Review: Different and original take on a sub/dom story.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 08 7, 2013
This story is so well written that I kept going back to re-read the beginning chapters a couple times before I could move on to finish the entire book.  The evocative ambience of Ben's simple life really sets the opening stage of the book.  He is a hard-working college student who lives in the tiny flat above the rowing club and pays for his lodgings and club membership by waking before dawn to open the boat house and get everything set up for the day, and to clean the building and store away the boats at night.  He goes out and practices rowing in the cold foggy mornings before his day of classes.  As the book progresses he meets the dark and dangerous Lucien Thorne, an English lord who is a former Olympic rower and owner of a great manor house.  Lucien chooses Ben to replace his retired rowing partner, but his interest is in more than sports.  Lucien is a domineering man who likes control, but also a caring and protective boyfriend.  I've read dozens of 'D/s club' books lately, I don't know if authors are writing more of them or if I've been reading more, but this is a completely original take on that sort of relationship.  Those books were occasionally rather derivative and repetitive, but this takes the relationship out into the real world which made it fascinating.  Another good book by this author is "Mountain Rescue".  At first glance, I thought, "Sports, augh..."  but the rowing scenes are really fascinating and make you want to get out on a river yourself. ;)Quote:"""Season of mists and mellow fruitfullness, my arse."  Ben shivered and muttered to himself as he unlocked the boathouse door the next morning and peered through fog that would not have been out of place in "The Hound Of The Baskervilles".  The sun was not yet up, and he could feel the heavy dew soaking through his canvas shoes as he pulled upon the large doors that granted access to the boats.""