Thursday, August 13, 2020

Kelsey Kingsley - The Life We Have

After the untimely death of his single mother, Greyson found himself orphaned at fifteen. That is, until the discovery of his father, Sebastian - a world renown drummer in a famous rock band.
Overnight, Greyson's world had been turned upside down, taking him from rags to riches. And now, six years later, Greyson's only goal is to follow in his dad's footsteps.
Except, while his father is a reformed ladies' man, Greyson is gay. And that's a secret he's not ready to let go of.
But he never planned on meeting Zach.
How can he keep the man he loves without disappointing the man he admires?



Comment: As planned, I did read this book which is the follow-up to the one I got to read last month and which was the first by the author I had tried. I actually got interested in this one but since I could get both, I did. I ended up not finding the other one as amazing as I expected by the blurb but I didn't lose hope this one would be more appealing and I'm glad it was.

In this story we follow a grown up Greyson, son to the protagonist of the previous book, as he follows his father's footsteps into a music career. Greyson is bent on trying and starting from the bottom, learning and getting experience by auditioning on his own, even though his father could help in finding a better band.
When he is hired by a band, his new life begins but not everything is as easy as it would seem. Besides, there's Zach - his drum technician, a slightly older guy he can't help but be attracted to although he isn't out and certain about how to share that part of himself with others, his father he idolizes included. But as time gets by and he becomes friend with Zach their connection becomes stronger, as does the challenge of understanding who he is and what kind of person he wants to be in the music world...

I did, in fact, have a better time reading this book than the previous one. The writing style is still the same and I can confess at times it felt like things were a little out of sync, as it happened in the other book. What I mean is, often a situation would be described a certain way but it felt superficial. 
Then we would get other scenes and those have quite an emotional impact. I can't really explain properly, but I got the feeling the writing isn't very well structured. 
The story is told, the scenes happen but there isn't a visible cohesion between the several situations... it makes the story feel stilted and weaker than what it could be.

A big part of this story is developed with the world of music and the easy access to additions people can find there as well as the coming out of Greyson.
There are also other things happening but they take a more secondary place and, closer to the end, we also have a bit more focus on Zach's family life and so on.
What endeared this story to me the most is how Greyson struggled to come out but how positive the experience still was because he had people surrounding him who welcomed his words and who he is.

There are obviously less positive aspects, namely related to the backstage addictions running free... it's quite annoying to think people feel they had to give in to peer pressure and that addiction exists at all... if only people could just say no!
Something that caught my attention, this must be the author's first m/m story? She didn't develop the intimacy/sex scenes as much as she did with the previous book, which was a lot more detailed in how the main couple suited each other sexually... It's true that, for me at least, it's not as if this story needed explicit sex scenes but I have to wonder why we didn't have a few more obvious situations of their relationship.

The end had some complicated issues, I think the author wanted to add too many things but I still had a good time and liked this book. I was rooting for Greyson, I liked how he still maintained a good relationship with those around him, his father especially... some things, on the overall writing, felt forced, staged, not as smoothly as they could have been but... 
I'm still glad Greyson found his HEA so I can more easily overcome the things I liked less, unlike with the other book, where the more negative details to me didn't make me enjoy the story as much.
Grade: 7/10

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