Short Order: Foothills PRIDE, Pat Henshaw

While not just a Christmas story, it revolves around the holiday and has a heavy Christmas feel to it despite trying to be more about the couple than the holiday itself.  It does a good job of bringing together two men who might ordinarily have nothing to do with one another but falls short with the voice of the story and the overall plot.

There were some deep issues as well as disturbing things that took place and they came off as merely events in the story's overall flow rather than pivotal moments or catalysts for change.  I felt disconnected from the characters and the story as if the narrator were an observer who knew Fen's mind rather than Fen himself.  I liked him in the beginning and had high hopes for his character to be quirky yet very down-to-earth.  I didn't know John at all and we get the events of his life but even after the intense reveal I still don't feel drawn into his life and him as a person.  The two men are good for one another and I can see a lasting romance.  I say that but I still feel detached from them in general.

Also, all the sexual situations are intimated and referred to rather than described so there's pretty much no steam in the story at all.  With Fen's honesty and attraction I was expecting something different in this regard but this is also my first book by this author so maybe that's just their style and I'm not aware of that.

So the story was good overall but I wasn't captivated as I was hoping to be.  This is more of a 2.5 stars rounded up situation but I can't fault the story for my expectations, only what I think might be missing or not quite enough based on what's actually there.  With that in mind, I'm rating this book a mostly solid 3 stars here and on all my usual review sites.

*$3.94 on Amazon!