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Glad Hands
Glad Hands Angelia Sparrow & Naomi Brooks Chuck rolls his rig across the no-longer-United States, from Montana to Arkansas. He expects a fast run with no complications. What he doesn't expect is Seven, a pretty blue-eyed drifter who turns not only his head but makes his blood boil. His gayness tattooed into his very skin, Seven needs Chuck's help to escape the very limited life Heartland forces upon him. And when the even more repressive Confederated States take an interest, Chuck and Seven are in for the ride of their lives.
199 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 1, 2009
3 people are currently reading
69 people want to read
About the author
Naomi Brooks
49 books11 followersNaomi Brooks has been writing since age 9 when she wrote a short story about giants that won a school contest. She continued on, writing Twilight-esque angst in high school, and later Star Wars and Highlander fan fiction in college and beyond. She went pro in 2006, collaborating with Angelia Sparrow.
While she's not trying to tame plot bunnies, Naomi enjoys PC gaming. She as a well-established neighborhood in the Sims 2 and a level 80 blood elf warlock in World of Warcraft (For the Horde!). She also adores her cat, though the sentiment is not exactly mutual.
While she's not trying to tame plot bunnies, Naomi enjoys PC gaming. She as a well-established neighborhood in the Sims 2 and a level 80 blood elf warlock in World of Warcraft (For the Horde!). She also adores her cat, though the sentiment is not exactly mutual.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 10, 2010
I saw this while scanning through the Literary Nymphs reviews and although very rarely do my tastes coincide with the reviews on the site, there is a plethora of reviewed books to peruse. So I was excited and pleased to find a book by authors I recognized set in a pseudo dystopian universe. It’s rather short at only 126 (including title pages, etc) so I knew I could read it quickly and easily. There was quite a bit of potential in the premise of this story and I was confused and disappointed that the authors seemed to deliver on very few aspects.
In 2091 in the world the authors created, the United States no longer exists, as we know it. Instead, various states have succeeded from the union and formed their own countries, governments, and regulations. The best analogy I can give is imagine the US becomes similar to Europe. Some of the countries are religious and racist, particularly the Confederate States – what we know now as the deep south; the West Coast, known as the Pacifica is more liberal and accepting to other race, religions and sexual orientations and so on.
Chuck Hummingbird lives in Seattle and drives a long distance rig. He’s of Cherokee decent and is “two-spirited”, in other words, he’s gay. He’s generally an easy-going guy with a surprisingly cheerful and upbeat personality. Nothing really seems to get Chuck upset or angry, which is slightly weird. He agrees to make a risky trip into the extremely conservative Confederate States when asked by the tribal council to do so. Although the country is well known for it’s shady laws allowing the execution of anyone not white for a variety of made up offenses from being out after dark to looking at the ground, the tribal council asks non-white Chuck to make the risky and potentially fatal trip.
Chuck goes to lengths to ensure there is nothing that he could get caught with or be accused of during the ill-fated trip, yet he doesn’t even think twice about picking up a homeless hitchhiker, Seven, who has been obviously abused and misused, tattooed with an “H” to mark him as homosexual. Nor does Chuck have second thoughts about having unprotected sex with this clearly abused and much younger boy. Chuck has a history of picking up strays, implied homosexual strays, ostentatiously to help them have a better life, but the connotation is almost as if Chuck commonly has sex with these boys he picks up, which is frankly creepy.
Seven, however, is a good character and perhaps the only fully realized aspect of the book. As the book is told almost exclusively from his point of view, his motivations and reasoning are best explained and understood. When caught with the mayor’s son in flagranto delicto, aka giving the boy a blowjob, Seven is whisked away to an asylum to be “cured” of his mental disease. He suffers two years of horrendous treatment and even going so far as electroshock therapy and then one day is unceremoniously released with no identification, no money, and no ability to get a job or home. The government ensures the tattoo and lack of records brands Seven as a deviant with no prospects. The months since his release have been hard, scrounging for food and being abused for something as simple as a shack to live in. Yet throughout it all, Seven retains his almost childlike innocence and hopeful nature. Almost unbelievable that through all his experiences he’s not become cynical and hardened, still clinging to his religious beliefs and the sometimes harsh memories of his youth.
When Chuck picks up Seven, the book started to take a turn for the worse that it never recovers from unfortunately. From their immediate sexual escapades, which they later paid for, to Chuck’s arrest and almost execution and then to their life together in Seattle; the story has a very uneven pace and a disjointed storyline. The entire CS escapades had a lot of buildup of predictable tension, then let down and slow pace only to ratchet up the tension to let it down quickly again. The resolution was over in a blink of improbable action with no further mention at all as the duo meander back across the various countries once more. There are also introductions and asides to characters with no connection to the storyline, which was confusing.
Ultimately, Chuck fell flat as a character as nothing at all bothers him. He is constantly happy, even dancing to his death, and all opportunities where his character could have depth and intensity were glossed over and ill written. Although Seven was the brief shinning point of the book, the story was too inconsistent with a very uneven writing style and jarring point of view changes. The duo of authors did not merge their styles very well into a cohesive, easy flowing story. The only two times Chuck gets upset in the story were baffling and confusing as I was felt like Seven, what did he say wrong? Furthermore what made Seven special for Chuck to want to marry him? Clearly Seven was suffering from a hero-worship and gratitude to the older man for saving him, yet the family and belief system Chuck offers him is not really that welcoming and comfort inducing. Chuck’s parents are standoffish and clearly against Chuck marrying Seven, due to his race, while the various therapy seasons for Seven seem counter-productive.
Without a doubt the authors knew about trucks as there was an incredible amount of detail, almost too much, but clearly the long distance trucking was an integral part of the characters and their lives, not simply a prop. The premise of the world and storyline was intriguing and had entertaining moments, although sometimes I clearly did not get all the jokes. The characters would often be laughing with such mirth and hilarity that they would cry tears of laughter, yet I was left wondering why I didn’t get the joke. Neither the situation nor dialogue was funny enough to fit the hysterical laughter that the characters dissolved into.
I wanted to like this book with the premise so full of possibility and potential. However the lack of a smooth and cohesive voice in combination to the uneven pacing had me frustrated. Added to that with the problematic characterization and simply improbable, yet predictable “action” subplot left this book firmly in the miss category for me. More time spent on the story arc and careful attention to editing would have improved it, yet several people did love the book so take my review with the proverbial grain of salt.
In 2091 in the world the authors created, the United States no longer exists, as we know it. Instead, various states have succeeded from the union and formed their own countries, governments, and regulations. The best analogy I can give is imagine the US becomes similar to Europe. Some of the countries are religious and racist, particularly the Confederate States – what we know now as the deep south; the West Coast, known as the Pacifica is more liberal and accepting to other race, religions and sexual orientations and so on.
Chuck Hummingbird lives in Seattle and drives a long distance rig. He’s of Cherokee decent and is “two-spirited”, in other words, he’s gay. He’s generally an easy-going guy with a surprisingly cheerful and upbeat personality. Nothing really seems to get Chuck upset or angry, which is slightly weird. He agrees to make a risky trip into the extremely conservative Confederate States when asked by the tribal council to do so. Although the country is well known for it’s shady laws allowing the execution of anyone not white for a variety of made up offenses from being out after dark to looking at the ground, the tribal council asks non-white Chuck to make the risky and potentially fatal trip.
Chuck goes to lengths to ensure there is nothing that he could get caught with or be accused of during the ill-fated trip, yet he doesn’t even think twice about picking up a homeless hitchhiker, Seven, who has been obviously abused and misused, tattooed with an “H” to mark him as homosexual. Nor does Chuck have second thoughts about having unprotected sex with this clearly abused and much younger boy. Chuck has a history of picking up strays, implied homosexual strays, ostentatiously to help them have a better life, but the connotation is almost as if Chuck commonly has sex with these boys he picks up, which is frankly creepy.
Seven, however, is a good character and perhaps the only fully realized aspect of the book. As the book is told almost exclusively from his point of view, his motivations and reasoning are best explained and understood. When caught with the mayor’s son in flagranto delicto, aka giving the boy a blowjob, Seven is whisked away to an asylum to be “cured” of his mental disease. He suffers two years of horrendous treatment and even going so far as electroshock therapy and then one day is unceremoniously released with no identification, no money, and no ability to get a job or home. The government ensures the tattoo and lack of records brands Seven as a deviant with no prospects. The months since his release have been hard, scrounging for food and being abused for something as simple as a shack to live in. Yet throughout it all, Seven retains his almost childlike innocence and hopeful nature. Almost unbelievable that through all his experiences he’s not become cynical and hardened, still clinging to his religious beliefs and the sometimes harsh memories of his youth.
When Chuck picks up Seven, the book started to take a turn for the worse that it never recovers from unfortunately. From their immediate sexual escapades, which they later paid for, to Chuck’s arrest and almost execution and then to their life together in Seattle; the story has a very uneven pace and a disjointed storyline. The entire CS escapades had a lot of buildup of predictable tension, then let down and slow pace only to ratchet up the tension to let it down quickly again. The resolution was over in a blink of improbable action with no further mention at all as the duo meander back across the various countries once more. There are also introductions and asides to characters with no connection to the storyline, which was confusing.
Ultimately, Chuck fell flat as a character as nothing at all bothers him. He is constantly happy, even dancing to his death, and all opportunities where his character could have depth and intensity were glossed over and ill written. Although Seven was the brief shinning point of the book, the story was too inconsistent with a very uneven writing style and jarring point of view changes. The duo of authors did not merge their styles very well into a cohesive, easy flowing story. The only two times Chuck gets upset in the story were baffling and confusing as I was felt like Seven, what did he say wrong? Furthermore what made Seven special for Chuck to want to marry him? Clearly Seven was suffering from a hero-worship and gratitude to the older man for saving him, yet the family and belief system Chuck offers him is not really that welcoming and comfort inducing. Chuck’s parents are standoffish and clearly against Chuck marrying Seven, due to his race, while the various therapy seasons for Seven seem counter-productive.
Without a doubt the authors knew about trucks as there was an incredible amount of detail, almost too much, but clearly the long distance trucking was an integral part of the characters and their lives, not simply a prop. The premise of the world and storyline was intriguing and had entertaining moments, although sometimes I clearly did not get all the jokes. The characters would often be laughing with such mirth and hilarity that they would cry tears of laughter, yet I was left wondering why I didn’t get the joke. Neither the situation nor dialogue was funny enough to fit the hysterical laughter that the characters dissolved into.
I wanted to like this book with the premise so full of possibility and potential. However the lack of a smooth and cohesive voice in combination to the uneven pacing had me frustrated. Added to that with the problematic characterization and simply improbable, yet predictable “action” subplot left this book firmly in the miss category for me. More time spent on the story arc and careful attention to editing would have improved it, yet several people did love the book so take my review with the proverbial grain of salt.
Read
May 19, 2009The setting is the same of a previous book by Angelia Sparrow, Nikolai, there is even a reference to a character in that book, but the feeling of this book is completely different; Nikolai was dark and gothic, I remember that I said it was not a romance. Instead Glad Hands is a classical love story with the nice add that one of the characters is a trucker, a profession that Angelia Sparrow knows well and so she describes it in a very accurate way. There is neither too much angst, an element that usually abounds when one or both characters are young.
Chuck Hummingbird is a Cherokee and he lives in the Tribal Lands, an independent territory inside of what it was once the United States of America. Tribal Lands is quite a good place to live, the territory didn't go back in time like other places, there is more freedom for people to be as they like, as for gays that are recognized members of society, but more freedom means also more crime. But from living with a bit more crime and not living at all, since in the Confederacy of South they kill homosexuals, Chuck thinks he is pretty lucky. And with his job as a trucker and his chance to travel the country, he sometimes picks up stray here and there, mostly kids who were kicking out of their home.
Seven is one of those kid. He is not so young, he is 20 years old, but he went through a very bad experience; in Heartland where he lived, an uber religious place, they still believe that they can heal the gayness from their kids, and Seven was sent in an hospital to have his "therapy". Now he is scared and skittish and he has a tattoo on his hand that prevents him to find a honest job and start a new life. And so he is thinking to leave and like a knight in shining armor arrives Chuck on his truck.
Chuck and Seven go along well since the first moment; it's obvious that circumstances make Seven falls in love with Chuck: he is his savior and he is also the first openly gay man he has met; with Chuck Seven finds again the family he lost, and there is no way that he will let him go. I don't know if meeting Chuck in a different situation would have the same result, but probably yes, since Chuck is really a good man and also very handsome (I always have a fondness for long black hair Native American style).
The book is almost divided in two parts: the first one is a road story, with Chuck and Seven who are too busy to run away from hostile territories to indulge in more than kisses and something more, but it's also the time when their relationship cemented in something more than friendship. The second one is spent with Chuck and Seven trying to find a way to make things work between them, and doesn't matter if this is a futuristic tale, the problem they face are exactly the same of an ordinary couple with more the issue from being from different cultures.
There is sex, but not so much as you would expected from an Ellora's Cave romance; the sex is something nice that happen between Chuck and Seven but it's not something absolutely necessary in their relationship, and so when they can't have it, it's not the big problem that would be in so many other books that base their existence mainly on it.
The futuristic part of the book is not so heavy and if not for the prologue (that leads you think that the futuristic setting would be more important) and the way in which gays can live in Tribal Lands (probably an hope for the future), the story would have had not a problem to be a contemporary: there are no special effects, on the contrary, this futuristic world is almost gone back to the past instead of proceeding toward the future.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0030N6DOQ/?...
Chuck Hummingbird is a Cherokee and he lives in the Tribal Lands, an independent territory inside of what it was once the United States of America. Tribal Lands is quite a good place to live, the territory didn't go back in time like other places, there is more freedom for people to be as they like, as for gays that are recognized members of society, but more freedom means also more crime. But from living with a bit more crime and not living at all, since in the Confederacy of South they kill homosexuals, Chuck thinks he is pretty lucky. And with his job as a trucker and his chance to travel the country, he sometimes picks up stray here and there, mostly kids who were kicking out of their home.
Seven is one of those kid. He is not so young, he is 20 years old, but he went through a very bad experience; in Heartland where he lived, an uber religious place, they still believe that they can heal the gayness from their kids, and Seven was sent in an hospital to have his "therapy". Now he is scared and skittish and he has a tattoo on his hand that prevents him to find a honest job and start a new life. And so he is thinking to leave and like a knight in shining armor arrives Chuck on his truck.
Chuck and Seven go along well since the first moment; it's obvious that circumstances make Seven falls in love with Chuck: he is his savior and he is also the first openly gay man he has met; with Chuck Seven finds again the family he lost, and there is no way that he will let him go. I don't know if meeting Chuck in a different situation would have the same result, but probably yes, since Chuck is really a good man and also very handsome (I always have a fondness for long black hair Native American style).
The book is almost divided in two parts: the first one is a road story, with Chuck and Seven who are too busy to run away from hostile territories to indulge in more than kisses and something more, but it's also the time when their relationship cemented in something more than friendship. The second one is spent with Chuck and Seven trying to find a way to make things work between them, and doesn't matter if this is a futuristic tale, the problem they face are exactly the same of an ordinary couple with more the issue from being from different cultures.
There is sex, but not so much as you would expected from an Ellora's Cave romance; the sex is something nice that happen between Chuck and Seven but it's not something absolutely necessary in their relationship, and so when they can't have it, it's not the big problem that would be in so many other books that base their existence mainly on it.
The futuristic part of the book is not so heavy and if not for the prologue (that leads you think that the futuristic setting would be more important) and the way in which gays can live in Tribal Lands (probably an hope for the future), the story would have had not a problem to be a contemporary: there are no special effects, on the contrary, this futuristic world is almost gone back to the past instead of proceeding toward the future.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0030N6DOQ/?...
June 20, 2011
The story started promising but went downhill fast.
Too smooth,predictable,sweet...meh...
Too smooth,predictable,sweet...meh...
January 3, 2013
This story definitely had a good element of action. It was right in the middle of the story so I did have a few moments after the big action sequence where I waited for or expected something else to happen/go wrong.
I know some people have issues with insta-love and with one character being the big strong and the other being the gooey-eyed devoted, but I really liked those aspects of this stories.
Both characters have some serious prejudiced histories to overcome. I did have an issue with Chuck bursting out in anger at Seven at one time and feel that it really came from nowhere even though the authors lead us to the water and explained it to us afterward. I just really seemed so out of character for Chuck to lash out like that. Seven seems to deal with his trauma and new situations realistically and fairly well.
I have to say that the lukewarm reactions by Chuck's parents when Chuck proposes to Seven, though probably natural for parents of even a 35-year-old, put a bit of a damper on the HEA.
I think in some ways this story could have been more fleshed out or should have been shorter. There seemed to be many demonstrations of how wonderful and amazing a man Chuck was for no other reason than letting us know that.
3.5 stars.
I know some people have issues with insta-love and with one character being the big strong and the other being the gooey-eyed devoted, but I really liked those aspects of this stories.
Both characters have some serious prejudiced histories to overcome. I did have an issue with Chuck bursting out in anger at Seven at one time and feel that it really came from nowhere even though the authors lead us to the water and explained it to us afterward. I just really seemed so out of character for Chuck to lash out like that. Seven seems to deal with his trauma and new situations realistically and fairly well.
I have to say that the lukewarm reactions by Chuck's parents when Chuck proposes to Seven, though probably natural for parents of even a 35-year-old, put a bit of a damper on the HEA.
I think in some ways this story could have been more fleshed out or should have been shorter. There seemed to be many demonstrations of how wonderful and amazing a man Chuck was for no other reason than letting us know that.
3.5 stars.
July 27, 2013
My first read of this type... I was curious. Done in good taste. A female writer doing this kind of story... I was a bit skeptical but it works. I do not particularly like the futuristic aspect of the story I felt it took away some of the easiness I expected at the start. A very acceptable book.
January 28, 2011
A little slow at first but gets better!
March 6, 2012
Well, if I ever need to know how to drive a truck, I'll just read this story again. ugh. If they could just take out quite a bit of that, I think it would have been a great story.
October 12, 2014
4.5 Stars
July 26, 2012
See Kassa's review.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews