Guest Review: Shades of Dreams by T.A. Chase

T.A. Chase
Shades of Dreams
Amber Allure, 2010

Backblurb:
Stephan Colby is on top of the world. He’s the lead singer of one of the hottest new rock bands, and his best friend is in the band to share the success as well. In addition, Stephan’s madly in love. Yet Fate has a cruel way of kicking a man in the teeth, and when Stephan’s world crashes down around him, he turns to his Rock, his bandmate, the one man who has always been there for him.

Rocky Sanicily has always had Stephan’s back, and they’ve been through a lot together. Rocky has also been in love with Stephan for many years, but has never found the courage to admit it. When Stephan suddenly loses the most important thing in his life, however, Rocky must do everything in his power to keep Stephan from giving up. If he succeeds, will he be able to finally tell Stephan how he feels? And if so, will it bring the friends closer together, or tear apart their relationship forever?

Genre & Keywords:
M/M, Paranormal, Unrequited love, Friends to Lovers, Grief

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Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Heat level: 2 out of 3 flames
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*THIS REVIEW MIGHT CONTAIN SPOILERS*

Guest review by Lis:

Sex, drugs and rock 'n roll and some cuties who charm the pants right of you. The ingredients for a good book. Well except maybe for the drugs *wink*. Shades of Dreams is among the latest of releases by celebrated author T.A. Chase. It started life as a blog story, but after a couple of weeks the story was pulled in favor of a complete story. I for one, was very glad with this!

However, the story did not quite turn out the way I thought it would or expected from this author. The story starts with a bang, right in the thick of things when Stephan hears his lover died in a car crash. Rocky is almost literally his rock in this hard time. At this point I really felt for Stephan. To lose someone you love so dearly and so unexpectedly? But Stephan's grief is not the main focus in this story. It is ever present for a long while in the story, but the focus is more on Rocky and his hidden love for Stephan. Still rivers run deep after all. Stephan is very oblivious to this... though he is the only one.

While I like stories with a little drama and unrequited love, there were several things that did not quite work for me. The switch between Stephan and Rocky from friends to lovers is rather sudden. While they were childhood friends and Rocky's been in love with Stephan for some time, they became lovers while Stephan was still in his grieving process.
Of course the transformation was nudged by a helpful ghost and that made the process easier to accept, but from Stephan's perspective it was rather sudden.

My other problem with Shades of Dreams has much more to do with the development in the oeuvre of this author. T.A. Chase is fast becoming a one-woman-book-factory. Her stories now lack the quality of her earlier books. She seems to be caught up in circular narrative: the way she writes her stories and her characters are fast becoming almost similar to her other stories. Her characters are quite often not unique, like they used to be and the sex is almost always the same as in previous books. An erotic scene from Shades of Dreams is very similar to say Bastet. While her writing is not bad, in fact it is better than some other authors, it lacks appeal.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed reading Shades of Dreams, but it lacked the usual Chase-oomph! It is a story about how love finds a way and does not always have to be hopeless.

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Linking:
T.A. Chase’s website | weblog | on Goodreads
Buy Shades of Dreams here

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Review of Out of Bounds and High Line by T.A. Chase

T.A. Chase
Out of Bounds (The Love of Sports, #1)
Samhain Publishing, April 2008
Genre: Gay | Sports | Coming Out
Rating: êêê½
Heat level: ¹¹

Out of Bounds is the first of two books about being gay in the macho, heterosexual world of sports. The books are connected by the protagonists, the twin brothers Kasey and Garrett Johnson. Kasey is the hero in this first story, Garrett in the second. Kasey is a professional basketball player and not publicly open about his homosexuality, unlike Garrett. Nightclub owner Gram is hot for Kasey for a long while but he’s not sure about Kasey’s sexual preference. When he decides to make a move on him, he discovers Kasey finds him attractive as well and they end up having passionate sex. In a very short period of time they become emotionally involved while they are having a lot of sex.
I think that maybe the many sex scenes elbowed out the emotional stuff a little bit. Things went a bit too fast for me: it seemed that one moment Kasey didn’t want to go public at all and the next he impulsively did just do that. The buildup of the pathos wasn’t well enough dosed. But I did like the characters; especially Kasey was portrayed as a hot and sweet guy, whose actions did match up with his kind and tender nature. He bottomed in all the love scenes, while he was the larger and taller of the two guys. Gram is a likable character as well but his feelings don’t change much and he doesn’t have issues to figure out, as Kasey does. So his role is of minor importance.
Kasey’s brother Garrett is introduced in Out of Bounds, which is nice because he’s the protagonist of the second book, High Line (look after the Back Blurb for more about that story).

Back Blurb:
Can a sexy nightclub owner convince an all star basketball player to risk it all?
Love of Sports Book 1
Professional basketball player Kasey Johnson makes a point of keeping his sexual preference under guard and out of the public eye. Empty, off-season flings are all he can look forward to until he retires. He figures his secret is safe—until he meets Ingram Fletcher, a nightclub owner who ignites a passionate inferno in his body.
Gram has lusted after Kasey ever since the long, tall basketball player was traded to Phoenix a year ago. But with Kasey’s twin brother running interference, up until now Gram’s been unsure if it’s safe to make a play. Then some incidental contact in the crowded club leads to a kiss that starts Gram wondering if a relationship is possible—now, and beyond March Madness.
A romantic weekend together answers that question. Now the only one remaining is if Kasey is ready make a fast break out of his comfort zone.

Warning: This title contains explicit sex, graphic language, nekkid man love, creative usage of chocolate, whipped cream and strawberries.

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T.A. Chase
High Line (The Love of Sports, #2)
Samhain Publishing, February 2009
Genre: Gay | Sports | Coming Out
Rating: êêêê½
Heat level: ¹¹

After Kasey’s story in Out of Bounds, High Line tells his twin’s Garrett’s. He is the gay twin who is out of the closet since he was 15 years old. As an actor he leads a rather public life. When he meets racecar driver CJ Lamont doing research for a new film, it’s lust at first sight. But CJ is married and Garrett has a boyfriend. Both have problems in their current relationships and after a month of spending time together they share a passionate kiss after which they each go their separate ways. Only after almost one year they meet again. CJ is divorced and Garrett broke up with his cheating lover. Plus CJ’s ex-wife outed him as gay. This can ruin his racing career and when CJ meets Garrett he’s not prepared to admit his sexual preference yet. But the attraction for Garrett is still there. And with small steps at the time the two men explore their feelings for each other. This is done in a nice and slow pace. Where Out of Bounds went to fast in the pathos department, High Line was much better paced. Both CJ and Garrett have each their own issues to deal with, which make them more equal heroes than Gram and Kasey were in the first book. Garrett is sweet and tender and CJ is adorable with his insecurities about his life but confidence about his attraction for Garrett. Their sex scenes are hot and tender. And their growing feelings of love are believable. T.A. Chase did a better job in this second book, which has twice as much pages as the first, in portraying the heroes, showing their feelings, dosing the sex and the love moments and building the anticipation.

Back Blurb:
Will giving him the green flag lead to love…or heartache?
The Love of Sports Series, Book 2
CJ Lamont is at the top of the racing world but his winning record is based on a carefully constructed lie. His world falls apart when his ex-wife reveals the truth. As he hits rock bottom, rescue comes from an unexpected source—Garrett Johnson, Hollywood’s hottest leading man.
Garrett’s acting career is taking off, bringing him accolades he’d never imagined. Good friends and family keep his days hopping, but watching his twin brother fall in love exposes the emptiness in Garrett’s life created by the betrayal of his ex-lover.
Garrett offers CJ a place to heal and a shoulder to lean on, telling himself it’s only to keep CJ from taking a more destructive path. But as time passes, the two men grow closer and CJ realizes he has a decision to make—whether to rebuild his fictitious life, or admit to loving a man who shines brighter than the Hollywood stars.
Will he reach for the star or sink back into his old life?

Warning: This title contains hot man love, sticky situations with honey, fast cars and faster men.

T.A. Chase's Bound by Love

T.A. Chase writes a lovely story about two kind but hot cowboys. I think that cowboys are perfect characters for a steamy romance, even when it's a gay romance. Tyler and Ren are deep characters with a well worked out history, they bring therefore some issues into the relation which makes it a good read. But, not unimportant, their attraction and encounters are also pretty steamy. They appear to be a perfect match in bed - although they don't necessarily need it to get satisfied, Ren likes to be in control and Tyler wants to give up control in bed. So there's a little spanking and binding. I rate Bound by Love with 4 stars. And I added two other novels of T.A. Chase to my wishlist: Out of Bounds and High Line. These are book 1 and 2 in the Love of Sports Series, about the gay twinbrothers Kasey and Garrett Johnson.

Back blurb: Two cowboys fall in love. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.
Tyler Newsome is heading home to the Lazy N, tired of the rodeo and tired of always being his charismatic twin’s shadow. It’s time he gets a life of his own—and maybe the man he’s always dreamed of, too.
Ren Alston’s always been attracted to Tyler, but never made a move because of his own mental and emotional baggage. But after years spent taming his demons and gaining control in every aspect of his life, Ren sees the younger man’s return as a sign of good things to come.
But first, they have to deal with Tyler’s twin, past indiscretions and Ren’s brothers. Will these cowboys manage to build a strong foundation of trust and love? Or will their problems be too much for them?

Product Warnings: Explicit manlove. Hot naked cowboys, caramel sauce, spanking, whipping and a new twist on the old fashioned roll in the hay.