Title: Thorns
Author: Feliz Faber
Genre: Contemporary, Mystery
Length: Novel (260pgs)
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press (26th July 2013)
Heat Level: Low – Moderate
Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥3 ½ Hearts
Reviewer: Pixie
Blurb: How can love between two men possibly be responsible for a horse’s death during the Kentucky Derby? Reporter Will Yeats wants to know the truth.
Seventeen years ago, a love affair between a jockey and a horse trainer and a tragic accident on the racetrack scandalized the horseracing world. But Nic Pithiviers and Louis Meerow seem to have no desire to set the record straight: they refuse the interview and send attorney Francis LeBon to question Will’s motives.
Francis has a special place in his heart for Nic and Louis, who taught him to take pride in himself as a gay man, and he’ll stop at nothing to protect them from a gossipmongering reporter. However, Francis doesn’t expect the reporter’s honesty and genuine determination to exonerate two men falsely accused… or the growing attraction to Will he feels.
While visiting with Nic and Louis at their horse training center in France, Will uncovers a web of intrigue, secrets, and old lies, and he unwittingly sets a series of perilous events into motion that not only threaten to destroy his budding relationship with Francis, but Nic and Louis’s decades-long commitment as well.
Purchase Link: http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=4034
Review: Will is a sports writer who has been told to find a story about gay men in the horseracing world, digging as deep as he can he discovers a scandal from seventeen years before. A horse falls at the start of the Kentucky Derby and the jockey and horse trainer are banned, but a picture has Will determined to discover what happened. Nic Pithiviers and Louis Meerow don’t want the past uncovered though and Will gets a visit from their friend and lawyer Francis. Francis is expecting a nosy reporter who wants gossip but what he finds is someone who wants the story of Nic and Louis the gay partners and Francis can’t stop his attraction to the cute reporter. Nic and Louis offer to do an interview and Will visits them in France, but Will digs up far more than he thought as secrets, intrigue and malicious intent come to the fore and it threatens to destroy his budding relationship with Francis.
This is a great story of scandals in the horseracing world, with a budding relationship thrown in and a long-standing relationship that is threatened. When Will sees the picture of Nic and Louis together after a disastrous race Will knows he has to get to the bottom of the story, but he changes his angle after a visit from a lawyer and finds himself in a tentative relationship with Francis. Embarking on a relationship with Francis is thrilling and Will begins to fall hard, but when Will is in France, a wall seems to come down between them and Will isn’t sure what is going on. Throwing himself into interviewing Nic and Louis, he knows they are holding something back and after a furious confrontation with Francis about some details that Will uncovered he learns the full story.
I really did enjoy this story and discovering more about the murky world of horseracing in the eighties, seeing the American and French cultures side by side as first Will and Francis explore a Downtown Art Walk in L.A. and the Will explores Caen in France. The storyline is a really good one with an old scandal that covers up the truth of what really happened at that long ago Derby with Nic and Louis still refusing to let the truth out, it also has another slight side story of sabotage and old secrets. Then we have the developing relationship between Will and Francis that undergoes a hard trial when Francis begins to have doubts and makes harsh accusations, but, we also have Nic and Louis’ relationship that we are drawn to as their relationship undergoes trails of its own.
I recommend this to those who love stories set in a horseracing world, wonderful details, two great relationships facing struggles, intrigue and mystery, devastating truths and some wonderful detailed settings.