Reading this book it was like going back on the same place and time when Bogard and Bergman, as Rick and Ilsa, kissed in front of an airplane in Casablanca.

Only that this time, Jake, the American adventurer who is managing a brothel in an far away from the common routes Moroccon town, Maarif, is not in love with the wife of a French revolutionary, Christopher, but with the man himself. But Christopher is not the only man with a place in Jake’s heart, there is also Nicolas, his former Foreign Legion fellow soldier, and now Chief of Police in Maarif. It’s not clear if Nicolas and Jake arrived together in Maarif, or if they are there together since there is more than friendship between them, what is clear is that, even if obviously in love with each other, no one of them is ready to live it.

Nicolas has the reputation of ladies’ man, always with a willing and beautiful woman in the bed, even if always with that air of mourning widower. I had the impression that Nicolas, even if ore romantic at heart than Jake, is not yet ready to openly live their love, like he had some bad experiences in the past, even if those experiences are not explained. On the other hand Jake, former male prostitute (for men) and who lived in an openly gay relationship with Christopher, is not managing a female brothel, and has like hardened his heart, not allowing people, and especially men, near it.

The murder of a German officer in Jake’s brothel is a trigger for all a series of events, first of all the realization for both Nicolas than Jake, that there is not time to waste, that they have to catch each moments and live it at fully. While in life Nicolas and Jake are fully grown men plenty capable to take good and well thought decision, in their private relationship, Nicolas and Jake are still at the try and mistake phase. Nicolas is in love with Jake, but he is not sure of him and of himself; he is still not ready to share all his trouble with a soul mate, he still believes to be a lonely soul, still endorsed to take decision, even life changing decision, alone, without consulting his partner. On the other side, Jake, who long ago has understood that the real love of his life is Nicolas, sometime still clings to the idea of his youth lover Christopher, that is more an ethereal figure, than the real man who Christopher is become.

The development of the story is both linear than complex: basically the story follows Nicolas and Jake in few days of their life and the reader is plunged in their story with little preparation. There is no background explanation, sometime a flashback here and there helps the reader to understand their relationship, but those flashbacks are never enough long to give the fully explanation. At the end of the story, we know something more on Nicolas and Jake, but, truth be told, they maintain a mystery aura that makes them even more interesting and fascinating.

All the supporting characters have specific personality, even the lesser important ones, like Jake’s girls, or the most interesting, like Frederik Abaroa, that I wouldn’t mind to see having his own story, maybe with the sweet girl who “entertains” him one night. The story is set at the beginning of the century, between the I and II World War, but truth be told, the historical setting remain a bit on the second scene, since all of them are living in a situation that is suspended in time, far from the society of the time, people come and go, and the world outside is flowing a rhythm that is not the same in Maarif.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608201015/?tag=elimyrevandra-20