Author: Jay Northcote
Narrator: Matthew Lloyd Davies
Publisher: Self-Published
Run Time: 6 hours and 7 minutes
Category: Contemporary
At a Glance: This is a really enjoyable and well-written story, but the narration just didn’t work for me.
Reviewed By: Sadonna
Blurb: When a professional relationship turns personal, it’s impossible to resist the law of attraction.
Alec Rowland is a high-flying lawyer in a London firm whose career is his life. He doesn’t have time for relationships and his sexuality is a closely guarded secret. After picking up a cute guy on a Friday night, Alec’s world is rocked to its foundations when his one night stand shows up in the office on Monday morning—as the new temp on his team.
Ed Piper is desperate to prove himself in his new job. The last thing he needs is to be distracted by a crush on his boss. It’s hard to ignore the attraction he feels, even though Alec’s a difficult bastard to work for.
Both men strive to maintain a professional relationship, but tempers fray, passions ignite, and soon they’re both falling hard and fast. If they’re ever going to find a way to be together, Alec needs to be honest about who he really is because Ed won’t go back in the closet for anyone.
Review: This is a case of enjoying the story, but the narration detracted from it for me.
Alec and Ed meet at a club one weekend and have a spectacular one-night stand. Ed has really enjoyed himself and he knows Alec did to, but in the light of day, it’s pretty obviously Alec would rather Ed were gone.
Fast forward to Monday and it turns out that Alec is Ed’s new boss at his first big job out of uni at a prestigious law firm. Needless to say it’s quite the surprise for both of them. And, turns out that Alec is not out. At all. To anyone—possibly not even to himself. He’s terrified that Ed will out him, or that something will happen that will cause everyone to know, and he just cannot have that.
The problem is that Ed and Alec REALLY like each other. Like, a lot. And they have a pretty hard time staying away from each other with all the long hours and the case and the team get-togethers. It’s hard for them to resist and so they end up not resisting too well. Then they go on a business trip together and Alec gives in to his desire to be with Ed, and asks for more than hookups. But, he’s not willing to come out of the closet and Ed can’t go back there.
Then we learn a lot about Ed and Alec’s families, and they couldn’t be more different. Alec has kept his family at arm’s length. Ed is close to his mum, stepdad and sisters. Alec hasn’t even really given it a go with his brother, who it appears has tried over the years to have a relationship with him. It takes a pretty big event to shake Alec up enough to maybe see if there is another way. And Ed is willing to help Alec, if Alec can just reach out and take it.
I really enjoyed the story of these two sort of opposite characters. Alec is very, very tightly wound, for a variety of reasons, but mostly because of his family. Ed is an open and honest guy, mostly because of his loving and open family. It’s easy to see why Alec would be so attracted. While there is a small age gap, it’s like Ed is more mature and clear-headed of the two, a lot of the time. Alec is blinded by his past and his fears. I enjoyed the secondary characters, particularly Alec’s brother and Ed’s family. Their co-workers are entertaining as well.
Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy the narration of this story nearly as much as the story itself. It kind of sounded to me like this was a parent narrating this story. The voices and the characterizations just sounded so old, like this was someone in their 50s trying to speak like a 20-something. It just didn’t work for me. I think had the narrator had a younger sounding voice for the characters, I would have enjoyed it a lot more.
You can buy The Law of Attraction here:
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