Reviewed by Donna
TITLE: Lucky Seven
AUTHOR: E.L. Esch
PUBLISHER: Loose Id
LENGTH: 172 Pages
BLURB:
Dante Mathers, college student, fifth year, has a track record for being dishonest with himself, and is about to undergo the biggest, scariest change of his life.
Dante’s forced himself to go out with girls in the past and he does it again when he’s approached by the beautiful Serena one day on campus, desperate to prove to himself that he’s “normal.” But when he loses a drinking contest and is dared to go to the next campus GLBT meeting by his best friend, he’s not sure how to handle it. Sure he could blow it off and say he went, but something nagging at the back of his mind compels him to go anyway. After all, he’s had problems with intimacy in the past and his first crush was a boy in high school. But is he really forcing himself to go, or is he finally starting to be honest with himself? No need to over think this, Dante tells himself. It’ll be get in, get out. No need to talk to anyone. Easy, right?
But then he meets Sven. Sexy, toned, wearing a leather jacket with spiked up bleach-blond hair, Sven’s bad-boy flare sticks out on campus and catches Dante’s eye. But there’s more to Sven than his punkish looks, and Dante’s about to find out all the sultry little details.
REVIEW:
Our prologue begins eight years previous to the remainder of the book, with poor Dante’s first attempt at sex with a girl. Clearly, if his only thought is that her boobs remind him of a water mattress, the experience is not working out so well. It ends in the girl storming out in a snit and with a mortified Dante who is in no hurry for a repeat performance.
Flash forward those eight years and we find Dante finishing up his last year in college. He’s rushing across campus to make it to a GLBTQ meeting when he spots the most gorgeous woman he’s ever seen and is frozen to the spot. He desperately wants to go speak to her but he still hasn’t gotten over those embarrassing nerves when it comes to dealing with females. Now you may ask, why is he going to a GLBTQ meeting if he’s checking out girls? Is he bi? (Just humor me and pretend you didn’t read the blurb!) Nope, he’s attending the meeting on a dare from his best friend and roommate, Greg. Apparently it’s hilarious to make Dante pretend to be gay when Greg believes that his bestie is really straight. Dante, in actual fact, doesn’t identify as straight or bi or gay or any of those other choices that are too numerous to list. What Dante is, is sexually repressed, which is how he finds himself dating his beautiful mystery woman while becoming more and more attracted to a friend-slash-acquaintance, Sven.
Now usually, this type of story leaves me groaning in disbelief. How does somebody have absolutely no idea of their sexual orientation? But this book pulled it off perfectly. Dante’s crazy shyness combined with his past embarrassing experience, his lack of anybody to talk to and his concern over what the answer may be, believably prevent him from ever contemplating the question. He’s not in self-denial he genuinely is confused.
And Sven and Serena don’t make life any easier for him. He’s slowly getting to know Sven, and recognizes an attraction to the other man, but Sven is very hot and cold in his responses towards Dante. One minute Sven is friendly and approachable and the next he’s distant and pushing away Dante’s overtures of friendship. Dante isn’t confident enough to deal with that. Then there’s Serena, who seems interested in spending time with Dante but Dante is uncertain whether his interest is romantic or friendly. It’s obvious pretty early on that there’s something a little dodgy with Serena and I feel the need to brag here – I totally guessed what her deal was.
This story would definitely be classified as slow-burn, but it’s exactly how the story needed to be written. Dante epitomizes the scared virgin and Sven is also pretty inexperienced so a faster paced romance would have been a little unbelievable. In some ways the characters feel a little high-schoolish, but again, that awkwardness usually found in younger people suited both of these main characters and the author managed it without making the story cutesy. While not at all angsty, there was just enough tension to balance out the slow romance.
This is now the second book that I’ve read by E.L. Esch and it definitely won’t be the last.
RATING: 
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