Rating: 
Title: No fear in lover
Author: Jamie Graig
Genre: Contemporary romance
URL: Samhain Publishing
Price: US $3.50
Other Information/warnings: Explicit m/m
Summary [from the publisher]:
Weston Scott is happy with his simple, quiet life in a small English village. Yet he is haunted by deeply closeted yearnings, a secret he has shared with only one person. His best friend, Mark. As a constant reminder to guard his own heart, Weston wears an emerald ring on his hand.Mark Goudy has a secret of his own, one that drove him to live far away in London rather than betray his best friend’s trust: He’s always been in love with Weston. Now he’s back, but not for a friendly visit. Mark’s through denying his emotions.And if he can manage to slip that ring off Weston’s finger for one night, he’s sure things will change. For both of them.
My review:
Seducing the untouchable – the virgin, the priest, the sworn sacrifice etc – is a well-established trope in romance, and so is friends becoming lovers. This is a story about both. The friendship side works better than the untouchable aspect, because Weston (an implausible name for an Englishman) can resist everything but temptation. His anguish after he does the deed was convincing enough, but it’s hard to take a priest or his vows seriously if his angsting before he commits the sin consists of three minutes of lip-gnawing while his lover preps him for fucking.
This story is just shy of 60 pages long, and 45 of them are sex scenes. The actual plot is pretty thin, but fine for what it is, as is the sex. I’d really have liked more about both men, more lead up because the very shortness of the narrative involves a lot of telling rather showing about Weston’s devotion to his vocation, Mark’s life away from him and so on. There’s far too many declarations of love, and the dialogue doesn’t strike me as authentic – they just talk too much for English guys.
However, this is a well-edited, well-written example of erotic romance. Mark and Weston are likeable enough, and Weston’s conflict realistic, if a little late in coming. If you want a short story that hits the notes it’s aiming for, then you might find this the one for you.
