Reviewed by Annika
TITLE: Straight from the Heart
SERIES: Wilde Love #1
AUTHOR: Sam Burns
NARRATOR: Gabriel Amari
PUBLISHER: Self-Published
RELEASE DATE: July 23, 2019
LENGTH: 6 hours, 27 minutes
BLURB:
On the same night that Alex finds himself disowned and sleeping on his best friend’s couch, he meets Liam, who saves him from being mugged. It’s a strange time to start a relationship, but everything about Liam feels right. When it becomes apparent that Liam isn’t the prince charming he seems to be, Alex has to deal with some hard truths about not just his new boyfriend, but his own history as well.
Liam is just trying to do his job, but everything keeps getting in the way. First he gets assigned to watch some stranger, then somehow, he finds himself dating the guy. Even if it doesn’t offend the boss, Liam knows the wrong thing to do when he does it. He finds himself wondering, though: is his job really the most important thing in his life, or can he walk away from it all for a brand new relationship?
REVIEW:
I loved listening to Sam Burns Rowan Harbor Cycle series, so when I saw that he’d released a new audiobook I jumped at the chance to listen to it. Sadly Straight From the Heart was a miss for me on several things.
I don’t need books to be accurate or true to reality, because let’s face it most of them aren’t. But I do need to believe in them. Believe in the characters and their actions, and I can’t say that I did that with this book. Let’s start with the fact that Alex knows that his new boyfriend (and yes we are ignoring the whole insta-love here) is lying to him about some pretty serious stuff. Getting shot serious kinds of stuff. Said boyfriend, Liam, admitted to Alex that yes he was lying, yes he was going to continue lying and that yes Alex would be pissed when he found out the truth. The two haven’t know each other for more than a week and Alex is perfectly okay with this, just shrugging his shoulders and just continue on. Mean for f*s sake, he’s questioning whether or not Liam is part of the mob! Perfectly healthy relationship here…. – or not.
Then there was Liam. Tasked with an undercover job to take down some gun runners in town. Add to that there was the fact that Liam admitted to not being a good liar – to one with close ties to the criminal organisation he’s tasked to take down. I mean who in their right mind puts someone that can’t act the part undercover? Added to that fact was that Liam in general came across as juvenile in his actions – despite having survived four! tours in Afghanistan. The whole investigation and suspense part was… well I don’t know what it was, but credible it was not. Suspenseful it was not, 5 year old playing make-believe – possibly.
There were many small things and others not so small that added up and made this listen less than ideal for me. On the other hand, these are all subjective and might work for you if you are looking for something light but not fluffy. It’s an easy read that won’t demand anything of the reader or listener and if you know that’s what you are looking for, you should give this book a try.
New to me narrator Gabriel Amari had a wide range of distinct voices and it was easy to differentiate between characters. I think he’s a narrator that many will like because he does have a talent for voice acting. My only problem, is that his voice, his pitch, didn’t work for me. I’m very sensitive to all kinds of sounds, so I am partial to the deeper voices, and Amari’s was just a notch too high for me. This is something that’s highly subjective and it not working for me should not in any way dissuade anyone else from trying this book or narrator out.
I can’t say that I hated this book, because I didn’t. I just can’t say that there was anything that I liked about it either.
RATING: 
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