Reviewed by Lesley
TITLE: Bee-tween the Music
SERIES: Love in Maplewood #4
AUTHOR: Chantal Mer
PUBLISHER: Self published
LENGTH: 197 pages
RELEASE DATE: June 6, 2025
BLURB:
After walking away from a career with the orchestra he’s played in for the last decade of his life, Dmitri Fairchild has spent a year figuring out his next steps. And he hasn’t come up with much. Burned out or midlife crisis, either way, he wants to find his love for music again.
Ever King returned to Maplewood ten years ago and hasn’t looked back. Between his apiary services, his shop, and playing his cello, the beekeeper is perfectly content. But his satisfying life feels a little less fulfilling when he meets the visiting violinist. The only problem, Ever doesn’t date tourists.
When Dmitri and Ever submit to their instant attraction, sparks fly. A fling may be what they both need to step outside of their comfort zones. As they explore new opportunities in life and in love, can they find a way to make music together and reignite lost passion?
Bee-tween the Music is a low-angst, small town, contemporary MM romance with instant attraction, a sexy violinist, a cello-playing beekeeper, and a town of nosey–um, I mean invested–neighbors.
With the highest percentage of LGBTQIA+ residents in Vermont, Maplewood is a town where everyone belongs. And with festivals year round, there’s always something fun happening! This multi-author, low-angst queer series features ten standalone romances—each set against the backdrop of a different festival. Come for the celebrations, stay for the happily-ever-afters!
REVIEW:
This is the fourth book set in the fictional town of Maplewood, Vermont
I love a good pun title and this one definitely makes me smile as the book is about a bee expert/amateur celloist and a professional violinist.
Ever King runs The Honey Spot, he moved back to Maplewood after his Grandfather passed away, We meet him the eve of the Maplewood festival he runs the Honey Bee Jubilee, a celebration of all thing’s bee related. He is a true Maplewoodian who doesn’t ever want to live anywhere else again. He is really gun shy of getting involved with the numerous tourists that pass through the town after a bad experience with a tourist five years before.
We meet Dmitiri on the worst day of his life. The man he has been dating for the last few years proposes on stage at the end of a concert they have been performing in, to somebody else. Overnight his world implodes. No job, no relationship and worst of all he has lost his love of playing music for music’s sake.
After going to Maplewood to record an album with some very good friends he meets Ever and starts falling in love with the town of Maplewood and all its inhabitants. But will the lure of a job in London be greater than the lure of staying in Maplewood and with Ever.
Honestly, whilst I liked this book, I did not love it as much as the first three in the series. They all seemed a bit more linked together with the secondary character in one book being the main character in the next book. I didn’t notice many cross over characters in this one except the Rocktogenarians. But there are definitely cross over references as in the feud between Sparky’s and Red’s Diners. It almost felt like this book is out of sequence. That being said this book definitely seems to be setting up some people for a story of their own. (Ok, I can’t resist I have just taken a peek at the blurb for the next one in the series and Chantal has definitely done her job of setting up the next story, rating upped). This book also felt like it had more long sex scenes in it, so if you like extra heat you will definitely enjoy this one.
This is my first book by Chantal Mer, and I like her writing style for the most part. Her prose is not flowery and writes in an easy and enjoyable way to read.
If you like multi author series set in quaint, small towns then you will definitely love this series.
RATING: 
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