Reviewed by Vicki
TITLE: Climbing the Savage Mountain
AUTHOR: T.A. Chase
PUBLISHER: Pride Publishing
LENGTH: 171 pages
BLURB:
After conquering the world’s tallest mountain, loving Toby shouldn’t be so scary.
Jensen Brockhoff wins his way back into Toby Schwartzel’s heart, but it won’t be that easy to erase the pain of the past. He has two more mountains to conquer and they’re the most difficult.
Toby understands Jensen’s obsession with the highest peaks in the world. He’s willing to wave goodbye as Jensen leaves on his trips, but he can’t help worrying that Jensen won’t come back. That the lure of the mountains will prove too difficult for his love to fight.
Climbing has always been Jensen’s way of escape, yet loving Toby is proving stronger and Jensen must choose between the man he loves and the passion that saved his life. Will Jensen give up his climbing gear to build a new life with Toby?
REVIEW:
Yeah! I’ve been waiting for this book! I read and reviewed Mountains to Climb (click to see my review) last summer, and it was really just a teaser for this longer story. In it, we were introduced to Toby and Jensen. They had been a couple, then Jensen took off and left Toby without a word. Six years later he comes back to Toby, with a tale of addiction, recovery, and an obsession with mountain climbing. I liked the book just fine, but the story took place over two days, and didn’t really give us a good look at Toby and Jensen. I hoped we might see more of them and finally, my wish has been fulfilled!
Climbing the Savage Mountain takes us back to Toby and Jensen. They are now living together, Toby still working in finance, Jensen living off of his investments, playing at being a house husband, and mountain climbing with his friends Jigger and Cat. Jensen has two last mountains on his bucket list to conquer, Everest and K2. Toby is not at all enthused about these two adventures, every time Jensen leaves, Toby is concerned he won’t come back. Either he’ll be dead, or he’ll realize he doesn’t want to be tied down and take off for the hills, never returning to his lover.
What we have here is a very nice continuation of Toby and Jensen’s story. There is a bit of mountain climbing details thrown in, we do follow Jensen on his journey to Everest, but mostly it’s the natural progression of their relationship. Going from boyfriends, to splitting up, to boyfriends reunited, lovers, partners, family, husbands, and maybe more. I loved watching their progression, Jensen is a bit of a wild child, he wants desperately to have a family that loves him, and he does want to settle down, but he seems a bit… careful maybe is the word, in his acceptance of what Toby and his family have to offer him. We see why, his family story isn’t happy, and he does come to love Toby’s family as his own. We see Jigger and Cat, and a great thing happens for Toby and Jensen in Wyoming.
T.A. is much more detailed in this story, and really gives life to these two men. I did like the mountaineering details, and the quote at the beginning of each chapter was a nice addition. The sex scenes are plentiful, hot and fun. Toby’s family was a great addition as well, I loved his parents. It’s overall just a nice sweet story. Low drama until the end, then we get some drama, but not in the will-they-break-up way, but something bad happens that has to be dealt with. I loved the way it ended, maybe it’s over, maybe we’ll get some more with these two….
I haven’t read much by T.A. lately, I have always enjoyed her books but she’s fallen off my radar recently. This reminded me that I do like her writing, and made me want to go see what I’ve missed.
This story is a stand alone, you don’t have to read Mountains to Climb to enjoy this one, but it is a short story and I liked it as well. I would suggest reading them both, just to get the full story about Toby and Jensen.
RATING: 
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