Title: Slow Heat
Series: Heat of Love: Book One
Author: Leta Blake
Narrator: Michael Ferraiuolo
Publisher: Self-Published
Run Time: 14 hours and 7 minutes
Category: Fantasy, Omegaverse, Mpreg
At a Glance: Given the lengthy text, I felt Michael Ferraiuolo did a solid job bringing this novel, Slow Heat, to life.
Reviewed By: Sammy
Blurb: Professor Vale Aman has crafted a good life for himself. An unbonded omega in his mid-30s, he’s long since given up hope that he’ll meet a compatible alpha, let alone his destined mate. He’s fulfilled by his career, his poetry, his cat, and his friends.
When Jason Sabel, a much younger alpha, imprints on Vale in a shocking and public way, longings are ignited that can’t be ignored. Fighting their strong sexual urges, Jason and Vale must agree to contract with each other before they can consummate their passion.
But for Vale, being with Jason means giving up his independence and placing his future in the hands of an untested alpha – as well as facing the scars of his own tumultuous past. He isn’t sure it’s worth it. But Jason isn’t giving up his destined mate without a fight.
This is a stand-alone gay romance novel, 118,000 words, with a strong HFN ending, as well as a well-crafted, non-shifter omegaverse, with alphas, betas, omegas, male pregnancy, heat, and knotting. Content warning for pregnancy loss and aftermath.
Review: With a fascinating new world created in a post human era when wolves seemed to be the only creatures that now inhabited earth, author Leta Blake introduces us to her take on the Alpha-Omega rituals and the special bond that exists between them. Referred to as “erosgape”, it is this instant recognition of your soul mate that drives alphas to claim their omega for their own. The feeling is mutual and undeniable and when it hits young college student Jason Sabel, it’s shocking for him to realize he is mated to a much older man. Vale, already in his thirties and thinking that this season of life had passed him by, had adjusted to relying on his close friend, Urho, to help him through the heat process when his need for sex and an alpha’s knotting him via intercourse was so overwhelming as to nearly drive the omega insane. Vale can get beyond the idea that Jason is a “baby alpha”, but what he can’t do is deny his own past which hides a terrible secret—one that will make their contracting as mates impossible.
The story was really good in so many ways, but I honestly had to shake my head at some of the over-the-top physical descriptions of twitching cocks and hardening nipples. I get that there was an instant physical reaction to a mate, but constantly reminding the reader by having body parts independently reacting when the two men were just in close proximity to each other was a bit much for me. Despite this, I will say the author has created a very interesting paranormal world, and Vale and Jason, in particular, were really compelling to read about.
The Audio: There were many aspects to Mr. Ferraiuolo’s narration that enhanced this story. The different voicings, particularly Jason and Vale, allowed for the characters to take life and made their instant attraction, due to their imprinting, believable. There were rich, emotional moments that were narrated nearly perfectly, highlighting how young Jason was and how he unnerved the normally unruffled Vale. I also enjoyed how even though Jason was the younger character, the narrator chose to make his the gruffer voice—it’s timbre deep and gravelly indicating the level of arousal the poor young alpha experienced every time he was in proximity to his omega. This was not an easy novel to bring to life, primarily due to rather lengthy explanatory passages which established this world author Leta Blake was creating. Longer prose passages talking of Wolf lore and history were necessary, and Mr. Ferraiuolo took them in stride, punching them with enough emphasis and pacing them just right to make them interesting and easy to understand.
Unfortunately, this same ability to narrate prose made some of the dialogue less impactful. There were many instances where words were spoken in harsh tones and growled out as an alpha wolf might do when he feels his omega is threatened. This was most prevalent in the opening chapters while Jason was so confused over his feelings for Vale and grappling with how Urho, Vale’s former alpha lover, was so familiar with Vale due to a prior claim on Vale’s affections. It was here that I felt the narrator didn’t differentiate enough between the internal stream of consciousness passages and the instances of sudden dialogue. Instead of sudden raw outbursts, we got simply more narration with little change of pacing or tone to indicate what emotions were being expressed at that point in the novel. In other words, it’s important to project anger in your tone if the text tells us a character is responding angrily. This was definitely lacking at critical times.
While those passages may have been less satisfying due to the similar voicing by the narrator, the intimate scenes between Jason and Vale were really spot-on, as were the different tonalities used for various characters. I never got lost when it came to knowing who was speaking because each voice had its own rich quality, and that really made this narrator stand out for me. Given the lengthy text, I felt Michael Ferraiuolo did a solid job bringing this novel, Slow Heat, to life.
You can buy Slow Heat here:
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