This book contained two conflicting story ideas, both of which might have worked under the right circumstances: Either this could have been a MM romance in which the couple literally sees Tyler as a son, shows him what love and family can be like, and decides to adopt him; or a MMM romance where Mitch was was only Tyler’s step-dad for a brief time when he was an infant but doesn’t recognize him as an adult, and the three develop strong connections while discussing their taboo history and dynamic. This story was neither of those things.
Tyler’s inner monologue does attempt to convince the reader that he never viewed Mitch sexually or romantically until now, as an adult. “He was only ever just Mitch. Mitch, the caretaker. Mitch, the father figure. Mitch, the best person I knew. But not hot. Never hot. Because I was a kid.” (Tyler POV, p.74) This quote may have fit under different circumstances, but everything else in this story completely counteracts this notion, past the point of taboo. Mitch was Tyler’s step-dad for eight years, and young Tyler called Mitch ‘Dad’ for years. The term ‘Dad’ (as in father, not daddy) is mentioned 16 times. This was too long of a time and too much of a father/son bond to be undone with a few short sentences about ‘never seeing him that way.’ Also, Mitch’s inner monologue continues to remind the readers that up until their present circumstance, he saw Tyler as his own son and no amount of retconning can undo that.
Actual quotes from the book:
“This kid is not the boy I loved like a son for eight years and a couple of measly months. He’s not the boy I called mine, and he called me Dad in return…” (Mitch POV, p.17)
“...My Tyler. The boy I used to love like he was my own.” (Mitch POV, p.34)
“...Ty. My Ty. The boy that I loved and lost, no longer a kid, but a man.” (Mitch POV, p.123)
To be clear, I am not shaming the Daddy/boy dynamic in and of itself. I am shaming the established dynamic between a father and a person he referred to as his own son. With this in mind, the continual infantilization (which becomes Tyler’s entire personality for 75% of the book) leaps over the line of Taboo into true and proper ick territory. The word 'boy' is mentioned 116 times and ‘kid’ 101.
Quotes include:
“Little boys belong in their bed at night and not God knows where with God knows whom.” (Cal about Tyler, p.42)
“F*** my little boy hole.” (p.158)
“I’ve-had-my-little-boy-hole-wrecked-by-a-midsize-anaconda-kind.” (p.163)
“...afterward, Cal always rubs my little boy hole with his miracle balm.” (p.196)
So, why did I read this entire book? Why not DNF? Honestly, because this book was just so deeply terrible and the writing truly baffling from start to finish that I stubbornly trudged through it in order to share all of the most unhinged banana-pants quotes with my best friend. And now, whomever reads this review.
TLDR: I read this book so you don’t have to. Please enjoy these absolutely mind-boggling quotes:
“Dale positively shakes, and although the guy has no soul, he kinda looks hurt.”
“A deep voice that sounded like a mixture of tires on gravel and a melancholic sax in a sweaty jazz club at 2 am engulfed me.”
“...scrunching his nose, the sprinkling of freckles glowing in the brightness of the overhead lights.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen hair this color, and we get a lot of Latino kids coming through. It’s not jet black. There’s no blue tint to it. But it’s not brown, either.”
“I lean in and wipe his cheek carefully. His skin vibrates beneath my fingers as he stays motionless.”
“I gulp once before gulping some more.”
“...my dick trying to drill a hole through my shorts.” (p.73) and “...my cock is trying to drill a tunnel through my shorts.” (different character, p.83)
“...his hairy chest tickling my nose, his nipples just there, right in front of me, ready to breakfast on.”
“I just gobble it up like one of those kids who aren’t allowed sugar and nearly O.D. on it at a birthday party.”
“Shit, he smells good. Like all musky and manly and… like top-tier potent pheromones. His scent is like crack and it’s doing stuff to my body, to my dick. To my hole. It’s full-on clenching and unclenching, almost like it’s trying to clap some horny-ass tune.”
“Mitch groans into my mouth, interrupting my butthole serenading his dick.”
“Shut up, traitor heart! Go drown in the traitor soup!”
“He jammed his cock so far inside me that I swear my one crooked front tooth is now straight.”
“It smells sterile, of nothing but cleanliness, and I wish I had my face buried deeply in a sweaty Daddy pit instead.”