This is my first Australian romance, plus it’s about two men, neither of them are confused about their sexual preference, and it was written by a man. Huzzah!
From Amazon: The most important things in Simon Murray’s life are football, friends, and film—in that order. His friends despair of him ever meeting someone, but despite his loneliness, Simon is cautious about looking for more. Then his best friends drag him to a party, where he barges into a football conversation and ends up defending the honour of star forward Declan Tyler—unaware that the athlete is present. In that first awkward meeting, neither man has any idea they will change each other’s lives forever… But as Simon and Declan fumble toward a relationship, keeping Declan’s homosexuality a secret from well-meaning friends and an increasingly suspicious media becomes difficult. Nothing can stay hidden forever. Soon Declan will have to choose between the career he loves and the man he wants, and Simon has never been known to make things easy—for himself or for others.
Wry and self-deprecating, Simon narrates the story and is a funny and engaging hero. Tigers and Devils is more of a (very enjoyable) love story than a romance novel. Let me see if I can explain what I mean by that. I make no promises.
- Simon and Declan fall hard and fast.
- Their relationship is largely long distance in the early days. Declan plays for a football (Australian, obviously) team in Tasmania and Simon works in Melbourne.
- The reader is told a lot of the early relationship, but the swoony part is largely passed over.
- The bulk of the story focuses on the issues they face as a couple as opposed to anything that slows them down from becoming a couple.
Tigers and Devils’ supporting characters were well fleshed out and Simon and Declan felt like real people. Sean Kennedy is a really good and diverting writer, but I could have done with a little more romance. I started it with a sample, then I bought the book, but felt no need to continue on to the following two novels. Tigers and Devils succeeded as a novel about two people falling in love, but I was looking for more of a classic genre romance.
LGBT romance recommendations can be found here.
Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful.
Mrs. Julien Presents 