Review: Four & 1/2 Stars - Enjoyable, Affecting Non-BDSM BDSM Romance
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 06 14, 2014
While reading this book, I was convinced the author was somebody who had mainly written BDSM romances, like Sindra van Yssel or Ann Mayburn, but was trying here to write a mainstream romantic novel. As both authors are a lot better than the majority of "vanilla" romance novelists, but prefer to turn their talents to kink, I consider that a positive thing. But Natalie Anderson apparently writes vanilla romances herself - so, I'm impressed.The story is about Chelsea, a physically (her leg that was badly hurt in a car accident that cost her the life of her fiancé) and emotionally scarred (she's terrified of bodies of water, even bathtubs, following almost drowning during the car accident while trying to save her fiancé) young woman who meets Xander, a strapping former lifeguard/security systems expert, during a fire evacuation in their building in New York City. Xander has a bit of a Hero Complex (he picks Chelsea up and carries her down many flights of stairs because she's not moving fast enough during the evacuation), which at first annoys her - she moved to NYC to get away from everybody "helping" her so she could prove her self-sufficiency. But she also feels a powerful attraction to Xander, and he to her - though neither is looking for a relationship, and at first she's not even looking for a fling. But Xander, partly to distract her while they're going down the stairs, starts riffing on Superheroes and why they rescue pretty women all the time, and as it turns more into an erotic fantasy Chelsea finds herself getting a bit tingly.So, after he runs into her later and basically smooth-talks her into going out for a bite with him, she says she wouldn't mind playing out his Superhero rescuing and having sex with his damsel fantasy - just this once. That begins a no-strings-attached Role Playing sexual relationship between the two of them - Xander shows up at her door with, by his own admission, a number of ever cheesier fantasies with involve him dominating her sexually, and she silently but eagerly submits to him... every night for a couple of weeks.Even though the RP only once, late in the story, evolves into anything like a b&d; scene (and it's a really mild one, too!), there are a few points in the story where both Xander and Chelsea acknowledge they're in a Dominant/submissive relationship with each other - except Xander finds himself wanting more from Chelsea than just her acquiescence, so he starts to try and find out what's wrong with her so he can help heal her. As matters progress and Xander starts to treat her more as a girlfriend than a play partner, Chelsea realizes Xander's Hero Complex and choice of security as a profession is to mask his own personal demons, which come traumatically to light when, during a RP which she finally initiates (the one that involves bondage, as it turns out!), he loses it after telling her he'll never let her go - and breaks up with her! That's when she realizes she's fallen in love with him, and she confronts him about his fears of turning into his hated, thuggish, insanely possessive father....Though both Chelsea and Xander can be annoying at times, you're always aware that they're fighting their personal fears and root for them to overcome those fears so they can be together. The book's title comes from a recurring thing Xander does whenever Chelsea freezes in terror (usually near water) and stops breathing - he kisses her and breathes in her mouth as he does so, telling her to "Breathe for me....", which the story uses as a metaphor for how two people who need to be self-sufficient learn to rely on each other when they need to.One minor criticism, from someone who lived in New York City for over 25 years - Ms. Anderson's view of NYC is a bit like a cross between the USA Network television series WHITE COLLAR's view of NYC as a glistening urban metropolis, and the wildly fanciful descriptions of exotic lands like India, China and Japan during The Age of Exploration. It's a lovely city they live in, but I'm pretty sure it only bears the slightest resemblance to the New York City I remember....