REVIEWED by Annika and Jen B.
TITLE: Lucky
AUTHOR: Garrett Leigh
PUBLISHER: Garrett Leigh
LENGTH: Pages
RELEASE DATE: September 18, 2018
BLURB:
Dominic Ramos is a Premiership football player with a secret. There are no trophies for being gay in his game. Locked into his rep as the meanest defender on the pitch, keeping his secret is soul-crushing, but love has no place in his sport, even if his soft heart craves it.
Lucky Coleman is on his knees when he meets a man with more money than sense. It’s a Grindr hook-up for cash, not a love match, but dreaming of his desperate, kind eyes earns a place amongst his numerous bad habits.
Meeting once was risky, twice pushes Dom’s courage to the limit. Losing Lucky seems inevitable, but his tight grip on his image counts for nothing when Lucky starts to fall.
Catching him could cost Dom everything, but if he can set his heart free, getting Lucky long term might be a risk worth taking.
Lucky is the start of a promising new series. It has great characters that you can believe in, they are flawed and in this case, more than a little beaten down by life, each in their own way. I loved reading their story, and it was surprisingly sweet for a Leigh novel.
Dominic Ramos, a Premiership football player with a secret that has the power to blow the careful world he’s build to smithereens. It has also kept him from living, from feeling anything but numbness. Kept him from forming friendships. In essence, Dom lives for his work, but at the end of the day it’s just that, a job. And a job that holds no passion for him anymore. At times when he needs something for himself, he finds hook-ups-for cash on Grindr. Little did he know that his latest hook-up would turn his life completely up-side-down.
Lucky Coleman has not has as much luck in his life as his name might suggest. With no money, no real place to stay and no job, things are not looking all that good. So to make some cash he decides to offer some paid “services” on Grindr. The man he meets is so much more than Lucky could ever imagine. Dom got under his skin in the worst way.
I was hooked by this book, this story, from the beginning. The characters drew me in. Their pasts and hurts. That chance meeting that meant so much for them both, that started them both on a new path. While this book wasn’t overly angsty or gut wrenching as many of the previous books by Leigh, it wasn’t all that happy or sweet either. It had a gritty and kind of a hopeless feel to it. Hopeless in the sense that neither Dom nor Lucky really felt any hope for the future, they were both stuck surviving and getting through the day. Which makes the times when they are together shine so much brighter.
I let you kiss me because you made it all real
There are some trigger warnings associated with this book, in this case in the form of an author’s note in the beginning of the book. Trigger warnings are both a good thing and a bad thing; they tell you what to expect in a book. It could be a deciding factor if you are on the fence. The bad thing is that they tell you to expect something in the book you’re picking up or reading. And in this case, what I was expecting was so much worse than what really happened. I was truly waiting for Lucky to become an addict and hit rock bottom. And that never happened. That doesn’t mean that Lucky had it easy in any way shape or form because he didn’t or that he didn’t go through some harshness. It was just that my expectations of the plot didn’t match up with what happened – and for me that was a good thing this time around. I don’t think I could have handled any gut wrenching at this point in my life.
Anyway, Dom and Lucky were opposites in many ways; they were still the same deep down. They were both what the other needed. Dom needed someone to wake him up, make him feel something. Lucky needed someone who believed in him, wanted him and calmed him. They both needed someone to care for and to be cared for. To love and to be loved. Their road might be a rocky one and clouded in secrets, but it is one well worth reading. I fell in love with this book and these characters and I can’t wait to read Cash’s story.
This is signature Garrett Leigh – a story that sucks you in quickly with endearing characters you can’t help but love and root for. Here, we have two completely different guys with two completely different sets of issues, who end up being so perfect for each other. One is living on the streets, scraping to get by, taking advantage of his bff when he can and then staying in shady shared apartment/rooms; the other is professional athlete living the high life. But, there is a lot more going on than what people see on the outside.
Lucky has ironically been down on his luck for a long time. He finally gets up the nerve to try Grindr for money and ends up meeting Dom. Dom lives in a different world where he is completely closeted with not much chance of coming out of it while in his current career. His rare basically anonymous hookups have been getting him by, but the strain is really starting to take its toll. Lucky is something special though, and they have an immediate connection.
Dom goes back to his world, but the pull to Lucky is strong. Secrets are kept on both sides, and when they come out, little by little, on each side, they made baby steps. Unfortunately, things got worse for each of them before they got better, and it took seeing each other in some pretty bad ways for the important things to be realized.
I love stories of struggle and the men finding their ways and overcoming to succeed. I wanted it to work out so badly for each of these guys. Poor Lucky just needed some consistent breaks. He had such a big heart, and I think Dom subconsciously knew he could trust Lucky from the get go. Likewise, Dom had lived the life others expected of him and I really wanted him to get a hold of his own destiny. Thankfully, we get to see them succeed. I didn’t want to say goodbye and hope we get to see them again. I’m definitely looking forward to Cash’s book and recommend checking this book and any of Ms. Leigh’s other books as well.
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