Between Us by F.E. Feeley Jr.

Pages: 48

Fantasy - Paranormal

Buy links:      Amazon         Amazon UK

The blurb:

When Jeremy, a tall, hunky, ladies man begins to explore his bisexual attractions, he realizes he loves his best friend and college roommate Roger. 

Roger secretly loves Jeremy back but is holding on to a secret of his own. A terrible one. 

On Halloween night both men are invited to a party where the truth of each other will be revealed in a horrific way. Will they survive a night of terror? Or will it rip them apart forever? 

My thoughts:

I don’t read (or watch) scary stories as a rule. I’m all for murder and mayhem, but horror… not so much most of the time. This blurb, however, intrigued me so I decided to overcome whatever preconceived reservations I might have and dive in.

The start of the story lulled me into a false sense of security. But the playful banter was soon replaced by the first apparition and the creepiness kicked off. As soon as it did I remembered why I so rarely read creepy stories; they make me feel too much. My stomach churns and I get jittery. It gets too much and I close the book only to open it again two minutes later because I HAVE to know what happens next, except that I don’t want to because NERVES, but I do because I can’t stand the tension of not knowing. LOL. It’s an experience I both love and try to avoid. And the more invested I am in a story the stronger those feelings become.

Yes, I did get quite invested in Between Us. Me, the self-confessed wimp who doesn’t deal well with either angst or tension, fully enjoyed the wonderfully torturous combination of romantic uncertainty and ghostly scariness. In fact, I was really impressed that the romance and ghost storylines in this book are perfectly balanced. All too often I’ve come across books in which one storyline ends up taking precedence at the expense of the other. Not in this book; romance and ghostliness play next to each other and one enhances the other.

I liked Jeremy and Roger, enjoyed the way they interacted, and I loved the premise of the story. While this is a fully formed story without an open ending, I would love to see more of them. And given what Roger’s secret is, and considering that he’s met and recognised Cindy (yes, I'm being vague on purpose), I could well see more spooky adventures for these two men. I would most definitely read them.

This was my first encounter with this author and I can safely say it won’t be my last. Between Us packed a whole lot of story into relatively few pages and did so very well. While I wouldn’t have minded more words, the story didn’t need them. If F.E. Feeley Jr can hook me this much in under fifty pages I can’t wait to find out what’ll happen when I pick up a full length novel.

Overall I highly recommend this book if you'd like to add more ghosts and romance to your Halloween.

About the author:

F.E. Feeley Jr was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan and lived there for twenty years before joining the military. He is a veteran of the US Armed Services; having done a tour in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2002-2003, he turned college student, pursuing a degree in political science. He now lives in Southeast Texas where he is married to the love of his life, John, and where they live with their five year old German Shepherd, Kaiser. 

As a young man, reading took center stage in his life, especially those novels about ghosts, witches, goblins, and all the other things that went bump in the night. His favorite authors include such writers as Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and Anne Rice, whose work allowed him to travel to far off places and meet fascinating and scary characters. As a gay man, he wishes to be able to write good fictional literature for those who love the genre and to write characters that readers can relate to. All in all, he is a cigarette smokin’, whiskey drinkin’, rock and roll lovin’, tattoo wearin’ dreamer of a man with a wonderful husband who puts up with his crap and lets him write his stories.