I love rock stars and I love M/M stories and the story of Evan and Jesse is great. I was hooked immediately and I totally lost myself in it. Their admiration and friendship grows into an internal love. I look forward to go right into No Fear -- I love these two and I am so not ready to let them go. Make sure you go into S. J. Frost's site...great character descriptions along with some freebie short stories but read them in order because of spoilers. ( )

Every teen musician’s dream of becoming a rock star is central to this romance about the perils and sacrifices endemic to the big time. When burnt out megastar Evan Arden hears Jesse Alexander perform, he’s blown away and drags his mentor and record producer to hear Jesse. From these humble beginnings, a great career blossoms.

Twenty-seven year old Evan, however, isn’t just enraptured by Jesse’s singing voice and composing genius. He’s also attracted to the twenty-year-old himself. So Evan manages to meet Jesse and they click.

Suddenly Jesse, who’s been booted from his family, is not only living with his gay brother Brandon as Brandon pursues an acting career in their hometown Chicago but also has his musical idol as a boyfriend. To add frosting to this luscious cake, Jesse’s band Conquest has a chance to become hot.

For his part, loner Evan, who has been spending the last few years roaming the world, is grateful to find someone whose agenda isn’t to use him as a stepping stone to the limelight. It’s as if the bars to his self-imposed exile from society have lifted. Not to mention the sex with Jesse is hot and heavy, always a plus.

When Evan decides to return to the recording studio and concert stage as Jesse is recording his first album and readies himself and his band for a concert tour, reality sets in. Is the world ready for a homosexual megastar? Will announcing his love for Jesse make them lose fans and revenue? If so, how many fans and how much revenue? As the paparazzi circle like vultures, Evan, without consulting Jesse, makes a decision that affects them both, and both suffer from it.

Read the rest of my review at AAR: http://www.likesbooks.com/cgi-bin/bookReview.pl?BookReviewId=9278 ( )

Loved it! Great characters, well developed relationships between the characters, it flowed beautifully for the most part (sometimes the amount of detail got in the way of the story but only a few times). The sex was smoking, although I did end up skimming after the third looong love scene.

My only complaints:

1. The reunion between the MCs was a little too swift in that they went from barely able to speak to each other to forgiving all sins and shagging.

2. Trish. From her handsy possessive attitude to her weird and creepy thoughts about raping a drunken Jesse, she was a character who went from ballsy and exciting to sleazy and gross. And there was no resolution for her character (unless it happens in another installment). Things were kind of left hanging.

I'm off the buy the next in the series. ( )

I think I need to do the minority report on this one. This review contains spoilers. I will hide the more important ones.

I found this book to be very frustrating. First of all, there were quite a few editing errors. In two places the author managed to say the opposite of what she meant, and there were many mixed and/or clunky metaphors, and lots of repetitive language. The book was too long and the sex scenes were frequent and repetitive.

Second, it is an insta-everything book (sex/love/commitment). Jesse is a virgin, but they have full anal sex the night they meet, several times. They are in love in days and swearing undying commitment within a few more days.

Then the temporary breakup at the end bothered me on several levels. There was the Harlequin trope of one partner breaking up with the other for their own good. Then there was the extreme cluelessness of Jesse in not figuring out what was going on. Jesse knew the studio wanted them to hide the relationship. Evan was still wearing what amounted to an engagement ring, he wasn't eating or sleeping. He was drinking too much. And it never once occurred to Jesse that maybe Evan was doing it for Jesse's sake. And finally, Evan quit singing because he suddenly and brutally broke up with a band member who went on to kill himself. So him suddenly and brutally breaking up with Jesse seemed extremely unlikely. ( )

Loved it! Great characters, well developed relationships between the characters, it flowed beautifully for the most part (sometimes the amount of detail got in the way of the story but only a few times). The sex was smoking, although I did end up skimming after the third looong love scene.

My only complaints:

1. The reunion between the MCs was a little too swift in that they went from barely able to speak to each other to forgiving all sins and shagging.

2. Trish. From her handsy possessive attitude to her weird and creepy thoughts about raping a drunken Jesse, she was a character who went from ballsy and exciting to sleazy and gross. And there was no resolution for her character (unless it happens in another installment). Things were kind of left hanging.

I'm off the buy the next in the series. ( )