Earthly Concerns by Xavier Axelson

Title: Earthly Concerns

Author: Xavier Axelson

Genre: Paranormal

Length: Novella (178pgs. Large print)

Publisher: Seventh Window Publications (12th March 2012)

Heat Level:  Explicit

Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥4Hearts

Reviewer: Pixie

Blurb: Between love and loss, there is obligation…

It was a peaceful night when Barrett and his daughter were driving home… then something happened. Something sinister.

Between shadow and light, there is uncertainty…

Now the only person Barrett can turn to for help is Anson, a man gifted with psychic abilities beyond reason. But Anson is also his ex-boyfriend, a man whose heart he’d already broken.

If you can see, you have to help.

As Anson delves deeper into the circumstances surrounding Barrett’s accident, he begins to realize that he’s not only in a race against time, but in a battle against his own broken heart and the terrifying understanding that whatever has taken Barrett’s child is a force of evil beyond anything either man has ever encountered.

And between decision and consequences, there are… Earthly Concerns.

Purchase Link: http://www.seventhwindow.com/index.php?main_page=product_music_info&cPath=&products_id=42

Review: Anson is awakened in the middle of the night by a phone call from his ex-lover begging for his help.  Anson doesn’t really want to, but knows that something sinister has happened and he is the only one who can get Barrett’s daughter back.

This is quite a darkish story that is well woven… but kinda odd. Anson is a psychic who is able to see and he doesn’t really know how it all works. Barrett is Anson’s ex-lover.   He couldn’t be the man who Anson needed so let him go.  Now, he needs Anson’s help to find his daughter.

I liked the dark aspects of this story.   the shadowy figure, the descriptions of moths, beetles and spiders and Anson being all angsty over Barrett. We don’t get a real feel about Barrett, except for his despair over his missing daughter and Anson.   Well, Anson comes across as a bit obsessed with Barrett. I liked the way that Anson and his psychic ability are portrayed and the descriptions are very well done to give a vague but dark feel to the story.

There is an extremely hot encounter between Anson and Barrett that is done as a memory dream and it shows an extremely passionate relationship that is filled with doubts. I must admit that I wanted to know more about the connection the two men have and how they came to have been separated, as you get the feeling that maybe Anson wasn’t as patient as he could have been with Barrett.  As Barrett, according to Anson, was struggling with his sexuality. It would have been really nice to have got something from Barrett’s POV, because all we know for sure is his despair over his daughter.

So, I will recommend this for those who love dark, mysterious, angst filled, despair lingering and pain filled stories that have hot sex and an ending that promises more for the two men.