You Never Know

I adore Mary Calmes and her writing, but this, for me, was a case where her signature first person, single POV did not serve the story well.

I love a good Second Chance Romance story, but I'll admit I'm a hard sell with them too. Especially when forgiveness is necessary. I require a lot of groveling, and it's easier to see how truly sorry someone is if their POV is included.

Hagen Wylie and Mitch Thayer met when Hagen was fourteen and Mitch fifteen. They became best friends and eventually lovers with a plan for the future - Mitch who was a year older would go to college and a year later, when Hagen graduated, he would follow, they would get an apartment and live happily ever after.

As you can tell from the blurb - that didn't happen.

Instead Mitch went on to football greatness in the NFL and Hagen joined the Army and went through hell and back.

Once Hagen returned home to Benson, Oregon, after he took some time to heal from the worst of his physical injuries, he started a new chapter of his life as a contractor with a sterling reputation for thinking outside of the box and making beautiful things. Hagen has a whole host of good friends, a booming business, and a fuck buddy in Hollywood-up-and-comer Ashford Lennox. While he suffers with "PTSD that presented as panic attacks, insomnia, reoccurring nightmares, and emotional distance" he still has a great life and he's ready to possibly open his heart again.

Then Mitch Thayer returns.

For me, I really needed to see Mitch's side. Even though he eventually apologizes, and does so a few times, I wanted an explanation of what the hell happened that first year of college. I wanted to know what drove him to discard Hagen so cavalierly and to throw away the "love of his life".

I needed that. Not having it made me unable to really get behind Mitch and root for him and Hagen together. Because it felt like he'd just hit a point in his life when the football was over, was established in his new career and could use someone in his life and so now Hagen was worth pursuing again. I just - Mary did a great job of making me mad at Mitch - and it took me a really long time to get over my mad.

But Mary has a way with painting a story and this time is no different. In the end I just wanted to see Hagen be happy and we get his blissful HEA in the end.

Normally I like Mary Calmes. However, I found this book boring. Mitch's response to leaving was shallow, empty, and vapid.

Foremost, I don't belong to a book club. I'm a gay male, middle-ages. I was not provided a free copy to write a review. Now that THAT is out of the way....

Bravo, Mary Calmes! Bravo!! A wonderful slow-burning love story, that doesn't read like porn in 90% of each chapter. Not at all formulaic, as some mass producing authors. Rich characters who ticked all my boxes. Mature, professional, real-life dailies....and the development of maturing character traits we love to see in gay men.

Here's to a successful sequel! 😉

REVIEW BY: Trio at Kimmers' Erotic Book Banter http://bit.ly/2w0aCn4

'You Never Know' is an awesome dose of the good old-fashioned Mary Calmes I love and didn’t realize how much I needed til I started reading this book!

Trying to make a life for himself back in his home town, Hagen Wylie has a lot to overcome. Scarred both physically and mentally from his service in Afghanistan, the last thing he wants is the return of his first love, Mitchell Thayer.

After seventeen years of no contact, Mitch is back in town and he wants Hagen back. Hagen resists but, as we Mary Calmes fans know, restoring their relationship is exactly what both these characters need.

Calmes spends a good deal of time at the start of this book establishing Hagen’s character. Told in the first person, we really get to understand the man he is now, as well as the man he is trying to be. Hagen knows he needs psychiatric help to deal with his PTSD and that he has serious trust issues after being abandoned by Mitch, he’s just not ready to deal with either yet.

Hagen has resisted long-term relationships until he hooks up with Ashford Lennox early in the story. These two try to make it work, but Hagen’s abandonment and trust issues keep cropping up and complicating things with his belief everyone will eventually leave him.

And then Mitch Thayer comes back to town...

I love Hagen’s internal dialogue. He is a strong character, and it is beautiful to watch him work his way through the story.

Calmes does an excellent job weaving the reminiscences in with the present and showing how much time has changed each of these guys.

The magic happens when they relax into the playful banter that Mary Calmes writes so well and it’s plain to see the attraction which drew these two together; and the love and affection that kept them together through high school.

'You Never Know' was a pleasure to read and had me rooting for all three of these guys. I totally fell in love with Ash; and since he and Hagen remain friends, I’m hoping he’ll get his happily ever after in a future novel.

3.5 Stars ~ I've always found it very soothing to read this author's work. Her stories are always romantic, regardless of genre, interesting, have fabulous dialogue, wonderful secondary characters, strong - even when they're vulnerable - main characters, and a plot I can easily allow to consume me. It's no wonder she's been a favorite since I read her for the very first time. Needless to say, I settled in for a great read when I picked up ‘You Never Know’.

The first thing that struck me was the easy, seamless banter between the residents of this not-so-small town on the Oregon coast. Granted, Hagen went to school with these people so being able to rib one another was second nature. I liked Hagen. A lot. Immediately. He was just so… there, in the moment, and the way he talked to himself, in his own mind, kept me highly amused. The fact that he went through something unimaginable while serving in the military, and yet, he was, for all intents and purposes, still able to be the good man he always had been, I found rather remarkable.

“But it was like when you heard a song or caught a scent and you were instantly transported back in time, and for me, it was worse because if there was anyone in the world who could maybe restore normalcy to my life—it was him. My trust in Mitch, in who he was, how he knew me in ways only a lover did, had not changed. If only I could be sure my heart would be as safe with him as the rest of me.”

It's the last line from the above quote that has Hagen really doing a lot of introspection after he sees Mitch again. There's no question the physical heat is still there, but Mitch doesn't seem to know what Hagen went through in the military, and how it changed parts of him. Both men have a lot of relearning to do about one another. Seventeen years is a long time to not have spoken and each man has changed from the young, first love they shared. (It was remarkable, though, how some things never change.) Hagen has no idea how determined Mitch is and Mitch has no clue the wall that Hagen has around his heart because of Mitch. Of course, it doesn't help Hagen that Mitch has two of the cutest kids I've seen in a while.

A very lovely book that definitely lived up to its promise. I would have definitely preferred far less time spent with Ash and more between Hagen and Mitch, but all in all an easy romance about coming home.

NOTE: This book was provided by Dreamspinner Press for the purpose of a review on Rainbow Book Reviews