Jardonn Smith

This day I really didn’t need to cry more, but it was time for me to read this Christmas novella by Jardonn Smith and so I did, and of course I cried. The Good Shepherd is a bittersweet novella, it’s a Christmas novella only since the two heroes met during the Christmas season of 1944, but they did so in a prisoner camp in German territory under Nazi occupation; during that 1944 they were lucky and with the help of a German shepherd they managed to escape and go back to United States to start a life together. Good you will say, that is a story with an angst beginning but with an happily ever after. Wrong. The author didn’t deceive the reader, he starts the story in 1951 and Harold, Jack’s lover, dies in Korea; from this event, Jack walks through the memory lane and tells us the story of their brief but deep love. Jack had only 6 years with Harold, but those six years will last all his life, a life that will be 10 times longer, 60 years.

Sure, this is a bittersweet story, but it’s also a love story. Jack loved Harold, and he understood that harnesses his lover in a country life would have meant killing him. But Harold died anyway, so what is the meaning of Jack’s generosity? That he was not the one who killed him. Harold was not happy in their farm, he wanted to fly, to fly away; he loved Jack and I’m sure he was thinking that he was always coming back to him, but that is the war, and that was the fate of many soldiers who didn’t believe they would die in war. And maybe Harold thought he was different, he had already managed to escape once, why not two? Harold was for sure a dreamer, and maybe he was also young. I don’t blame Jack for letting him go, probably if that was not the case, Harold would have gone in any case, and their love would have been destroyed. In this way, even if Jack has no more Harold, he has at least the memory of their perfect love.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006O1YC8K/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (plus d'informations)

This is a bittersweet Christmas tale, and even if there is an hot sex scene in the middle of it, it’s quite different from what I’m used to read by Jardonn Smith.

Forrest Barton is 44 years old and waiting for his partner, Ernest, to come back home from the IIWW. It’s not that Forrest doesn’t understand how difficult it’s for Ernest, he himself was a soldier during the IWW, but he misses his man. Especially on Christmas time when they have traditions together to share with Forrest’s cousin, Wilton and his partner Gaither (both men are in Grit by Jardonn Smith and William Maltese). Ernest told Forrest to respect their tradition, and that is the above sex scene I mentioned: when they gathered together with Wilton and Gaither, Forrest and Ernest shared their bed with the other couple and they do the festivities on their own way. This year, and for the past three years since Ernest left, Forrest moved to a ménages a trois, and that is the only sex he has and only since Ernest told him to, in a way Forrest is faithful to Ernest.

After the sex scene, the story moves immediately to the bittersweet tale, with Forrest helping a young soldier, Vernon, to deliver some Christmas gifts to his 3 and 4 years old sons and his wife at home. It’s a wonderful and tragic tale, an old fashioned holiday tale that had me almost in tears. I so wanted for it to have a different ending, as I always want when reading war novels, even if I know that a different ending is almost always impossible. War was not generous, and many, many men succumbed to its wrath.

I strongly recommend this novella, aside for the little paranormal element, it’s also a good historical setting, with right references to the time and war period.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004HKIKGU/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (plus d'informations)

There are some Gay novels that is difficult to classify as romance, and for this reason I think, in this last period where Gay Romances are overlooked by all a series of readers, can be the hunting place for them. Grit comes from a couple of authors who are specialized in basic, and dirty, sex, a sex without “frippery”, sex that the more romantic romance readers can maybe don’t understand, but if some of them want to give to this story a try, I think they maybe can be surprised… or maybe they will hate me to direct them to this story, but in any case I think it was worth the try.

This is the story of 4 men, 2 couple, Wilton and Gaither, Bobby and Dan, two couple that are at the opposite, experienced and daring the first one, tentative and a little scared the second one, but all of them will find their right happy end.

While young Bobby and Dan should be in a way more dear to the romantic reader, they are discovering their love for each other (be careful, I’m not saying this is a roses and chocolate story, but at least they are young (and I think pretty) enough to be of interest for that type of reader), I had a special “love” for Wilton and Gaither. All the opposite from pretty Wilton was probably my favourite of all of them: the one who makes the engine of a beginning of the century train work, Wilton hasn’t had an easy life, but now he is good, he has an home of his own, a good job, and I think that he would like to have also a good man by his side. But Wilton, even if he doesn’t let it out, I think has a wrong idea of himself, like that, since he is not pretty, and rough, and on and on in his mind with the lesser quality in him, he always picks men in need of something he has (money) and not exactly searching for that thing he would like to give for free (love).

Involved with Gaither, a some sort of police officer, in the search of a missing Dan, the two have the time to explorer a relationship that they only quickly tasted before, and Wilton will find out that Gaither is not a man who let himself fooled by Wilton’s rough exterior, that he is able to see the good (and somewhat kind) man inside.

The sex, both between Bobby and Dan, than above all between Wilton and Gaither is, as I said, basic, and in Wilton and Gaither’s case, even extreme. I’m not saying it’s kinky, even if the more experienced Wilton and Gaither play a some sort of BDSM ante-litteram relationship. Sex in these types of stories is a must, even since, truth be told, readers are not really searching for romance when picking up these books… and that I think is the nice surprise I was saying above, finding happily ever after, and even a glimpse in what was, apparently, a long and satisfying relationship is even more nice.

From what I can tell, also the setting, a beginning of the XX century America is good, there was really the feeling of a society that was on the edge of a big change, even if remembrances of a recent “wild” past were still there.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608201228/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (plus d'informations)

When I read Let's Get Medieval by Jardonn Smith I was quite candid in stating that while The Bishop of Grunewald was not my cup of tea, I somewhat liked The Tortured Secutor. I like the setting, the roman empire, and I like the relationship between the two men, very explicit and 'down and dirty', but with a certain degree of romance, even if not the classic 'pick glasses' type of romance.

Danube Divine is on the same level of The Tortured Secuter, and it's also losely connected to the previous story. But instead of in the apex of the Roman Empire, the story is set during its decline and it's not told from the perspective of a glorious and pompous roman soldier, but from the perspective of two 'barbarian', Theo and Gregoric, two of the Goth who scattered the Roman at Hadrianopolis. There is also another thing that links this story with the other one, the way it starts: Theo and Gregoric are in a warriors paradise, or walhalla, or in any other place a good warrior went when his time on earth is ended. In this way we know, from the start, that both Theo than Gregoric had a good life, and, despite everything will happen during the story, we know that they will overcome all of it.

Theo and Gregoric are cousins but their similarity ends there. Gregoric is stoic and steady, he has a bigger perspective on life than the immediate day; Theo is more easy, he enjoys the day and little think on tomorrow. After the Battle of Hadrianopolis, Theo is roaming among the dead Roman soldiers, like many other, to find a pair of boot of his size... not exactly an eroic act, but quite normal in that situation. Among the fallen soldiers he finds Drusus and Strabo, two Romans, injured but still live; they are like all the other soldiers, but for Theo they are different, thanks to the medallion they wear, Theo recognizes two fellow Mithras worshipers. I don't know if Theo saves them since they are fellow worshipers or since he is in lust with Drusus, in a way or the other, Theo kidnaps Drusus while leaving Strabo to Gregoric's care.

Gregoric is on the battlefield with Boris, a Christian priest but also a Mithras' worshiper. Boris was Gregoric and Theo's tutor, and when it was time, he became Gregoric's lover. Their relationship is more a Master and disciple one than erotic love, but nevertheless it's deep and involving. Gregoric is willing to die for Boris, but I have the feeling that Boris knows that Gregoric is fated to something bigger. He teaches him everything to let him go to his destiny.

The novel is very long but it's parted in different phases each of them told in first point of view from Theo or Gregoric, and the mood of the story varies according to the narrator. At the beginning it's Theo who told as he met Drusus, and all the focus of the story is on their erotic escapade far from the horripilation of the Battle of Hadrianopolis; there is sex, and it's playful, the mood of the story is light. Then the ball shift to Gregoric, and he remembers as he met Boris. For a good portion, Gregoric recalls what Boris told him about his past, how he was initiated to the Mithras's cult, how he arrives to be a captive of Gregoric's uncle. Then Gregoric goes down the memory lane, his love for Boris, and how he ended in the Battle of Hadrianapolis. All this part of the book is full of historic details, or history mixed to fiction; there is a bit of romance, I really love Gregoric and Boris' relationship, but it always had a sadness inside.

From that moment on, with Gregoric's narration that reached Theo's point, the story continues from Gregoric's point of view, and so it remains on a upper level, less light but more involving for the history lover. There is less sex, even if sometime the author returns to his distinctive point of view on what is sexy and erotic, Boris's torture with Gregoric that almost reveres his body it's at the same time dreadful but so full of love. In the end I think that this is one of the most romantic book I read by Jardonn Smith, and Gregoric and Boris' love is an epic one.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608200329/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (plus d'informations)