Reviewed by Annika
TITLE: Chase in Shadow
SERIES: Johnnies #1
AUTHOR: Amy Lane
NARRATOR: Sean Crisden
PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press
LENGTH: 9 hours, 39 minutes
RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2014
BLURB:
Chase Summers: Golden boy. Beautiful girlfriend, good friends, and a promising future.
Nobody knows the real Chase.
Chase Summers has a razor blade to his wrist and the smell of his lover’s goodbye clinging to his skin. He has a door in his heart so frightening he’d rather die than open it, and the lies he’s used to block it shut are thinning with every forbidden touch. Chase has spent his entire life unraveling, and his decision to set his sexuality free in secret has only torn his mind apart faster.
Chase has one chance for true love and salvation. He may have met Tommy Halloran in the world of gay-for-pay—where the number of lovers doesn’t matter as long as the come-shot’s good—but if he wants the healing that Tommy’s love has to offer, he’ll need the courage to leave the shadows for the sunlight. That may be too much to ask from a man who’s spent his entire life hiding his true self. Chase knows all too well that the only things thriving in a heart’s darkness are the bitter personal demons that love to watch us bleed.
REVIEW:
Chase in Shadow isn’t a perfect tale, it isn’t an epic romance nor is it a happy one – far from it. It will break your heart, possibly scarring it for life. Now I said this story didn’t have that epic romance, but it does have a great one, but it’s laced in denial and wrapped in a whole lot of pain. So you better be ready for that going into this story.
Chase Summers does not break promises he makes. Even if said promises might break him into a million pieces. He’s haunted and scarred from demons in the past, and he’s locked them all up tight, behind that red door, but sometimes the red seeps through. To say that Chase is closeted is putting it mildly, his closet is hidden way back in the corners of Narnia, camouflaged by his engagement to Mercy. When he’s introduced to Johnnie’s, the gay porn site, he believes he found a way to have it all. Making gay porn is a way for Chase, or Chance as he calls his alter ego, to explore his sexuality and for the first time in his life he’s found something real. He also finds Tommy Halloran, another actor in the Johnnie’s stable. They connect instantly and have a lot of chemistry. But life for them isn’t easy; for one Chase isn’t out and hiding so much of himself is taking a toll. Then there is Tommy with demons of his own, and the two of them together the way they were wasn’t always the best thing for them.
The angst is pretty much non-stop in this book, and it’s not only Chase’s angst, but also a lot of Tommy’s as well. How they both hurt being apart, but also being together, without truly and honestly being together. It can be overwhelming, especially if you aren’t prepared for it going in. At the same time, it could also get a bit repetitive and I honestly wouldn’t mind just a sprinkle of something that wasn’t angst/hurt or sex – you know to shake things up.
I would say that listening to the audio probably isn’t the ideal way to experience this book. Sean Crisden is without a doubt very talented, and worth listening to in his own right. But the way this book was written it wasn’t always easy to follow changes in timelines or abrupt switches from one scene to the next. I missed some subtle – or not so subtle- hints or clues when those switches occurred, because as it was, I was thrown out of the story with each switch trying to piece it all together.
RATING: 
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