Book Reviews

Book Blurb

Reuben Schiller is just who he is. He may have finally had his diagnosis of something with far too many capital letters, but he takes his meds like clockwork and goes to work and…he’s fine. Honestly. He’s fine with the insane shifts, he’s fine with living with his dad, and he’s even fine with driving his trusty old rust bucket of a car around the fine city of London. It’s all bought and paid for, the car. And Reuben is finally growing up. And feeling it.

Graham Smith may have once been an ordinary teenager, but these days, he goes by The Dieter, the biggest pop star on the planet, and he’s honestly lost the will to actually…live. He’s guarded by a team of ever-changing security guards twenty-four seven in a house he bought on a whim. He hates it. Almost as much as he hates his mobile phone, his bandmates and the goddamn awful vegan grain salad he keeps getting fed for lunch. His life is supposed to be all sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll. Instead, it’s…some kind of unhinged circus.

Reuben’s life is about as rock ’n’ roll as a bacon sandwich. And Graham? Graham just wants everything to stop. Even if it means giving up everything he’s spent the past ten years working for…for a single bed in a council bedsit somewhere in the dodgy part of Peckham.

 

Book Review

Reuben Schiller is a hot mess. He’s in his late twenties, but still living with his dad Stewart, who has even provided him his current job as a doorman in a ritzy central London hotel. All he owns is a battered old car and way too many emotional and mental scars. At least, he has finally succeeded in getting his life on track, more or less. Friends? Zero. Lovers? Same story. But all that threatens to change the day an all-too-well-known face shows up at his workplace. A face hidden by an enormous hoodie to avoid unwanted attention, but one Reuben recognizes nonetheless. It’s no one other than Graham Smith, better known as the Dieter, world-adulated lead singer of the pop group the Blitz. A walking hot mess all by himself, too. Strangely enough, he’s all by himself where normally an entourage of security goons and PAs are swarming all around him. He seems completely lost.

 

What to do? The young man is scared, clueless, fragile like the thinnest piece of china, and only asks for a place where he can breathe for a moment. His life in the limelight has become too much. Reuben being Reuben, he takes the guy under his wings, feeds him, then smuggles him out of the hotel and allows him to sleep in his small bed. That’s what any decent human being would do when seeing someone in desperate need of help. There’s just a small rub. The Dieter, aka Graham, is not only impossible to handle, but also develops a heavy crush on his improbable savior. And Reuben isn’t gay. Not at all. He just likes Graham. For reasons only the Fates understand, they get each other, they know how to talk with each other, they make each other laugh. Deep inside, Reuben knows they make each other happy. But that can’t be. Mustn’t be. Right?

 

This was a novel that drew me in from the get-go. Sophia Soames at her best—two confused, complicated characters who just don’t know who they are, what they want, and where they’re headed in life. In many ways, they’re still stuck in their dreamy idea of childhood, when other people would protect them, guide them, and show them what is what. Yes, they both really suck at adulting, for the simple reason that they don’t want any of that. Being an adult is way too tricky, with too little place for fun and happiness; it’s challenge after challenge, decision after decision. I think that’s what got me in the first place because even at fifty-two, I still rather suck at adulting (I’m improving, though). And I remember all too well how I felt when I was Reuben’s or Graham’s age. Everything seemed possible, both an exciting and scary prospect, but I constantly wished someone else would set things on track, decide, and let me be my messy, irresolute self.

 

The second thing I absolutely loved was that these two characters were meant for each other right from the start. Just the way two negatives when you multiply them become a positive number, Reuben and Graham complete each other. They have lived different lives, different stories, and their current trajectories have nothing in common. But deep down, they’re struggling with the same issues, the same sense of being consistently overwhelmed by the mere weight of existing, the same awareness that they’re not up to the task of what is expected of them. And that creates the strongest of bonds between them. They become buddies, then friends, and finally, finally, finally, lovers.

 

I also appreciated the fact that Reuben’s reluctance to dive into the seemingly dangerous waters of gay love didn’t come from some deeply ingrained homophobia. He’s very open, thanks to his perfectly accepting dad, who might even be seen as the one who pushes him into Graham’s arms. But his lack of experience in the relationship and sex departments makes him shy away from what his growing attachment to the pop singer means. He has learned that with every decision come consequences, and for a long time, he’s not willing to accept those. Only when he throws Graham out of his dad’s flat (out of his life, in fact) does he realize how much he needs the other guy.

 

This was the perfect read for the gray and rainy summer we’ve had here in Paris, so far. Sophia’s easy and easily recognisable style made me forget the dreary, heavy skies outside when I was sitting in the bus or tram. The bitter-sweet story (as always more sweet than bitter because that’s how Sophia writes) sucked me in and made me black out what was going on around me. As always, I loved how messy, contradictory, conflicted everyone was in this novel. That’s what made them so real to me, as if Reuben, Graham, Stewart were people I knew in real life. I can’t wait for book four of this series to be published (yes, book five was out before number four) and unapologetically recommend both author and novel.

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the author. This book has been provided by the author for the purpose of a review.

 

Additional Information

Format	ebook and print
Length	Novel, 269 pages
Heat Level
Publication Date	13-May-2024
Price	$4.99 ebook, $10.99 paperback, $15.99 hardcover
Buy Link	https://www.amazon.com/TRUST-London-Love-Book-5-ebook/dp/B0CXTQ7QBH