Review: Could Have Been Better
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 03 7, 2014
"Cowboys Down" was a bit of a disappointment for me. I really liked previous M/M books I've read by Ms. Elsborg ("With or Without Him" and "Every Move He Makes") and was expecting her normal literate, evocative and creative work.Don't get me wrong, there's nothing essentially wrong with most of the book - the characters, places, dialogue and exposition are all handled really well. It's the plot itself that presents certain challenges.The most egregious problem is that the book's not particularly unique or creative. British man, Jasper, takes a holiday at a Wyoming dude ranch to try to get out of his totally buttoned-down, up-tight life in London. Immediately upon arrival, he meets Calum, the young adult son of the owner and falls into insta-love (though, as with so many works in this genre, denial continues, unabated, for more than half the book).And therein lies the problem. It's as though Ms. Elsborg either decided to throw every M/M Romance convention at the wall in hopes something might stick, or maybe I'm missing the point, and this book is actually a parody of the genre. Perhaps she was actually writing a gay "Perils Of Pauline"?Imagine a single book featuring a parent with Alzheimers, another who's had two heart attacks by the end of the book, yet another who committed suicide, a sister who's gorgeous, but intellectually challenged, a quadriplegic brother who died young, a gang rape of one of the men, an abduction and attempted murder, the obligatory time in the hospital, a neighbor who is trying to take over the ranch, multiple poisonings... I could go on and on. Unfortunately, the book does go on and on.Although I love Ms. Elsborg's prose, this is that rare book that left me anxiously anticipating it ending. I normally love long books - the longer the better - but all of the incredibly dreadful things that happened took their toll until I started talking to myself: "oh damn, what's left to happen that hasn't happened already?" and "time for a HEA already!" (fortunately the reader does, eventually get one).The sex scenes were sometimes hot, but often just ate up pages at an alarming rate. In more than one case, the reader is treated to an extended sex scene followed by a paragraph or two of development, followed by another interminable romp. One of the biggest cliffhangers in this book is "will he bottom, or won't he"?I'm so disappointed. If I didn't know better, I would have assumed this book was written by someone other than the author, based on the masterful touch and timing of her other writing.Hopefully, this is just an outlier. The characters were interesting enough, the places vivid enough that I'd like to read more about them, as long as the excesses of this book were reined in. This is not her most recent book, and the newer ones seem to be much, much better, so I won't give up on Ms. Elsborg!