Reviewed by Sadonna
TITLE: Footwork
AUTHOR: TA Moore
PUBLISHER: Rogue Firebird Press
LENGTH: 198 pages
RELEASE DATE: September 10, 2023
BLURB:
Bode Harlan has never claimed to be a good guy, but he’s trying to keep his nose clean and his head down these days.
After a year in prison for assault–and to be fair, he did it–he isn’t looking to go back. Admittedly, his pretty face being the star attraction in an illegal underground fighting ring seems to run counter to that goal, but he’s gotta pay the bills and there ain’t much else he’s good at.
And it keeps his parole officer off his back…since she runs the place.
Then his mom skips town and her boyfriend kicks Bode’s 14 year old brother out on the street. Bode grew up in and out of foster care, he doesn’t want that for Danny. It’s not like he can take the kid in, though. He’s an ex-con who gets beat up twice a month for money. That’s how he ends up on his good-natured ex-boyfriend’s doorstep. Sonny is a soft touch. At least he always was for Bode. All he wants is somewhere to crash for a couple of nights, nothing more. Sonny’s got his life together now–a home, a boyfriend, even a dog–and it would take a real asshole to want to blow that up.
…of course, Bode’s never said he wasn’t an asshole.
REVIEW:
Bode has just gotten out of jail. He didn’t have the best life growing up as the child of a teenage mother. No father in the picture, series of men his mother latched on to. In an out of foster care. He also has a temper. But he needs money and he can make that with his pretty face and his fighting ability through an underground fighting ring that his parole officer runs. He doesn’t have many options as a convicted felon and his reputation precedes him. Daley will keep his file clean and no parole violations as long as he does what she wants.
When Bode’s 14 year old deaf brother gets thrown out by his mother’s latest landing spot after she’s apparently run off with another guy to Vegas or someplace, well he needs a place to stay that is not the halfway house he’s supposed to be living at. So he takes Danny and goes to the one person he’s pretty sure won’t say no – his ex, Sonny.
Sonny has moved on after Bode broke up with him and went to jail. But he still has a soft spot for him and he doesn’t want to see Danny in foster care either. He’s got enough strikes against him with how he’s been raised too with a mother who can barely be bothered. However, his current boyfriend, a copy named Paul, is not too happy about it. Bode swears he’ll be out after a few days. They both this is not true, but he allows it. Then things go from bad to worse with trouble with, Danny, lack of contact from his mother, and Bode putting himself in harm’s way. Again.
I have to say I struggled with this book. I mean I have no frame of reference for this type of life, but I’m not sure I want to read about it in detail with the violence and corruption and just overall doom either. At one point, I just wanted to DNF it. I didn’t like the characters or the world they lived in. I guess this is the lives some people live, but honestly I just didn’t enjoy it. This is probably a me thing and not the book. But there is unrelenting bad decisions, violence and just a dark world here. Even Sonny isn’t enough to brighten it for me. If you’re in the mood for a dark and gritty story, then maybe you’ll enjoy this. There’s nothing wrong with the writing. It just wasn’t my cup of tea. As usual, YMMV.
RATING: 
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