Blurb:

Always hiding his tormented past along with his scarred body, Kaden James finds it difficult to keep a job. Luck finally turns his way when he finds work as a cook on a Montana ranch, where he meets terrifyingly handsome Logan Michaels. Logan is different from any man Kaden’s ever met, and before long, he finds himself falling in love with the big cowboy.
But Kaden’s nightmares won’t let go of him so easily, and he’s not just jumping at shadows. He has nearly a lifetime of abuse, horrifying memories, and pain addiction to overcome. Can Logan’s gentle touch help Kaden heal inside?

My thoughts: 

In the last few weeks I read a couple of books that were way too short for the story to be told properly, so I was looking forward to reading this novel. I’m all for the tortured hero and all and, God, nobody can be disappointed in that respect. Poor Kaden has suffered a lot during his childhood and it didn’t even stop once he got to Logan’s ranch. This was a bit much, really. Can’t you give the poor man a break? I found the fact that there was another one of those perverts right there on the ranch somewhat disturbing. Talk about out of the frying pan into the fire.

There were a few more things that bothered me about the characters or the plot.

Gay for you

I’m not particularly keen on “gay for you” stories. That point didn’t come across very believable for me at all. Logan never felt anything for a man before and then along comes Kaden. From then on, Logan acted as if it was the most natural thing in the world to fall in love with a “boy” (more to that in bit). He was surprised about himself, admittedly, but took it in stride. How come there was no concern whatsoever about what other people might think when he is all of a sudden in a gay relationship. We’re talking about a ranch owner in a small town in Montana here.  And what about the woman he has been going out with? As much as it is desirable that she understands the sudden switch to men and the resulting dumping of hers (that happened tacitly), is it realistic?

Contradictive behaviour & jealousy

In the hospital first Kaden finds Becca’s father reacting cold towards her. Given the situation that father must be a right ass. Later on however, he acted like you would expect him to react, so what was the cold, detached father thing about?

Logan’s jealousy didn’t sit well with me at all. Somehow that went against his character the rest of the time. When he gets into the hospital room and finds another man touching “his” Kaden he is angry about this. Why? It’s a physical therapist, for crying out loud. The same later again when they are in the recording studio. He wants to lock Kaden away from the world so nobody can steal him away from him? If I was Kaden I’d run as fast as I could.

Christine Feehan for the m/m crowd

One thing that sort of spoiled the story for me completely was the way Logan addressed or thought of Kaden as his “little one” or “the kid”. If you read hetero romance and love Christine Feehan and you feel like trying out m/m, go and read this book! I wish they wouldn’t  have called him a “teen” constantly. OK, he IS a teen technically, but did that have to be mentioned all the time? He is 19 at the start of the book (Logan is 9 years older), and even almost 2 years later he still is “the little one”. Sorry, but he is not.

I love books with a large age gap and I have read books with minors and the young age of characters never bothers me, but this constant focus on Kaden being a boy and Logan being the oh so big, strong adult really rubbed me up the wrong way.

All those things are depending on the individual reader (as almost everything is), so if you like a very tortured and sensitive hero, characters very devoted to each other and  a slowly building relationship this might be for you.