best friend, and saying goodbye with words just won't be enough...
18 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 22, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 17, 2020
No feelings at all and very fast plot.
The boys are fucking with each other like they never did something else ...
It's not really a "First Time Romance"
The boys are fucking with each other like they never did something else ...
It's not really a "First Time Romance"
December 30, 2023
BLAND & CONTRIVED
I always say, it's not the plot, but how you tell the story that really matters. This one didn't tick any boxes of everything it promised to be.
First of all, it's meant to be erotic; secondly, it's got "first-time" romance in the title; and whatever faint traces of plot in this is supposed to be Best Friends-to-Lovers themed. From the way they were presented as BFFs, to how they transitioned (if you can even call it that) to lovers, to how it's supposed to be their first time, and how it's supposed to be erotic, it just falls flat on all counts. I think it boils down to the very Tell-and-Not-Show presentation. We're just "told" they're best friends over and over again, but we hardly ever get "shown" how and why. Then before their "super close friendship" is even properly established: BAM! they're having sex already. Even the tiny amount of angst that is squeezed into that somewhere is hard to relate to because again, the audiences were hardly given anything to work with, enough to feel invested in them as best friends. Stranger still, they're supposedly teenagers who're getting physically intimate for the very first time with a guy (MC wasn't even sure his LI swung that way until an hour ago that day), but amazingly, the sex plays out like a scene straight out of a porn channel—they miraculously know exactly what to do and how to do it, like they're suddenly professional porn actors—not even a second of doubt or cluelessness passes between them about how to go about it, heck! They even go hardcore right away – with anilingus and all (something even many gay couples who have sex often don't get into), and it's like they've done it at least a dozen times before because they're experts at it already (so I'm not sure where the "innocent first-time romance" fits in here?). The way the act is narrated was also painfully perfunctory: each step is described like they might as well be strangers who hired each other for a one-night stand, it almost reads like an instruction manual on the plainest, most basic points of sex by rote. There're no tender moments, no fragility of long-suffering feelings finally pouring out, it just feels like something they need to do because… well, reasons. Certainly not because they're in love. More of like because they won't see each other for a long time and they're desperate to have sex because they're horny (I actually didn't even feel the lust, to be honest; it was that drab). (Oddly enough, before this, they had not seen each other in 3 months—even if they're supposedly best friends and one is on the verge of leaving—and this "time gap" is never explained.) Yet, there's nothing sexy or passionate—or even desperate! about the way they "made love" either (yes, they're teenage-best-friends-turned-insta-lovers, but they use "make love"; I wouldn't bat an eye if they were long-term sweethearts or of a more ripened mature age, but teenagers having sex for the first time who just decided they were in love an hour ago? That's… weird). So, no, it actually wasn't even remotely erotic. If anything, it felt contrived.
The premise is supposed to be touching and sweet, but nothing is connecting feelings-wise, so it was just one of those stories that felt like it dragged on longer than it actually was and I couldn't stop checking how many pages to go because I wanted to just be over with it already. I think if this story went through a reliable beta-reader or copy editor, all of the above could have been nicely ironed out and this might have better succeeded in what it was trying to be.
Got this for free on Apple Books. This did not entice me to read more from this author, but who knows? I might give it another go, someday.
I always say, it's not the plot, but how you tell the story that really matters. This one didn't tick any boxes of everything it promised to be.
First of all, it's meant to be erotic; secondly, it's got "first-time" romance in the title; and whatever faint traces of plot in this is supposed to be Best Friends-to-Lovers themed. From the way they were presented as BFFs, to how they transitioned (if you can even call it that) to lovers, to how it's supposed to be their first time, and how it's supposed to be erotic, it just falls flat on all counts. I think it boils down to the very Tell-and-Not-Show presentation. We're just "told" they're best friends over and over again, but we hardly ever get "shown" how and why. Then before their "super close friendship" is even properly established: BAM! they're having sex already. Even the tiny amount of angst that is squeezed into that somewhere is hard to relate to because again, the audiences were hardly given anything to work with, enough to feel invested in them as best friends. Stranger still, they're supposedly teenagers who're getting physically intimate for the very first time with a guy (MC wasn't even sure his LI swung that way until an hour ago that day), but amazingly, the sex plays out like a scene straight out of a porn channel—they miraculously know exactly what to do and how to do it, like they're suddenly professional porn actors—not even a second of doubt or cluelessness passes between them about how to go about it, heck! They even go hardcore right away – with anilingus and all (something even many gay couples who have sex often don't get into), and it's like they've done it at least a dozen times before because they're experts at it already (so I'm not sure where the "innocent first-time romance" fits in here?). The way the act is narrated was also painfully perfunctory: each step is described like they might as well be strangers who hired each other for a one-night stand, it almost reads like an instruction manual on the plainest, most basic points of sex by rote. There're no tender moments, no fragility of long-suffering feelings finally pouring out, it just feels like something they need to do because… well, reasons. Certainly not because they're in love. More of like because they won't see each other for a long time and they're desperate to have sex because they're horny (I actually didn't even feel the lust, to be honest; it was that drab). (Oddly enough, before this, they had not seen each other in 3 months—even if they're supposedly best friends and one is on the verge of leaving—and this "time gap" is never explained.) Yet, there's nothing sexy or passionate—or even desperate! about the way they "made love" either (yes, they're teenage-best-friends-turned-insta-lovers, but they use "make love"; I wouldn't bat an eye if they were long-term sweethearts or of a more ripened mature age, but teenagers having sex for the first time who just decided they were in love an hour ago? That's… weird). So, no, it actually wasn't even remotely erotic. If anything, it felt contrived.
The premise is supposed to be touching and sweet, but nothing is connecting feelings-wise, so it was just one of those stories that felt like it dragged on longer than it actually was and I couldn't stop checking how many pages to go because I wanted to just be over with it already. I think if this story went through a reliable beta-reader or copy editor, all of the above could have been nicely ironed out and this might have better succeeded in what it was trying to be.
Got this for free on Apple Books. This did not entice me to read more from this author, but who knows? I might give it another go, someday.
August 17, 2018
Fun, quick read that escalated very quickly. Maybe a bit too quickly. I would've preferred more intimacy and not a scene out of an adult film. But that being said, I can understand every part of this story. The heat of the moment, the raw emotion, the passion, the friendship.
“But things will still be different,” he said. “You’ll move to England, and you’ll make friends with smarter, better looking people, and…”
“And what?” I said.
Eric shrugged. “And forget about me?"
Favorite part from the story.
“But things will still be different,” he said. “You’ll move to England, and you’ll make friends with smarter, better looking people, and…”
“And what?” I said.
Eric shrugged. “And forget about me?"
Favorite part from the story.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews