Book Reviews

Book Blurb

Daniel
I suck at relationships and don’t trust anyone, but there are reasons for that. For one thing, every person I’ve ever cared about has let me down. The only recent exception: O’Leary’s town veterinarian...my new best friend.

I came to O’Leary for a fresh start. To pare things down to essentials. To forget about the failures in my past. The last thing I need is complications, and most definitely
Not.
A.
Boyfriend.

Julian
I’ve lived in O’Leary my entire life and learned to fly under the radar a long time ago. I do what’s expected, say what’s expected, and keep to myself as much as possible. It’s a hell of a lot simpler spending my time working with animals than trying to interact with actual people. The one unlikely exception: the gorgeous guy who moved to a cabin just outside of town and somehow became my best friend.

But friendships are complicated, and one morning I find myself accidentally telling the whole town the biggest lie of my life. Which is how Daniel Michaelson, my very straight, very hot best friend becomes my fake boyfriend, even though he’s most definitely
Not.
My.
Lover.

 

Book Review

“Love was this. Love was connection. Love was when your rough corners and missing pieces weren’t imperfections you needed to correct, they were the tabs and blanks on a jigsaw puzzle piece that perfectly aligned with someone else’s and locked you together seamlessly.” ~ Daniel

 

A recent addition to the town of O’Leary, and by recent, I mean the last year, who seems to be a recluse living in a cabin off in the woods, and the town veterinarian are the stars of ‘The Gift’, book two in May Archer’s ‘Love in O’Leary’ series. Daniel is an author who achieved some measure of success in NYC but when his last two books were critically slammed, he ran off to a small town for a sabbatical. Julian is the oldest of three boys, the town vet, and due to some trauma in his past, tends to keep his feelings and real thoughts in check. These two certainly made this book entertaining and fun while visiting some hard truths about being an adult.

 

Daniel is an only child of wealthy parents and it’s not an easy relationship. They were fine with him being a bestselling author until he had a couple of releases that didn’t do well and then they, along with his wife and friends, essentially abandoned him and left him to flounder. In a bit of a dramatic turn, he took off for the woods, not completely unlike Thoreau, bought a small cabin and a rusted old truck, threw his laptop and his phone into a drawer, and just worked on existing. Finding a saw-whet owl being attacked by a murder of crows leads him to the town vet and a fascination he never saw coming.

 

 Julian’s father died when he was in college and unfortunately it happened the same night that they had words. Nothing Julian did or said caused his father’s heart attack, but ever since then he keeps his thoughts and feelings bottled up inside to the point where the whole town describes Dr. Ross as quiet, calm, patient, and understanding. Imagine Daniel’s surprise when he gets a whole different Julian as a friend. In fact, over the course of the story, Daniel gets constantly surprised by different Julians he wasn’t expecting but absolutely loves.

 

There are a number of things that I really liked about this book. I like that portions of it are running concurrent with the first book in the series and I hope that continues throughout as I find the overlapping to be entertaining and it keeps me anchored with the other couples I’ve already read about. I especially like the little tongue-in-cheek that May does in regards to Daniel’s thoughts about being an author and his utter “failure” after having two books not make the bestseller lists. And, I particularly like these two men together along with Daniel’s sexual awakening to another man. Their romance is sweet, a little angsty, and made me laugh out loud more than once. Plus, I learned all kinds of interesting animal facts of which I was unaware. Thank you, May, for this wonderful addition to the series.

 

“But what if… and I know it sounds ridiculously simple, but I cannot express how revolutionary this idea was to me in that moment… what if I could stop reacting to things the way I always had, like the world was out to get me, and just maybe trust that someone could see me beneath my failures and disappointments. I knew I could do that for Julian. Maybe Julian could do that for me?” ~ Daniel

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. This book has been purchased by the reviewer.

 

Additional Information

Format	ebook and print
Length	Novel, 362 pages
Heat Level
Publication Date	04-January-2019
Price	$5.99 ebook, $18.99 paperback
Buy Link	https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MP5RYZN