REVIEWED by Jen B.
TITLE: The Good Green Earth
SERIES: Colors of Love #3
AUTHOR: V.L. Locey
PUBLISHER: V.L. Locey
LENGTH: 230 Pages
RELEASE DATE: September 16, 2019
BLURB:
After the Syracuse Stallions clinch the championship, Nathan Zinkan, the renowned wild man of the AHL is arrested for a DUI. Again. When a no-nonsense judge adds a heavy dose of community service to an already stiff sentence, Nathan has to forget a summer of partying and slide on a pair of gardening gloves. His entire future now rides on how well he can behave while helping elderly urban gardeners tend to their tomatoes.
Watching local garden center owner Bran Cavanaugh working without his shirt is a benefit he wasn’t expecting. Pity Bran is also the one in charge of the community garden as well as keeping tabs on Nathan’s hours served. The two men are instantly at odds due to Nathan’s rebellious nature and Bran’s icy demeanor. Yet there’s no denying the attraction that begins to build between the hot-headed athlete and the cool as a cucumber master gardener.
Will their attraction grow into something deeper, or will it wither and die on the vine?
REVIEW:
Every once in a while, I find a book where the story is really good, but there is one or, if I’m really lucky, more than one, character that just steals the show. Such is the case here. I absolutely loved Nathan. He is a young hockey star that fought upstream most of his life against his military-driven family, the loss of not one, but two parents and a brother, taking the blame from the other brother with an added dose of homophobia to go along with it. He is a successful and talented hockey player who got a little too caught up in the partying side of things which leads him to the beginning of this story.
Rather than head home for the summer like the rest of his team, Nathan must stay behind and work off his sentence through community involvement. He is assigned to work at a garden center with a program that allows elderly people to tend gardens. Nathan is begrudgingly taking things in stride with a somewhat nonchalant attitude which pretty much clashes right away with the owner, Bran. Nathan does quite a bit of growing through his time at the center. He learns the meaning of atonement, makes some great friends, but, try as he might, he just cannot get Bran to give in to their obvious attraction.
Bran is a great character as well. He is a widower of two years still feeling the loss of his husband. He recognizes his attraction to Nathan, but he has some guilt and other issues to get over before he finally allows himself to give in to Nathan. What I absolutely loved about Nathan here is that even when Bran did give in, it was Nathan who actually took a step back and slowed things down sensing it was exactly what Bran needed. He became the more mature of the two, even though he is younger. He was also the more dominant of the two which was sort of contradictory to their roles outside of their relationship as a couple. Nathan just has this bubbly personality that made me smile, and it was easy to see that Bran basically had no choice but to fall for him. They do have a few hurdles to overcome, so it isn’t all smooth sailing, but nothing drags on for very long before decisions and solutions are made. In the end, they both realized what was important, and despite the logistical problems with Nathan’s job, they made it work.
This has been a fabulous series so far bringing some refreshing storylines to the hockey genre that is becoming so popular. Ms. Locey is on my auto-read list, as I have yet to be disappointed. I hope there are many more exciting stories ahead, as they help get me through the off season and excited for the new one about to start. Highly recommended.
RATING:
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