Reviewed by Dan
TITLE: Taking a Chance
SERIES: The Restoration Series #3
AUTHOR: A. M. Arthur
PUBLISHER: Carina Press
LENGTH: 262 Pages
BLURB:
The last time Elliott fell in love, his fiancé cheated on him. Now fresh out of rehab, Elliott’s confidence lags behind his libido. Not that that stops him from lusting after the sexy carpenter working on his kitchen—from a distance. He won’t risk his sobriety on another potential broken heart.
As half of an experienced home renovation duo, Augustus expects this job will be easy. Until he sees the house’s tenant, a man he never thought he’d meet—his ex’s other man. Augustus knows he should say something about their secret, shared past, but he’s tongue-tied by their intense, unwanted attraction.
Despite attempts to keep things professional, the two men give in to temptation and forge a genuine connection—and his developing feelings for Elliott leave Augustus in an impossible situation. If he stays, his secret will always hang over the relationship. But telling the truth might send Elliott spiraling to a new rock bottom and cost Augustus the only man he’s ever really loved.
REVIEW:
What happens when two men meet and there is an instant spark between them? Sounds great, right? Well, what if one knows that they shared a man? A man who lied to both of them and then right after one found out, the cheater died? And what if the other man didn’t find out the truth until after the death?
Augustus left his wife when he finally admitted he was gay, and then had a great relationship with his boyfriend Doug for a year, until Doug died as the result of a car accident. Only afterwards did Augustus find out that Doug had a fiancé! And that he has been the “other man” this whole time!
Elliott, who we’ve met in previous books in this series, was Doug’s fiancé. They had been together for a couple years and Elliott thought they were blissfully happy, until he found out Doug had been cheating on him. Rather than give Doug the satisfaction of cheating on him, Elliott turned it around and told Doug he had been cheating on Doug (even though he hadn’t). Doug stormed out and was in the car accident that killed him.
After that, Elliott dropped into the depths of depression, self-hate, and self-destruction. He became an addict, had tons of unsafe sex and attempted suicide.
That is the background. Most of it comes out in this book in bits and pieces, but if you’ve read the previous books in the series you will be aware of most of those facts.
Now we’re up to this story. Elliott is out of rehab and doing great. When the friends he is staying with win a kitchen makeover on one of those home improvement shows, he is thrilled for them. But then the hosts of the show arrive and Elliott is instantly attracted to one of them, Augustus. When Augustus sees Elliott, he instantly knows who he is, because he found pictures of Doug and Elliott after Doug’s death and that is when he found out he was the “other man”.
What will happen when both men are attracted to each other? Will Augustus tell Elliott the truth about who he is?
This was another delightful read from A.M. Arthur! I love this writer’s style, characters, and storylines. The book, as always, was expertly edited. I highly recommend this series, and really everything I’ve ever read by this author!
RATING: 
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Thanks for the review, this looks like something i would love to read. I see that this is part 3 of a serie but i was wondering if you can read this as a standalone or do you need to read the serie in order?