Rainbow Reviews

BOOK BLURB:
Expectations riding on a generation of young Englishmen are immense; for those who’ve something to hide, those expectations could prove overwhelming.

BOOK REVIEW:

• "Aftermath" by Charlie Cochrane: When shy Edward Easterby first sees the popular Hugo Lamont, he's both envious of the man’s social skills and ashamed of finding him so attractive. But two awful secrets weigh Lamont down. One is that he fancies Easterby, at a time when the expression of such desires is strictly illegal. The second is that an earlier, disastrous encounter with a young gigolo has left him unwilling to enter into a relationship with anyone. Hugo feels torn apart by the conflict between what he wants and what he feels is "right." Will Edward find that time and patience are enough to change Hugo's mind?

"Aftermath" is a story of first love, for both the main characters. Charlie Cochrane writes it in a style that's almost claustrophobic. "Aftermath" focuses closely on Edward and Hugo alone and there are no significant secondary characters. Cochrane's style dramatizes Edward and Hugo's emotions, and the extra focus on the two, without outside characters, greatly exaggerates any feelings between the two. This worked well with the story, since the central conflict in "Aftermath" is Edward and Hugo battling with their emotions, and there are no side conflicts such as dangerous diplomatic missions or impending marriages. I appreciated this style sometimes and was frustrated by it other times. It can get a bit too much, and I did feel claustrophobic and closed in with all the heightened emotional drama surrounding so few characters. I actually took a break from this story and jumped to Rowan's before returning to it again. But some parts of it did work for me.

"Aftermath" is a good start to the anthology, by presenting all the thrill and risks associated with loving another man in a society that rejects all such relationships. Cochrane writes in an appealing style that charges and intensifies the experience for readers. I look forward to his future works.

• "Gentleman's Gentleman" by Lee Rowan: Lord Robert Scoville has lived in a reasonably comfortable Victorian closet, without hope of real love, or any notion that it's right there in front of him if he would only open his eyes and take notice of his right-hand man, Jack Darling. Jack has done his best to be satisfied with the lesser intimacy of caring for the man he loves, but his feigned role as a below-stairs ladies' man leaves his heart empty. When a simple diplomatic errand turns dangerous and a man from their past raises unanswerable questions, both men find themselves endangered by the secrets between them. Can they untangle the web of misunderstanding before an unknown attacker parts them forever?

"Gentleman's Gentleman" is a sort of mystery combined with mild action and romance. Lee Rowan wastes little time on unnecessary details and dives right in to introducing the perils surrounding the jobs that her characters are undertaking. The story has a rushed feel, in the sense that the reader is being whooshed from place to place, train to hotel, and the fact that their assignment changes during halfway through this short story adds to that effect. Overall, I really love this story and I feel it's one of the strongest of the three in this collection.

From the beginning, we find out Robert Scoville and Jack Darling mean more to each other than just superior and officer, or employer and employee. It communicates through to their actions and whether or not either one of them picked up even subtle hints, nothing comes of it because they're afraid their close relationship will be ruined by adding intimacy. This was the main issue they had throughout this story. Even though this is a short story, Rowan takes the time to show how dependent Robert and Jack are upon each other, and I really enjoyed the fact that she added short sections at the beginning and end to show Robert and Jack's friendship ten years before and twenty years after. I also love her ingenious solution to the marriage problem for Robert!

• "Hard and Fast" by Erastes: Major Geoffrey Chaloner has returned, relatively unscathed, from the Napoleonic War, and England is at peace for the first time in years. Unable to set up his own establishment, he is forced to live with his irascible father who has very clear views on just about everything ~ including exactly whom Geoffrey will marry and why. The trouble is that Geoffrey isn't particularly keen on the idea, and even less so when he meets Adam Heyward, the enigmatic cousin of the lady his father has picked out for him ... As Geoffrey says himself: "I have never been taught what I should do if I fell in love with someone of a sex that was not, as I expected it would be, opposite to my own."

"Hard and Fast" departs from the two stories before and is written in first-person narrative, which is perfect for this story. Geoffrey has an attractive voice, and his thoughts run into funny asides about his father and the other characters which added spice to this story. The beginning of it, however, was a little hard to get into for me because of the style it was written in. Here are a couple sentences from the second page:

"It was last spring, the first spring free of war ~ a soldier’s spring ~ and London, though cold as hell, was still resplendent in red and white. It was, it seemed to me, as I drove through St. James’s with my father, as if London had draped itself in the colours of Victory, daring the Corsican to come again if he dared, to strike north and east ~ for London at least was ready for him should he dare."

Some of the first chapter carried on that way, and I thought the numerous use of commas to break up fractured thoughts was a little distracting and confusing. They might simulate how real people think, but those sentences drew attention to themselves and disrupted the flow of the story. It was a good thing for me that this didn't happen as often after the first chapter, and I was easily able to slip into Erastes' wonderful story.

Geoffrey Chaloner is pressured to marry by his father, who's looking to improve their social standing. Miss Pelham is too shy and Geoffrey often finds himself making conversation with her cousin, Adam Heyward. Heyward frustrates Geoffrey because Geoffrey has a hard time guessing his intentions.

The first-person narrative really heightens the feeling of Geoffrey's confusion with Heyward because we're offered no other perspective than Geoffrey's. Heyward is just as hard to figure out for the reader as he is for Geoffrey. At times, his exasperation and his resignation are very intense and this is one of the story's strong points. Erastes can express her character's emotions without turning them into meaningless jumble or resorting to over the top angst.

"Hard and Fast" sets a good pace and is an excellent story, if you lop off the ending. The subheading for the last chapter is, "In which the birds have flown, my father gets a shock and a solution comes from the unlikeliest of sources." It lives up to its promise. To me, the ending is very unlikely.

Despite that though, "Hard and Fast" is a wonderful story and is one of my favorites of the bunch. It's worth reading alone for Geoffrey's addictive narrative voice.

This collection as a whole is thoughtfully put together, with talented authors, and definitely worth reading for any fans of historical romance. All three pieces take place in Europe with a past war playing some sort of role, but they each spin off into unique directions that are wonderful to read. "Speak Its Name" is an excellent anthology and is highly recommended!

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. However, some books were purchased by the reviewer and not provided for free. For information on how a particular title was obtained, please contact us at reviews@rainbow-reviews.com.