Title & Link: You’re Welcome. Love, Your Cat
Author: Clancy Nacht & Thursday Euclid
Cover Artist: P.L. Nunn
Publisher: Loose Id
Buy Link: You’re Welcome. Love, Your Cat
Genre: Contemporary M/M Romance
Length: Novella (121 pages)
Rating: 4.5 stars
A Guest Review by Sammy
Review Summary: Two men reach beyond their own insecurities to find a love that may very well last a lifetime.
Blurb: Since vowing celibacy over a decade ago, history professor and classic car aficionado Edwin Blais’s only comfort has been his dead partner’s cat, Francesca. When she gets lost, Edwin’s beside himself…until he meets the man who found her.
Cat-lover and mechanic Forrest James is a Roman sculpture brought to life, old enough to run a successful garage but not old enough to forget the secrets of a painful childhood.
Edwin’s lonely, and a straight man poses no threat to his vow. Soon he’s going to the garage every night after class. Forrest’s quiet friendship is healing Edwin’s broken heart until a night of mind-blowing sex changes everything. Edwin can’t deny his growing feelings, but a relationship between them seems impossible.
After Edwin uncovers the mysteries behind Forrest’s tough exterior, he’s forced to choose between a lost love and an unexpectedly tender new love who needs Edwin more than he ever could have guessed. Only by dealing with their tragic pasts can either forge a future. Will they find a way to do together what neither could do alone?
Review: Two exceptionally wounded men meet by accident when Edwin’s cat escapes the pet sitter’s home and is found by the local mechanic. Each of these gentleman hide a deep self-loathing that springs from very different sources but smacks of one unifying reason: guilt. For Edwin, it is the loss of his husband and the resulting realization of how little love and care he demonstrated for his man that keeps him mired in self-condemnation and the resolved to be celibate for the rest of his days. Forrest, on the other hand, has that horribly wrong self-hatred that only a sexually and physically abused person can claim. Both men wring out every ounce of compassion a reader has available each time they proclaim themselves unworthy of the other.
You’re Welcome. Love, Your Cat by Clancy Nacht and Thursday Euclid is a story of base survival and hopeful healing. It is also a classic case of miscommunication and second guessing. Edwin is hopelessly drowning in the idea that at the age of 42 he is old–well beyond the age of anyone like the hotter, younger, more physically beautiful Forrest could ever want around. Forrest is beaten down with the notion that his being gay is evil, that due to abuse at the hands of his stepfather, he is ugly and tainted goods and sure that given his meager education and blue collar job he could never appeal to a college professor such as Edwin. And so these two dance around each other, with an attraction so fierce they nearly explode with desire when in close contact.
In the last two paragraphs I have merely begun to unwrap the many layers of this story and touched only briefly on the cast of characters that are introduced. There is so much to this story and I must admit that the authors do a tremendously good job of unpacking each new piece to the plot and together build a story that is quite lovely to read. Perhaps the only real problem with this novel was its beginning. It is difficult to get around how much Edwin’s self-pity darkens everything he does. Forty-two is hardly ancient and the idea that he is such an intelligent man and yet still thought to impose this punishment of celibacy upon himself seemed a bit much to believe, particularly when it is later revealed how much he enjoyed rough sex and looked outside his marriage to find it.
Also, while the character of Susie, Forrest’s sister, really added to the story line and made for a truly touching and important sub plot point, the addition of Edwin’s stepbrother, Thoreau, left me cold and just a bit disgusted. In short, where Susie was compassionate and caring toward both her stepbrother Forrest and his lover Edwin, Thoreau was an ass who took great pains in giving Edwin his opinions on what an jerk he felt his stepbrother had been in the past.
These were the real problems that kept me from giving this novel a full five star rating. Truly, the writing was seamless and this team of authors knows how to tell a good story. Overall, I really enjoyed this novella and will look for more work from this winning combo. You’re Welcome. Love, Your Cat by Clancy Nacht and Thursday Euclid was well worth the read despite its minor glitches!
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