Review: Ashes (Men of Hidden Creek Season 2 #1) by H.J. Welch

3 out of 5 stars

Ebook. Kindle Unlimited. 295 pages. Publish August 5 2018.

Blurb:

“It’s always been you.” 

Kris Novak pours his heart and soul into his job at Hidden Creek’s only gay bar. When an arsonist burns the place to the ground, his whole life goes up in smoke and only his long-time crush can save him. 

Firefighter Remi Washington never told anyone he’s bi, let alone acted on it. But when he temporarily offers his spare room to his best friend’s younger brother, he’s drawn to the twinky, beautiful Kris in a way he can’t ignore. How long before he gives in to this temptation? 

Soon Kris stands accused of having started the fire and he has to fight with all his strength to clear his own name. Will Remi risk outing himself to stand by Kris’s side, or will that closet door remain closed forever? 

Welcome to Hidden Creek, Texas, where the heart knows what it wants, and where true love lives happily ever after. Every Men of Hidden Creek novel can be read on its own, but keep an eye out for familiar faces around town! This book contains a daring rescue, a meddling mommy matchmaker, and enough sparks to start a wildfire.

Likes:

• Remi’s journey to accepting his bisexuality.
• Harrison and the role he played.
• The mystery surrounding the fire.
• How much Kris cared for the LBGTQ+ community.
• The characterization of Remi’s dad and Remi’s fears about coming out.

Dislikes:

• Remi and Chris didn’t have enough of a spark.
• The awful dirty talk.
• Too many italics.
• Too many characters from previous books to be truly standalone.
• Remi being biracial doesn’t come up at all.
• The clichéd ‘I’ve done something wrong so here’s a dozen red roses’
• Lots of awkward phrasing.
• Stereotyping of what gay guys should look like/be.
• Preachy.

---

I had a hard time deciding between giving this book 2.5 or 3 stars. I finally decided on the three because, while there was a lot that didn’t work, there were enough things I liked to just barely bump it up to three stars. But it was a close call, and I honestly can’t recommend this book.

I was really into this book at the beginning. The blurb caught my attention and the plot was interesting. Then my interest took a nose dive around halfway through and by the 80% mark I didn’t care at all.

The plot was solid. It just wasn’t executed well. For such a long book, the romance was missing all the little moments between Remi and Kris where their relationship grows. There were big moments, but the times when they hung out casually, playing video games or having dinner, happened off page and received a paragraph of summary at most. Plus it feels like there’s more interaction between the MCs and other characters than with each other. Because of that, the spark between them never caught fire.

I ended up not caring about Remi and Kris’s relationship at all. The only reason I finished the book was because I wanted to know who set the fire. The fire plot, with its hint of mystery, was nicely done.

Remi’s journey was by far the most interesting part of the book. His transformation, both in terms of accepting himself and in realizing that it’s okay for him to do the things he enjoyed – like cooking – was fun to read about. His father’s characterization was also done very well.

I would have thought that Remi being biracial would have come up at least a little, but it wasn’t even touched on. It made me feel like him being biracial was something that was tossed into the story to let his mom score a point near the end.

Then there were the sex scenes. I am usually all for the smutty smut, but after reading the first sex scene, I skipped all the rest. The dirty talk was both terrible and hilarious. Who shouts out ‘honey bun’ in the middle of sex? It was so ridiculous. Not to mention syrupy sweet and a bit clichéd after Kris and Remi got together.

Unfortunately, there was no indication on the Amazon page that this book is part of a larger series. And while this book is technically standalone, there were way too many characters from previous books who the reader was obviously supposed to know. It made some scenes, like the brunch at around 40%, very confusing. I had no idea who any of the people were and they weren’t introduced well.

My final big annoyance happened in the epilogue. Kris has no business experience and yet he

While I didn’t care for this book, I liked the setup enough to go and read the others. Starting at the actual beginning this time, of course. The series is written by different authors, so I hope I’ll have better luck next time.