Reviewed by Kimberley

TITLE: Love Lies Bleeding

AUTHOR: Remmy Duchene

PUBLISHER: Wilde City Press

LENGTH:  149 pages

BLURB:

When literature professor Anderson Williams arrives late to a father/son date to find his father dead, his world collapses around him. Now not only is he mourning his father, but he’s scared for his life while trying to make sure his father’s face doesn’t become one of the thousands of cold cases in some dusty room. Then he meets NYPD detective Leo Sung Kim and he isn’t prepared for his body’s reaction to the cop.

Sung Kim’s seen horrible things as a cop. But the latest serial killer is worse than anything he’s encountered. To make things worse, he’s instantly in lust with Anderson which makes staying professional almost impossible.

Even as Leo fights his emotions, the killer gets bolder. When the smoke clears, Leo could not only lose his heart but his life.

REVIEW:

There are many things I liked about this book. The first was the interracial aspect. I adore interracial couples and Duchene has this wonderful habit of featuring couples with at least one man of color. As a woman of color, it’s really important for me to read about gay black men being portrayed as loving, strong, sexy, intelligent men as opposed to the stereotypical homo-thug, rude boys that has become somewhat popular in the African American/Afro-Caribbean LGBT communities. Not only that, she makes these men EQUAL. The MM writing genre, although wonderful, is lacking when it comes to ethnic diversity and that is a bit disheartening. There needs to be, and I would really love to see, more ethnically diverse characters, sans the stereotypes of course, featured in this genre.  Duchene, along with author Sharita Lira are trying to fill that void. Love transcends skin color, ethnicity and gender and Duchene shows that through every one of her books.  Both of the men in this relationship are strong, caring, compassionate and passionate alpha males with both men giving as good as they get. Another great thing is that Duchene does NOT fall into the literary trap of stereotyping her characters whether they are black, white, Asian or Latino, etc…. You would never know that these men are of different races and when it is mentioned, it’s in a matter- of -fact manner and is only mentioned as a way to provide that particular character’s physical description. She doesn’t dwell on it at all. That is a like a breath of fresh air to me.

This isn’t the first book that I’ve had the pleasure of reading from this author. Of all the books I’ve read, this one is my second favorite with Again being the first. The book starts off a little slow but quickly picks up by the third chapter. Anderson’s and Leo’s characters are well developed and written. I really appreciate how she wrote their dialogue without all of the ridiculous stereotypical slang or Ebonics and whatnot. She presented a character who is a professor so it makes sense that his dialogue fits his character. The story flows nicely and even though I was able to figure out who the killer was pretty early on in the story, I still enjoyed watching it all play out. She didn’t drag the story out unnecessarily. She simply put it on the plate and served it the people. The ending, in my opinion, could’ve used a bit more spice, a bit more ‘umph’ if you will, but it wasn’t bad at all.

Duchene has definitely come into her own as a writer and simply gets better with each book. The editing, which has been a struggle in past, has improved tremendously. This author was always able to tell a great story; it was just the editing that did her in every time. She took the critiquing of her work with grace, absorbed it, learned from her mistakes, and applied that new knowledge to her writing. And believe me, it’s showing in the work. She is growing as an author and honing her craft. I cared for these characters, felt for both Leo and Anderson, so much so that I’ve made them both my ‘book boyfriends’. This book is definitely worth picking up.

Rating:  

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