Amy Jo Cousins

Jack is the perfect person to get his own story for #2 in this series, Bend or Break.

He was an angry wild man at college so much so he recklessly threw away his prospects.

Fortunately, Tom Worthington and Reese from #1, Off Campus, reappear here too. The touching love story between Jack and Miguel rang with the same pathos as Tom and Reese's story.

I will be working my way through this series.

Once 2 books out of 3 I'd consume were romcoms, but these days I find that edgy stories and characters like this series has are more fulfilling. At minimum the romcom has got to have some edginess, like Isabel Lucero's South River University series, which I'm reading concurrently, for my imagination to be snared.… (más)

I'm very tempted to give this novel another half star, it appealed to me so much.

But I usually feel that way about novels where two isolated traumatised people find each other.

Tom Worthington is the archetypical romantic hero, though his circumstances would indicate anything but. He meets Reese Anders, his "roomie", who brings out his protective streak - he needs to rescue Reese.

But it is Reese who rescues Tom, of course. Tom faces his own demons and blooms under Reese's nurturing streak. I like that Reese calls Tom on his paranoia such as when he confuses his willingness to make people like him, with manipulation of people for an ulterior motive.

I haven't read this author before, but I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the Bend or Break series - all of which are on Hoopla - yeh Hoopla.

All Hail! Cooper North. His voice realises the potential of this novel.… (más)

The conflict occasionally felt contrived, but overall, not a bad story. Not too fluffy, not too deep. I thought this was GFY but Tom was actually bi. It felt like maybe that fact was withheld a little too long? I liked that eventually Tom started pushing back against the bi-erasure.

This definitely needed some editing help as there were practically no dialogue tags and sometimes the speaker indicated by context was actually not the speaker. Frex:

"This is my roomate, Reese. The guy with no filter is Cash. We used to run together." Nostalgia momentarily evoked, Cash turned back to him for a high five. "Run strong, bro." Tom gave a half-hearted smack at his head... The speaker in that last paragraph was Cash even though the actions are attributed to Tom. And you only know that because Tom wasn't really into the fist bump. This is what dialogue tags are for. So you don't need to parse the shit out of the text to figure out what's going on.

Anyway, this is the second by Amy Jo Cousins I've read, but I probably won't be reading another. It's just too middle-of-the-road for me to seek out any more.… (más)

4,5 stars

Best MM Anthology I have ever read.
Good plots very well written, emotion without slush, interesting characters and warm sexiness.

A Very English Christmas by Keira Andrews - 4 stars

Mr. Perfect’s Christmas by Joanna Chambers - 4.5 stars

The Christmas Ship by Amy Jo Cousins - 4 stars

That Thing by Megan Ericson - 4, 5 stars

Just Like Heaven by Suki Fleet - 5 stars

Not Your Grandfather’s Magic by Kaje Harper - 4 stars

Bottle Boys by Anyta Sunday - 3,5… (más)