Reviewed by Annika
TITLE: Before the Call
SERIES: Small Town Hearts #2
AUTHOR: Emma Alcott
NARRATOR: Michael Ferraiuolo
PUBLISHER: Self Published
RELEASE DATE: March 13, 2020
LENGTH: 9 hours, 37 minutes
BLURB:
Rule #1 Don’t fall for the ridiculously hot straight guy
Rule #2 Especially not if he’s your best friend
Rule #3 Extra-especially not when you’re supposed to be his private tutor
Rule #4 Oh, god, but those eyes
Rule #5 Okay, maybe eyes are fine if you don’t look south
Rule #6 Don’t look south
Rule #7 You looked south, didn’t you?
Rule #8 Are you even listening?
Gabe Mitchell isn’t listening. What’s worse, ever since he moved back to the small town he thought he’d left for good, he’s turned into a habitual rule breaker.
Falling for his straight best friend, Clark Summers? Check.
Falling for his straight best friend, Clark Summers, who also happens to be his newest mature student? Check.
And don’t you dare get him started about what’s going on down south, because Gabe doesn’t need to check that to know he’s in deep.
It’s a good thing Clark’s missed him these last four years, and a better thing that he’s willing to do whatever it takes to have Gabe back in his life, because rules are about to be broken. All of them. And Clark’s only rule? The one about being straight? It might just end up broken, too.
REVIEW:
Clark and Gabe were best friends in high school, they were joined at the hip and vowed things would never change. Still, they both knew it would, Gabe was going off to college and Clark was staying put to start working in the mines. Four years later Gabe moves back to town to start teaching at their old school. Their contact has been sporadic while Gabe was gone, but they quickly starts where they ended, but with the tantalising promise for more.
The romance was slow and gradual – until they finally got together. Then the heat and passion was non-stop. Personally it was a bit much and repetitive for me, but like always the preference of heat levels is individual and shouldn’t deter anyone from picking a book up. The two as a couple worked perfectly, they made sense and had a connection that went beyond the physical. They built each other up and championed the other. There was some drama, but it fit with the set-up of the plot and story.
Before the Call was narrated by Michael Ferraiuolo. I have to admit that I was expecting J.F. Harding as he narrated the first book. On the other hand a change of narrator isn’t a really an issue in this case as each of the books are only loosely connected by the small town theme. None of the characters overlap. Anyway this was another wonderful performance by Michael Ferraiuolo. He makes you dream away to this small town to spend time with Clark and Gabe, their second chance. The start of something new and everything that entails.
Everything he does was spot on, the pacing voices and feelings, so many feelings. He made you feel the longing Gabe felt for Clark, his best friend. But also the love Gabe had for is family and his need to make it all come together, his longing for more and fear of the unknown and uncertainty of the future. Ferraiuolo made the experience pleasant and effortless and it was easy to dream away to a faraway land (at least for me).
Before the Call was a sweet and mostly uncomplicated best friends-to-lovers story.
RATING: 
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