HE’S BEHIND YOU
by Rebecca Cohen
Pages:
140
Date:
December 5, 2015
Details:
No. 3 Treading the Boards
Review copy
E-book
The
blurb:
It’s panto season for the Sarky Players, an
amateur dramatics society based in Greenwich, South London. With the
traditional Christmas play around the corner, it’s time to get ready for more
larger than life performances—on and off stage.
While Craig Rosen is happy with his quiet life playing Warhammer and working in
a university lab, a new colleague thinks he needs more excitement and drags
Craig along to an audition for the Christmas pantomime, Aladdin.
Corporate lawyer Jason Carter accepted he’s gay a little later in life than
most, but now divorced and in his late thirties, he’s ready to embrace who he
really is. He can’t believe his luck when he runs into Craig at the audition
and the cute younger man agrees to help him navigate his new life. There’s no
doubting the attraction between Craig and Jason, but with Craig’s insecurities
and Jason still finding his way, they’ll need to make sure they don’t veer off
script.
My
thoughts:
First
and foremost; yes, this is the third book in a series and, yes, this works
perfectly well as a stand-alone novella. While I’m now curious about the other
couples, I didn’t feel as if I missed out on anything due to not having met
them before J
This
Christmas story doesn’t feature Christmas day, or Christmas Eve for that
matter. It does feature a Christmas party, the headache of Christmas presents
and, most importantly, the most British (and Irish) of pivotal Christmas events:
a pantomime.
I
liked the idea of Jason only getting around to embracing his true nature in his
late thirties, after a marriage and kids. It gave the story a ‘real-to-life-
feel for me. I loved Craig’s double role; insecure as he is, he suddenly finds
himself trust into the role of experienced and knowledgeable partner when it
comes to his relationship with Jason and it is fair to say it takes him a while
to come to terms with it. He doesn’t find it any easier to believe that Jason
might really be interested in him. Jason not being very communicative until
it’s almost too late, doesn’t help matters at all.
I
liked that the story read a bit like a pantomime, with the players being blind
to things which were blatantly obvious to the audience / reader. At times the
quips between Jason, Craig and some of the others had that borderline vulgarity
of pantomime humour to them—although in true pantomime there’s nothing
borderline about it of course J
This
was a very enjoyable, feel good romance which I mostly read with a broad grin
of my face. The one or two more angsty moments were resolved quickly and didn’t
interfere with the overall happy feeling of the story. If you’re in the mood
for an uplifting, funny and festive story you could do a lot worse than picking
up He’s
Behind You.
Buy link:
Bio and Links:
Rebecca Cohen is a Brit abroad.
Having swapped the Thames for the Rhine, she has left London behind and now
lives with her husband and baby son in Basel, Switzerland. She can often be
found with a pen in one hand and a cup of Darjeeling in the other.
