Beaten Track Publishing, $3.99
Contemporary Romance, 2015
If my life were one of my design projects, by the time I met Elise at college, I was little more than a rough pencil sketch, blurry and unfinished, graphite smudge where I’d carelessly erased the bits I didn’t want. Elise and I married, and she unwittingly finalised the drawing, refining the edges, adding detail, filling in the blanks. Career, promotions, great apartment, beautiful, successful wife—it was simultaneously perfect and meaningless, and it stayed that way for eight years. Two-dimensional, without form, a blueprint for a life that had been filed away in the wrong drawer.
Then I met Adam Ashton.
Oh my, the opening paragraphs certainly know how to draw me into the story practically immediately.
Oh, and don’t worry, this isn’t some cheating spouse story. The “I” in question, Sol Brooks, is no longer married, plus he and Elise married like they were joining the US army back in those days—they don’t ask about the other person’s “friend”, and they don’t tell about their own “friend” either.
And then, these people start to converse, and my anticipation plummets. Can I have some kind of rewind so that Checking In is entirely done without conversations?
“And when I say sexy, I’m after nice soft curves, you know what I mean?”
I knew what he meant.
He gave those air boobs a good tight squeeze, jutted out his jaw and laughed like—what were they called? Beavis and Butthead?
“Ugh-huh-huh. Ugh-huh-huh.”
When everything is quiet, I get EM Forster. When these characters talk, I see my life flashing before my eyes.
Oh yes, the story. Sadly, this is part of an ongoing series, and I haven’t read the previous story. Here, Adam and Sol are already a couple, and Sol’s second ever boyfriend Calvin shows up for that obligatory “We need some drama for the sequel, so bring out the ex!” stuff.
Nothing much actually happens in this story, though, just reams after reams of feels from Sol’s point of view. Sure, he goes places, sees people, but these are just excuses for him to launch into yet another interior monologue about his feelings. He’s easily the most emotionally-attuned bloke in all the lands in the northern hemisphere, and I can only wonder whether it is as exhausting for him to keep feeling non-stop as it is for me to follow that guy’s train of thoughts. There’s something very artificial about a story that allows the protagonist to dwell incessantly on his feelings all the time, like he has nothing better to do, like doing a number two or something. The overall effect also makes Sol come off as, well, pretty self-absorbed and whiny too.
Still, things aren’t that bad, as the author has a lovely way with words, so long as the characters aren’t conversing with one another.
“He’s never been any bother.”
“That’s what I told her, but she insists it’s down to the way we handle him.”
“Ah, well. Might as well lap up the praise.”
“Yep. We’ve done good.”
“You have.”
Oh, hush. Have these people use sign language or something, just bring back the lovely prose! Even then, if I were honest, the opening paragraphs are the highlights of the elegant phraseology and wordsmith in this story. Everything else is a downhill trip to ugh-huh-huh land.
