HISSED AS A NEWT

HISSED AS A NEWT by Sue Brown

 

Pages: 82

Date: 21/10/2014

Grade: 4

Details: No. 2 With a Kick

            Received from the author

Kindle

The blurb:

"All guys do emotional just in different ways. I eat ice-cream, you get drunk in the gutter…” 

A drunk clown rolling around in the gutter is not what David Wright expects to find as he walks to With A Kick, his favourite ice-cream shop. David has had a lousy day. A literary agent has crushed his dreams and all he wants is the consolation of alcoholic ice-cream. He’s about to walk away when he realises the clown has been dumped by his boyfriend. On a whim, David takes the clown into With A Kick before he gets arrested. Underneath the smeared make-up, he meets Stan, who has just found his boyfriend and best friend getting more than friendly. Over ice-cream, David and Stan discuss their problems and discover maybe they can help each other.

My thoughts:

‘Hissed as a Newt’ was a sweet and funny short romance. Both David and Stan were easy to like as characters and neither was too good to be true, which is always a huge plus in my mind.

As relationship starts go, the first meeting between David and Stan is far from promising. David has just stormed out of the office of the woman he had hoped would be the agent he needs to kick of his writing career and is in a rotten mood. Stan is dead drunk and being sick in a gutter. The two should have never exchanged a word except that David, for reasons unknown even to himself, decides to help the sad man dressed as a clown.

When David discovers Stan is more or less homeless after he walked in on his partner in bed with his best friend, David offers the sad clown his sofa for the night. A strong and immediate attraction combined with more practical considerations turns the one night solution into a more permanent arrangement. The two men may just be exactly what the other needs.

This book was written in Sue Brown’s smooth and easy to read style. The characters are recognisable and sympathetic although both have their quirks and issues. Sure, they get intimate very quickly and seem to be falling for each other almost instantly but, in the context of the story it came across as believable. The one issue the reader might have about Stan’s motivation – is he just on the rebound – is recognised and addressed by the characters and therefore not an issue. And I have to say this book ends on one of the best lines ever.

This is the second book in the ‘With a Kick’ series but I can’t say not having read the first book was an issue; this story stands completely on its own.  Having said that, now that I know this is part of a series, I want to read the prequel too. And I really hope there will be a story about ‘With a Kick’s’ owner and his employee.

Overall this was another entertaining read by an author I’m growing increasingly fond of.