Hi guys, we have Alexis Hall visiting us now with his latest release For Real, we pin Alexis down and Aerin asks him a couple of questions, there’s a great excerpt that was ‘borrowed’ from Riptide, there’s a brilliant giveaway so make sure to leave a comment and we also have Aerin’s review…. and I can safely say she was blown away! So enjoy the post book lovers <3 ~Pixie~

For Real

Alexis Hall

Laurence Dalziel is worn down and washed up, and for him, the BDSM scene is all played out. Six years on from his last relationship, he’s pushing forty and tired of going through the motions of submission.

Then he meets Toby Finch. Nineteen years old. Fearless, fierce, and vulnerable.  Everything Laurie can’t remember being.

Toby doesn’t know who he wants to be or what he wants to do. But he knows, with all the certainty of youth, that he wants Laurie. He wants him on his knees. He wants to make him hurt, he wants to make him beg, he wants to make him fall in love.

The problem is, while Laurie will surrender his body, he won’t surrender his heart. Because Toby is too young, too intense, too easy to hurt. And what they have—no matter how right it feels—can’t last. It can’t mean anything.

It can’t be real.

Aerin Interviews Alexis!

Hi Aerin – thanks so much for having me 🙂

After reading Glitterland and Waiting for Flood I had this image of you as this proper English man, all sweet and innocent. Now that I’ve read For Real…I know better! For Real was one of the filthiest and kinkiest books I’ve ever read. Where have you been hiding this raunchy, dirty, kinky, passionate side?

Oh gosh, I’m not sure what to say. 

I mean, I’m thrilled you found FOR REAL so, um, enjoyable — I was setting out to write an erotic romance, so it would be sort of disappointing if that hadn’t, well, come through. I think the thing about erotic content is that it’s not really all that different to any other sort of content – when you write something funny you want people to laugh and when you write something sad you want them to cry. And when you write something erotic you want them to … err … find it erotic.

More broadly, I tend to write across a range of styles and genres so I tend to fit both the level and the type of erotic to the sort of story that I’m writing. WAITING FOR THE FLOOD, for example, has kissing and a man with his shirt off, but that was all I felt the story needed and it felt right for those characters. GLITTERLAND is kind of in the middle. And, obviously, FOR REAL is at something of an extreme.

So I wouldn’t say I was hiding my passionate side. It just hadn’t really come up. So to speak.

What (or who) inspired you to write a book in the BDSM genre?

It might sound a bit odd but FOR REAL was mostly inspired by other books in this genre. In the sense that BDSM is quite prevalent in m/m so I’ve incidentally read quite a lot of it. And I started to notice particular patterns which weren’t necessarily patterns that particularly appealed to me.

So basically I ended up trying to write the sort of story I was having difficulty finding.

And my editor at Riptide, Sarah Frantz Lyons, was very supportive throughout. We talk about kink a fair bit and share quite a lot of perspectives on it so that sort of gave me the courage to stop worrying about a kinky book was supposed to look like and just write the kinky book that felt right to me. Which I also knew would feel right to at least one other person on the planet, which is why FOR REAL is dedicated to her.

From my personal experience (in reading these sorts of books, of course) BDSM is a very delicate subject, and very few writers manage to capture the essence in their work. I love that in For Real we got to know the feelings, thoughts and experiences from both sides, the dominant and the submissive, which is something no author I’ve read has ever done before.  How much (and what kind) of research have you done in order to write this book; how much of it comes directly from your kinky, awesome little mind, from your own thought and feelings on this subject?

This is a tricky one because I’m rather too British to talk about my sex life in public. I do have some experience in that scene, I still know people who are actively involved it and I kind of keep an eye on developments. And I’ve always been interested in the way the reality of it intersects with our fictional representations so in that sense FOR REAL owes quite a lot to my thoughts and feelings about kink.

For example, a lot of the BDSM books I’ve read have included certain types of social settings—like there’s always an amazing club, where everyone is supportive and welcoming, and  you always find exactly what you’re looking for, and nothing never smells of disinfectant—which don’t map particularly accurately to anywhere I’ve ever been. So I definitely wanted to present a different view of the public Scene. There are three different club scenes in FOR REAL and while none of them are completely awful all of them in some way fail to live up to somebody’s expectations.

I’m glad that you felt I managed to capture both sides the dynamic – as you say, kink is a very delicate thing and so our perceptions of it are naturally very subjective. I think, to an extent, writing a dominant or a submissive is just like writing any other kind of character: it’s a combination of imagination, empathy and experience.

Of course the one really significant piece of research I did was for the lemon meringue pie scene. I was halfway through making one and probably failing quite badly when I suddenly realised I knew I an amazing person who would be so much better at this than me. So I wrote to Elisabeth Lane (from Cooking Up Romance) was all “hey, do you fancy helping me make a kinky lemon meringue pie” and she was like “hell yes.” So I sent her the scene and she got back to me a few days later, basically pointing out all the ways it wasn’t culinary authentic or logistically possible so I re-wrote the whole thing to fit proper lemon meringue pie timings.

Because people do actually notice that kind of thing.

So now I feel very confident that anyone wishing to re-create the lemon meringue p ie can do so accurately and with delicious consequences.

How did your writing experience while writing For Real differ from the other books you’ve written so far?

When I started the dual POV was quite challenging because I had to head switch in mid flow but after about three chapters I got into the swing of it. The more you write a character the more you understand them and the more easily their voice flows so, after a little while, I was fine with it.

And, obviously and it occurs to me that this was probably what you were thinking of when you asked this question, the more explicit erotic content did give me a number of British moments, where I’d write something and then quietly die at the prospect of anybody ever actually reading it.

Ironically, voice helped a lot with that because there are things I wrote as Toby I would never have the balls to articulate for myself. I think the moment I realised how freeing Toby was going to be was in something like the second chapter when he’s looking at Laurie’s cock. And I just gave free reign to this lavish description of a dong and it was kind of hilarious and embarrassing and awesomely fun.

Which character do you like the most in this book, Laurie or Toby, and why?

They’re both my characters so you sort of have to love them both a bit, or writing them would be a chore. A sense I get, perhaps wrongly, from a lot of the BDSM I read is that they’re sort of written looking at the dom. I think the assumption is usually that that reader will identify most naturally with the sub and the dom is there to look hot and do sexy things. So when I was outlining FOR REAL, I decided to start by looking at the sub – so I essentially came up with this guy I thought it would be amazing to have on his knees. Someone kind of stern and remote and powerful and a little bit emotionally distant so that his unravelling and his surrender would feel all the more potent. And then Toby was created to contrast with that and to address some of my issues with the way is dominance is understood, both in life and fiction. So I guess the short answer is that I identify with Toby but I’d totally do Laurie.

Excerpt

Toby

I wake at fuck knows what time in a strange bed, in the arms of a man I hardly know, and it’s perfect. I’ve never been held like this before. Kind of so . . . absolutely. His fingers are slack against my wrist, but they’re still there. This comforting weight, like he can’t bear to let me go. I don’t think he’s moved all night long.

I’m super careful because I don’t want to wake him, but I wriggle myself round in his arms until we’re face-to-face.

Laurie.

His breath’s morningy, but so’s mine. I just like looking at him like this. He’s both more and less like himself somehow, stern and soft at the same time. And, lying there in this warm haze with him, I can’t believe all the things he’s given me in a single night: power and submission and kindness. And now this as well. His peace.

He’s also the first person who’s ever taken me seriously. The first person to really make me feel beautiful. I can’t help wondering what the fuck I’m supposed to be able to give him back.

Very, very lightly, I touch his eyelashes. The corner of his lips. He doesn’t stir. And I’m a little bit worried this is what stalkers do.

I know we’re not lovers or boyfriends or friends, and I know that he’s going to wake up, and call a taxi to drive me out of his life. I hope he doesn’t regret me—this stupid kid he took home one night—but I’m going to remember him forever.

I’m not sure I’m the same person who snuck into that stupid club. The only thing I was right about was him. I kind of half wish I’d met him later. When I’m older, and I’m all cool and sophisticated. However that happens. I can’t really imagine it properly though. The best I can come up with is us both wearing tuxedos. And we’re in this sort of . . . bar, I guess, which is all oak and honey and candlelight, and I’m all like, From the top shelf, please, to the bartender. And Laurie looks exactly the same, but I’m kind of hazy, and my brain wants to substitute Daniel Craig, and what the fuck kind of fantasy is this, where I’m played—in my own head—by somebody else?

Besides, if I had met him some other time, I wouldn’t be here now. And he wouldn’t be my first. And I wouldn’t lose that for anything.

I hope he hasn’t totally ruined me.

I’ve no idea what time it is. Late, I think, from the light, which is kind of bright and sharp and sparkly, like you sometimes get after seriously hard-core rain. And it’s such a ridiculously gorgeous room to wake up in, a little bit fairy-tale, especially since he’s got this massive four-poster bed. Or some kind of posh modern take on one, anyway, since there’s no curtains or canopy, just the base and the posts, which are heavily carved with arches and spirals and have that inside gleam of really good wood, so deep and rich you think it’d be warm if you touched it. It’s fancy without being fussy, and, honestly, it gives me a bunch of filthy ideas.

He’d look fucking amazing spread-eagled on a bed like this.

And that’s a fantasy I can definitely imagine properly.

I’m not sure about the technicalities, but I reckon you could get somebody into some pretty interesting positions. And by “somebody” I mean Laurie. Legs up and wide, arms above his head. Exposed, vulnerable, and a little bit degraded. And so, so hot. And I know exactly how he’d look: frowning and desperate and embarrassed and turned on. And mine. Just like I’d be his for letting me do that to him.

God. What would it be like to have someone trust you and want you that much? To put aside fear and pride and shame and inhibition. All the stuff that’s supposed to be so important. Parts of ourselves we’re supposed to protect and care about.

I sometimes wonder what it means that I want someone to do that for me. But then I think it doesn’t matter, and that it’s just a thing I want. And either everything we want is weird, or nothing is. Unless it’s like . . . avocado. I seriously don’t get that. The texture makes me gag, and it tastes like you’re chewing the inside of somebody else’s scrotum. Who the fuck would want that?

After a bit, I slide carefully from his arms and crawl off the edge of the bed. Poor bastard must be beyond knackered, because he doesn’t stir. Just makes this fucking adorable noise, nearly a whimper. It’s probably nothing, but I pretend it’s for me. For the loss of me.

It’s kind of weird to be wandering around his house with my knob flapping in the breeze, so I wrap myself in yesterday’s towel and go down to the kitchen. My clothes have gone a bit fluffy in the dryer, but they’re basically fine, and I pull them on. And then I find myself doing all this weird shit.

I pad around and open all the curtains for him. Pick up The Times from the doormat. There’s no post because it’s Sunday. Then I find myself back in his kitchen, peering into the fridge. It’s well-stocked, actually, in this slightly anonymous I get food deliveries way.

I’m probably supposed to be going away. Slipping off discreetly so he doesn’t have to wake up and freak out about having brought me home and let me stay.

But then I think of him upstairs, so utterly asleep, and the way he held me all night. The way he dried me, so gently and carefully, looking at me like I was precious, and going on about benzy-whatever-it-was. Making me feel all cared-for. Well, that and horny. And now I want to do something back.

There’s not much in this world I know for definite I’m awesome at, but breakfast I can do. I think I must’ve had natural skills in that direction, but half a year at Greasy Joe’s has honed me into a bacon-and-eggs samurai.

I know, right? It’s the sort of shit parents dream for their kids. Little Tabitha’s going to be a doctor. Rory’s going to run for government. Crispin is deworming orphans in Somalia. And Toby, well, Toby’s not so bad with a griddle pan.

But, hey, at least I’m good at something. For a while there I genuinely thought I wasn’t. And, anyway, I’ve always wanted to play with an AGA.

I want to show off and do him a full English, but with the stuff he’s got lying around it would be more like three-quarters, and I don’t like doing things half-arsed. So scramblies it is.

I spend a little while like a contestant on Deal or No Deal, opening all the doors of the AGA and peering inside, trying to figure out what the shit is going on in there until I work out which one is probably the roasting oven. I find a grill rack insert, line up some pieces of bacon and stuff it in there, near the top. Then I find a kind of metal badminton racket that opens and closes, and I guess it’s either for kinky shit beyond my wildest dreams or making toast, so I stick it on the boiling plate to heat.

And then I get performance anxiety because scrambled eggs are like this . . . art form. They’re the wax-on-wax-off of cooking. Simple on the surface but infinitely complex and diverse. Totally magical.

It’s got to the point that all the regulars at Joe’s will say, “You know how I like them, Toby,” and the truth is, I do. I’m literally walking around with twenty different variations of scrambled eggs in my head. Bit of a comedown for somebody who was supposed to be a lawyer, but beggars can’t be choosers. And egg-maker is way better than beggar, isn’t it?

But the thing is, I don’t know how Laurie would like them. And that’s kind of a problem because I want to make him the best fucking scrambled eggs he’s ever had or even imagined possible. Is he traditional or American style? Big curds or small? Preseasoned or postseasoned? Creamy or buttery?

Jesus. It’s carnage in my brain.

So I go for what I like best. Well, usually when I cook for myself, I just go for quick and dirty, but I make for him what I’d make for me if I wanted to show myself a good time. If that makes sense.

I break the eggs into the frying pan, add some butter and seasoning—he’s got proper sea salt and everything—and give them ten seconds in the roasting oven. Basically, there’s two ways to go from here: stir like crazy or hold off, fingers twitching.

I let my fingers twitch and distract myself by putting the kettle onto the boiling plate. Then I grab the pan and gently fold the eggs in. It’s a bit weird, not having them on a hob where I can keep an eye on them, and I’m nervy it’s all going to go horribly wrong. But then I settle into it. I know it’s just scrambled eggs, not like cordon bleu, but there’s something that feels right to me about cooking. It’s calm and focus at the same time. And you get something real at the end of it, something that can make someone happy.

Next time I check the AGA, the eggs are pretty much done, all gold and velvety. I stir in some crème fraîche and some freshly chopped oregano and pile them onto a plate on top of the crisscross-patterned AGA toast, along with lots of butter and the grilled bacon. And, of course, I steal a little of the leftovers, just to make sure I’m not about to serve him a pile of ming. But, no, it’s fine. It’s good. Creamy, but not too creamy, fluffy and indulgent. See, this is the other thing I like about cooking: you always know when you’ve got it right.

I can’t find anything like a tray, but I manage to make it back upstairs, balancing the paper, the plate, and a cup of tea. He’s still fast asleep, curled around the space where I’d been lying, in the warmth that maybe I’d left. I put everything down on the bedside table and perch next to him. I’ve never tried to wake someone up . . . like romantically before. I’ve no idea how.

“Uh . . . good morning . . . Hi.”

Yeah, that probably wouldn’t have woken a napping mouse.

I lean in to shake his shoulder, and it feels like a ridiculously intimate way to touch someone when they’re kind of helpless and out of it and you’re awake. “Laurie?”

If I was going for gentle, I fail hard. He jerks from oblivious to frantic in about a nanosecond. And his face is like this magic mirror of responses: surprise, confusion, loss, awareness. There’s even this moment in the middle when he looks happy to see me, but it’s gone as quickly as the rest. Eventually, he’s Laurence Dalziel again, and says in this dry, resigned way, “Good morning, Toby.”

“Hey.” I grin at him because I’m an idiot. “I made you breakfast.”

First, he’s all bewildered again and then unflatteringly worried. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“It doesn’t suck.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—” He’s still trying to shake off sleep.

“Yeah, you did, but it’s okay. Come on, sit up. There’s tea as well.”

That gets his attention, and he uncurls. The covers kind of fall away a bit, and suddenly I remember he’s naked under there. And holy shit. I mean, I know I’ve seen him already, but the novelty is nowhere near wearing off.

I want all the naked, all the time.

In this light, I see different things, different shadows. Sun dapple on his shoulders. Sparks of gold at the tips of the hair on his arms. Though it’s harsher too, picking up grey sometimes and imperfections on his skin, the places where his body is rough and lived in, its muscles earned.

He was gorgeous yesterday, kneeling and burnished and kind of a fantasy. And he’s still gorgeous this morning, rumpled and tired and real.

Shit. I’m meant to be doing stuff. Not just staring at him lustily, thinking of all the things I want to do to him. And, for the record, some of those things are perfectly normal. Like kiss him.

I pass him the plate, wafting it a bit so the scent of butter and herbs fills the air. He’s still slightly dazed, so I forgive him for the grateful OMG, it doesn’t look awful expression that crosses his face.

“You really didn’t have to.”

I shrug. “I wanted to.”

“What about you?”

Oh yeah. Me. “Wow, I totally forgot.”

For some reason, my stupid makes him smile. God, I’ll be sitting around doing he loves me, he loves me not with a daisy before long, but he’s got such a good smile. Makes the gold in his eyes shine. “We’ll share,” he tells me.

So we sit there in his bed, probably in the middle of the afternoon, and he feeds me morsels of toast and egg, and I feel kind of cherished and turned on and so fucking happy. And I wish I didn’t have to go and get on with my messed-up life.

I wish this was my life instead.

Just great eggs and a hot guy and no worries at all.

And they are great eggs, by the way. I can tell he likes them.

That’s the other kind of beautiful thing about food: watching somebody enjoy it. Admittedly, it doesn’t normally get me horny, but Laurie’s a special case.

“Where did you learn to cook like this?” he asks. I’m both surprised and chuffed he cares. Or maybe he’s just making conversation with his slightly-more-than-one-night stand. Either way, I like this glimpse of him. Relaxed and sleepy-eyed and looked-after. A little unprotected piece of who he is.

“Nowhere,” is what I tell him. But then his head tilts inquisitively, and I can see that he’s not going to let me get away with that. “I kind of cooked for myself a lot when I was a kid.”

“Why?” Now he sounds sharp. “Does your mother not believe in food either?”

Whoops. I guess I’ve accidentally painted myself as some kind of abused, underfed guttersnipe. Which isn’t true at all. When I was younger, Mum and I had some rough times, but I’ve kind of got over it now. She’s my mum, y’know? What can you do? “No, she does. It’s just she doesn’t believe in time.”

“I beg your pardon?”

I have to laugh at the expression on his face. “She’s not a martyred slave of time.” He’s still blank. I get this a lot when I have to explain my mother. “Baudelaire?”

Nothing.

I sigh and crunch the last piece of bacon. It’s so good. Salty and rich, with just the faintest hint of charcoal to give it depth. “She believes you should do things when you feel moved to do them, or else you become nothing but a mechanism of chronology or something. But, me, I’m totally a martyred slave. I want to eat three times a day, and I want the savoury bit to come first and the sweet bit to come second, and I want to sleep through the night and wake up in the morning.”

He sits up a bit straighter, which makes the duvet slip down, and I’m briefly distracted by . . . oh God . . . everything. Nipples and hair and hard ridges of muscle. He’s all rough and delicious and—

Fuck, he’s talking.

“So she just left you to fend for yourself?”

“Dude, no. There was always food. But I got sick of Cup-a-Soups and Super Noodles, so I started experimenting.” He had that social services look I’m pretty familiar with. “Laurie, we do okay.”

“I’m sorry, but your mother sounds like a nutcase.”

“Oi!” Nobody gets to call my mum a nutcase except me. “She’s a genius.” Then he gets the other look I’m familiar with. “And I’m aware they probably seem pretty similar from a distance.”

That’s why I don’t like talking about this stuff. People always get the wrong idea. It’s not the Super Noodles that grind you down, it’s spending your whole life being second. Like, don’t get me wrong, Mum loves me. She loves me more than she loves anyone else in the world. I’ve never doubted that for a moment. But there’s something else: the ever-fading flame of inspiration, or whatever.

That’s where my mother dances.

Not for ordinary stuff like scrambled eggs or school reports or anybody else’s dreams. And I get it. And it’s okay. But she’s never going to understand what it’s like to . . . not have that. She’ll always support me in whatever I do, whether I’m studying law or working for £5.03 an hour as a kitchen porter at a greasy spoon, but that’s kind of the whole fucking problem.

Laurie breaks the silence with, “That was delicious. Thank you.”

“’S’okay.” I go kind of squirmy inside with pleasure. I like it so much when people enjoy my cooking, and that makes me embarrassed and self-conscious. Because it’s kind of pathetically needy, when you get right down to it. Like wanting to be first.

There’s butter glistening on his fingers from the last piece of toast. He’s got good hands. Because, frankly, he’s got good everything. They’re strong and blunt and very, very steady. Except, sometimes, when they’re really not. And that’s a wild thrill all by itself.

I know so little about this man, but I know he unravels hands-first.

I swoop in and clean him up, my tongue getting right down in the tender little V between his fingers, where he tastes so very much like him.

It makes him groan.

And my cock perks up like a Labrador at walkies.

“Toby.” There’s warning in his voice.

I look up at him, the tip of his finger caught between my teeth and cushioned by my lips, and I make my eyes as big as they can go.

“Please stop that.” There’s something else in his voice this time.

And, uh, I’m so confused. Please stop that should in no way press the Go button in your brain. And, honestly, it doesn’t in a real way. I know what the rules are and how to take no for an answer.

But the way he says it.

Right now, it’s ambiguous in the wrong way. But I can so easily imagine it being ambiguous in the right way.

I want him to say that to me and mean it and not mean it, knowing I might not stop. I want him to say it in pleasure, and I want him to say it pain. And I want the power to deny him. Just because I can. Just because his suffering makes me hot.

I let go of his finger with one last kiss.

And then we stare at each other because it’s suddenly awkward as fuck. I’m supposed to be leaving but I’m not, and he’s not asking me to.

“Won’t your mother,” he says finally, “be wondering where you are?”

She probably hasn’t noticed yet. Wait. That sounds bad. She would notice. She definitely would. It’s just her maternal panic sensor is kept on the lowest setting.

I shake my head. “But I should be going, right?”

“Yes, you should.”

“Yeah.” I chase a crumb round and round the empty plate with my finger. “Or we could—”

“No.”

Shit, I’ve gone too far. I always do that. There was reluctance before, but now certainty’s come down like a wall. I keep trying though. Probably because I’m an idiot. But what have I got to lose? “You don’t even know what I was going to ask.”

“I don’t have to.”

Whoa. Talk about quelling. I sigh. “Well, it doesn’t have to be wall-to-wall kinky shenanigans. We could . . . fuck or talk or go for a walk. Anything.”

Shit, could I sound any more desperate? But I kind of am. Also: go for a walk? What the fuck. Who does that?

“Toby.” Wow, I hate it when he’s this gentle. “We can’t do any of those things.”

I really, really don’t want to sound petulant, but I know I will anyway. “Why not?”

“Because I’m thirty-seven, for one thing.”

“And people who are thirty-seven don’t fuck or talk or go for walks? That must totally suck.”

“Not with nineteen-year-olds.”

“Dude, if this was ancient Greece, you’d be buggering me senseless by now.”

“Yes, well, we no longer live in a world of socially mandated pederasty.”

I nearly go, And you say that like it’s a good thing, but for fuck’s sake, it’s not funny. I’m nineteen and I’m not a kid. I know what I want, and he wants it too, so why is it suddenly not okay? “Your main objection is some vague perception of social stigma? Not, like, not fancying me or not wanting to fuck me?”

“It wouldn’t be right.” He pulls the duvet up to his chin, like he’s trying to hide under it. It’s kind of cute, or would be if he wasn’t trying to hide from me and a bunch of true stuff. And that’s when I catch it—the faintest tremor in his hands. Fuck yeah.

“And what we did last night was?”

He goes all red. “It was . . . different.”

I’m kind of hovering on the edge of cross now. I mean, it’s kind of nice he doesn’t want to exploit me or whatever, but fuck it, I’m so ready to be exploited. I lean a little closer to him. I’m being way too intense, but I can’t help it. “Are you telling me what we did before wasn’t sex? Wasn’t intimate?”

He stares at me, all rainy eyes and wildness. Lost, just like me. Then he shakes his head because he’s not a liar. I knew that about him from the first.

“So, what’s the big deal?”

For more excerpt click here: http://www.riptidepublishing.com/titles/for-real (Just click the excerpt tab)

About Alexis

Alexis Hall was born in the early 1980s and still thinks the 21st century is the future. To this day, he feels cheated that he lived through a fin de siècle but inexplicably failed to drink a single glass of absinthe, dance with a single courtesan, or stay in a single garret.

He did the Oxbridge thing sometime in the 2000s and failed to learn anything of substance. He has had many jobs, including ice cream maker, fortune teller, lab technician, and professional gambler. He was fired from most of them.

He can neither cook nor sing, but he can handle a 17th century smallsword, punts from the proper end, and knows how to hotwire a car.

He lives in southeast England, with no cats and no children, and fully intends to keep it that way.

• Connect with Alexis:
• Website: com
• Blog: com/blog
• Twitter: @quicunquevult
• Goodreads: com/alexishall

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Review

Title: For Real

Series: A Spires Story

Author: Alexis Hall

Genre: Contemporary, BDSM

Length: Super Novel (470 pages)

ISBN: 9781626492806

Publisher: Riptide Publishing (June 1st 2015)

Heat Level: Explicit/Erotic

Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥♥ 5 Hearts

Reviewer: Aerin

Blurb: Laurence Dalziel is worn down and washed up, and for him, the BDSM scene is all played out. Six years on from his last relationship, he’s pushing forty and tired of going through the motions of submission.

Then he meets Toby Finch. Nineteen years old. Fearless, fierce, and vulnerable. Everything Laurie can’t remember being.

Toby doesn’t know who he wants to be or what he wants to do. But he knows, with all the certainty of youth, that he wants Laurie. He wants him on his knees. He wants to make him hurt, he wants to make him beg, he wants to make him fall in love.

The problem is, while Laurie will surrender his body, he won’t surrender his heart. Because Toby is too young, too intense, too easy to hurt. And what they have—no matter how right it feels—can’t last. It can’t mean anything.

It can’t be real.

Product Link: http://www.riptidepublishing.com/titles/for-real

Review:  Have you ever read a book that’s not exactly angsty but has gutted you all the same? That’s what this book did for me and I love it so fucking much! It’s nothing like I imagined and everything I’ve ever wanted from a BDSM book. It’s just so…HUMAN. That makes no sense reading it but I don’t know how to explain it. I love the characters so much! And the honest humor, self-criticism, and lack of pretense is gutting me in the best way! This book is a gem and it ruined me for any other BDSM book to come.

Toby was my favorite, I love him to pieces! He’s such a unique person and impossible not to love! I absolutely adore him! He’s honest to a fault and innocent, insecure but not clueless, he knows his shortcomings and doesn’t think too much of himself, but he KNOWS WHAT HE WANTS! I loved reading his POV because he made me laugh and he broke my heart, sometimes both at the same time. 

““Uh, do you really like those books over there? Like, are they valuable?”
I blinked through moisture-heavy lashes. “Well,sentimentally, perhaps. Why?”
“I kind of . . .” He picked at a bit of fluff on the carpet. “I kind of . . . projectile ejaculated all over them.”

While he strokes himself, I crawl round to his side and
slip a finger between his lips. And he just takes it in like it’s my
cock, like it’s a fucking gift, moaning into my skin.
And I kind of come all over him.
Which really wasn’t the plan.
But it comes out of nowhere, like an awesome sneeze.
White light in my brain. Bam. A fucking orgasm, somehow
dragged out my fucking finger.
So fuck the plan.

Laurie is very different from Toby but somehow they just fit together perfectly. Laurie is a closed book, he doesn’t want to make himself emotionally available to Toby, but not because he’s an insensitive jerk. Laurie truly likes Toby the way he is, sees him in a way that most people can’t. For him Toby is perfect with all his imperfections. But Laurie is hung up on his past relationship and thinks Toby is too young for him, and he’s sure that if he opens up he’ll get hurt.

The relationship between Toby and Laurie is that between a dominant and his submissive, only not in the way we’re used to. There are no power trips, or stupid rules and expectations. This is mostly relationship focused, how to make yourself vulnerable to someone else, how to trust them and learn them. It’s filthy, and kinky and romantic, gorgeous and heartwarming, and I can go on and on and still wouldn’t do it justice. And guess what, there’s no tragic back story!!! No rape or abuse or anything to make this story dark. This is about the loss of love and finding a new love, about re-connecting with who you truly are when you lost sight of what’s truly important to you. 

This book…..one of the best ever, definitely the best by Alexis Hall, he rocked it! This book has the BEST description of a dick ever! The BEST rimming scene I’ve read in a long time! The BEST kink IMHO, perfectly executed! And it has the BEST FEELINGS, and there’s nothing better than a book that makes you feel. LOVED to the moon and back!!!

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