Colin and Martin's London Christmas

Colin and Martin #2

by Drew Hunt

Christmas is a special time for Colin Rodgers and Martin Kellam. Their relationship began during the holiday five years earlier. But this Christmas could be their last.

Colin left the garden gate open and Toby, Martin's guide dog, got out, only to be run over and killed. Although he tries not to blame Colin, Martin finds it hard to forgive his boyfriend.

In an effort to save their relationship, Colin takes Martin to London to spend the holiday with the Rodgers family. There they meet Colin's Uncle Matt, visiting from Australia.

Will the spirit of Christmas, the warmth of family, and the thrills of the big city be enough to mend Colin and Martin's relationship?

Genres: M M Romance, Holiday, Contemporary, M M Contemporary, Gay, Short Stories, Christmas

45 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 16, 2010

About the author

Having read all the decent free fiction on the net Drew could find, he set out to try his hand at writing something himself. Fed up reading about characters who were super-wealthy, impossibly handsome, and incredibly well-endowed, Drew determined to make his characters real and believable.

Drew lives a quiet life in the north of England with his cat. Someday he hopes to meet the kind of man he writes about.

http://www.smashwords.com/profile/vie...

Reviews

[Deeze]

A lovely catch up story with Colin and Martin.

This one starts off on a bit of a sad note, but like all good Christmas fics ends on a Happy one.

Simple but sweet.

[Elisa Rolle]

This is the second chapter in the very common life of Colin and Martin, two ordinary gay men living in northern UK. I remember their story was very, very romantic, about a blind gay man, Martin, who was setting out to spend yet one another Christmas alone with his guide dog and that fell in love just days before Christmas with the delivery guy, Colin.

Nor Colin or Martin are “special” men, and aside for Martin having a disability, they are pretty much not “hero” material… what is heroic in being a delivery guy? But nevertheless the story was romantic, the love between Colin and Martin sweet, and Colin, despite his boring job, was a wonderful romance hero, sweeping Martin away in a brisky December night and giving him the most perfect date of his life.

Now 5 year later Colin and Martin are living together, but they reached almost a breaking point: Colin inadvertently caused the death of Martin’s dog, and Martin is not able to forgive him. That is what made so special to me this novella; sorry if I’m rude, but when there is a character with disability in a romance novel, they are almost always saints… they are never wrong, they are always so polite that sometime I’d like to knock them off to see if I would have a reaction. I loved that Martin was not perfect, I loved that he was angry, and bitter towards Colin, even if, truth be told, Colin didn’t deserve it. Why I loved it? Since they were realistic. Can you imagine Martin’s feeling of loss when he is deprived of his guide dog? True, Colin is there, loving him, but to Martin is like someone was emasculating him.

Don’t worry though, this is a seasonal romance, a Christmas tale, and as such, our common heroes will find a way towards happiness.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004GKMKFS/?...

[Karen]

Colin sees in Martin all the things that make him amazing and Martin does the same for him and for me that's so close to the real world, we don't find perfect soul mates in this world or at least not all of us. More often than not what we find is a wonderful but flawed person who sees the good in us that maybe everyone else has missed and is willing to love us and be that one person we can always count on and if we're lucky, truly lucky we do the same for them and with a strong commitment and a lot of effort on both sides you get something really, really good out of it.

It's been awhile since I read 'Colin and Martin's First Christmas' book #1 in this series, but I'd have to say that my favorite thing about this series is still the fact that the author has created two very real characters they're not gorgeous, hunky, rich successful, everything they do turns out perfect men. Colin delivers groceries and can't cook worth a damn, Martin is blind and socially withdrawn, his best friend, no his only friend is his guide dog, Toby...ummmm well he was until Toby gets hit by a car because somebody left the gate to the yard open. Colin decides that a change of scenery is in order as he tries to get their relationship past this tragic event and convinces a rather begrudging Martin that they need to go spend Christmas with his family in London. Question is will they each be able to find and give the forgiveness needed to get past Martin's loss?

So far these stories have been fairly short in the 50 page range so there's not big complicated plot with convoluted solutions. Just a nice sweet little story about two ordinary men trying to make their life together work as best they can and maybe in there somewhere they get to have a Merry Christmas if all goes well.

[Plainbrownwrapper]

This is the second of the "Colin and Martin" stories. As with the first of the series we find clunky writing but a nice premise.

In this one, Colin has accidentally allowed Martin's guide dog, Toby, to escape from their fenced yard and be killed on the road. It has been several months since the accident, but Martin still hasn't forgiven Colin and Colin can't forgive himself. So this is a tale of the consequences of holding on to anger and hurt feelings, and the benefits of forgiveness. This one also has an Aussie relative come to London to visit for the Christmas holiday, so it's stuffed full of amusing Aussie-isms throughout.

[Suze]

Crikey, read the first Colin and Martin nearly 3 1/2 years ago, almost the same time that has passed between the stories - and all is not well.
I felt the reactions and guilt felt by both men in the aftermath of Martin's dog's death and the damage to their relationship was quite realistic - none of us are completly forgiving.
Matt is a whole different kettle of fish but his story is heartbreaking.

[Ro]

3.75
Reread and liked this one more with the reread. The first time I was sorta pissed at Martin for being so grudgy but this time, I got it. He wasn't, but Toby was his lifeline to the world. And Matt's story was heartbreaking.

[Bookbee]

Sweet but satisfying.

[Ramsi]

3,25 stars

I liked this one a lot more than the first in the series.