Review: Enjoyable read
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 29, 2014
I received 'Artist’s Touch' from the author through the Goodreads M/M Romance Group’s Don’t Buy My Love program for an honest review.This story is told in third person through the eyes of both Wallace ‘Wally’ Harte, a writer, and Kenon Alavi, an artist.Wally is a struggling writer that works as a bartender.  He is extraordinarily good looking, supposedly nave, and has very low self-esteem. His low self-esteem is one of the things I didn’t understand in this story. I couldn’t understand where he got it from or why he thought that way. The only conclusion I could come to, is that he was poor and struggling. When he compared himself to how much Kenon had achieved, Wally would start beating himself up in comparing his achievements. The other was that he thought no one like Kenon would ever want him other than as a play thing. In this case he was correct, but only at the beginning because Kenon did develop feelings for Wally. I did like the added characteristic the author gave Wally that he hated confrontation and tended to run away when things got stressful. It was a realistic way to add tension to the story.The author did a good job of making Kenon annoying, because I really disliked him at the beginning. He was a jerk and a user. As the story goes along the reader starts to get glimpses of why Kenon is the way he is. I think the author did a good job of pacing the revelations of why Kenon was a jerk.There was a lot of sexual tension with Kenon coming on to Wally then backing off. I can see how Wally got confused. It was an interesting cat and mouse game that was played.I absolutely loved the world the author created with the concept of ‘The Guild,’ a place where male artists, I’m guessing many of them, if not all, were gay, could get together in a very creative atmosphere. I can see why someone like Wally would be completely envious of a world of creative minds like that because I was getting excited just reading about it.The only problem I had with the story was the last chapter, when Kenon and Wally have their talk about what happened at the party and where they’d go from there. All of a sudden Kenon sounded like a soft spoken woman. He got all chatty about his feelings and didn’t talk like the Kenon we’d been reading previously. I just couldn’t get it out of my head that it was a woman speaking which ruined a lot of the makeup scene for me. Also Wally seemed to forgive Kenon too quickly, making the ending seem rushed.I enjoyed this story; it was a fast, easy read with very few editing issues. I liked the MCs and the ‘The Guild.’ The things I had issues with were the last chapter and Kenon sounding like a female and that the makeup scene felt rushed. Other than that it’s a good book. I give this 4 Stars.