WL's Mainstream Gay Book Reviews - 15. Will and Patrick Meet the Family (Book 2 of Wake-up Married series) by Leta Blake

I’ll use Fridays as my standard day for series, since I can’t seem to stop reviewing books and I started Book 1 last week, I’ll just continue through all 7 books.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27217967-will-patrick-meet-the-family

This is another short Novelette at 105 pages and probably 30-40K words, which I guess represents a very short read for most people. It continues the story of Will and Patrick as they meet and interact with Will’s family, friends, and colleagues, along with his ex-boyfriend Ryan.

This book opens up with a meeting with Will’s erratic mother Kimberly and gay uncle Kevin, whose partner died of AIDS years ago due to his infidelity to Kevin. Their first reaction at Patrick was one of contempt and suspicion, despite Patrick noting the fact that as a Brain Surgeon, he’s independently wealthy without Will’s mafia connected fortune. They all did agree to keep up the appearance of a loving marital union, in order for Will to keep the fortune and allow his foundation to continue to function. After the encounter, Will take Patrick to Jimmy’s, a local diner in Healing, South Dakota. Where Will encounters Ryan Whitehead, Will’s ex-boyfriend, and Ryan’s new lover, Hartley. A tense showdown between Will and Ryan happens, revealing a glimpse at the verbal and psychological abuse that Ryan has subjected Will along with how Ryan manipulates others perception of Will as nothing more than an Alcoholic. Patrick not only defended Will’s honor, but he also kissed Will passionately to demonstrate to everyone, especially Ryan that Will is worth being loved. Patrick met the owner of Jimmy’s, Andy Seckel, who he nicknames sicko, because he reminds him of someone from his past (This is an important plot point, related to Patrick’s childhood abuse at a man named Mr. Roland). Patrick and will continue to have sexual tension throughout their time together. Patrick accepts the job at Healing’s regional hospital as the head of the neurology department and meets his new boss Don, who is an understanding and very even-tempered chief of staff at the hospital. The hospital is funded by Will’s mafia connected fortune, so Patrick and Will work closely together on Hospital administration and projects related to his neurology department. A side-plot of Patrick meeting his new friend Jenny at the hospital preparing for an organ donation to a local resident helped deepen Patrick’s connections with Healing. Will, in contrast upon returning to his work, Good Works Foundation, confronts his friend, lawyer, and Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor, Owen about everything that has occurred. Owen is pushing for Will to rejoin the AA meetings, but Will does not want to confront Ryan and Hartley, who were also members. Patrick makes several phone calls, including to his foster mother, Dinah, revealing he was married to Will. Ryan and Will encounter each other again outside the apartment they shared in Healing. Without Patrick, Will is demeaned by Ryan and breaks down, when he tells Will, “What you want sexually is disgusting” and “You will never stay sober, I know you better than yourself and you're hopeless”. Patrick helps Will stay centered and keep his diabetes at bay despite what Ryan’s presence and actions have done to him psychologically. Patrick actually faces down Owen over Will’s self-flagellation at his inability to maintain sobriety, represented by the little chips that Owen gives him as part of the AA program, in Patrick’s words “it (the coins to represent every time an alcoholic ends their sobriety) reinforces hopelessness”. The tenderness and sexual tensions grow between Patrick and Will, both growing closer, but still unable to fully accept each other sexually as true partners.

For me, the story begins to grow more interesting at this point; though, it can be slow and uneventful. I've read complaints and they are justified that Leta Blake spends a lot of time setting up her characters, but I'd rather world-building and character developed romance than incompatible people falling in love. We get an entire cast of characters in Book 2: Kimberly, Will's mother, is a shrill and erratic figure in Will’s life, having married several times after leaving Will’s father. She is by far one of the weirdest mothers that I have read in gay romance fiction, not a villain, nor heroine, she's so unbelievable and yet so real at times. I love to hate her throughout the books. She’s selfish, conniving, and wrathful, but on the other hand, she does love her children and her son. As for Will’s gay uncle Kevin, even though I have read all 7 books, I can’t honestly pin him down as a character type. His dead partner Roy haunts him like a Jane Austen character, who can’t let go of his past. In a way, he’s a classic romantic, but his conservative attitude towards being gay is not healthy for Will as we learn throughout the books and ultimately, I think for himself as a gay man, dealing with complex issues of a dead partner, whose infidelity caused the infection with HIV and death from AIDS. I can’t honestly say I love or hate this character, but I can say that his story probably needs to be explored by Leta Blake at some point. Despite his conservative and classic views on love, I do want him to find love again with another man. He's not a bad person, he just needs to deal with his pain and loss properly.

Patrick continued to be a breakout character in this series, his small acts of kindness and defense of Will helps to shape their romantic bonds and made what could be an outlandish scenario believable. Will’s diabetes is a constant background issue that is never forgotten by Leta Blake, nor Patrick as romantic counterpart, who helps him by reminding him to eat and emotionally supporting him, despite his own psychological issues from childhood sexual abuse that is revealed in book 2. You can see that Will and Patrick are good for each other and help each other become better people throughout their time together.

We encounter, what I consider to be the two main villains of this series in Book 2: First is Ryan Whitehead, Will’s abusive ex-boyfriend, who emotionally and psychologically through manipulating perceptions of others about Will destroy Will’s sense of self. Second is Owen, Will’s lawyer and AA sponsor, who plays a different kind of villain, an anti-villain who hurts Will through deceptively well-meaning, but ultimately destructive advice and views.

Ryan’s words about Will as an unsuitable lover and sexually perverse made me angry at him even more after finishing all 7 books. Will’s sexual interest may not be “normal” even in the gay community, but who made Ryan the ultimate judge of what kind of gay sex is right or wrong

Maybe it’s just my view, but if you love someone and don’t share their sexual interests in activity, it doesn’t mean you should call them out as “perverse” if they harm no one else and only seek to find joy in it. There’s nothing wrong with young gay guys who enjoy using their imaginations to create role-playing scenarios as a form of sexual activity. Nor is there anything wrong with consenting adults who enjoy anything kinky. Add to that, Ryan linking of Will’s alcoholism with his sexual drive, you create a vicious cycle of self-loathing and repression. Leta Blake made a meta-commentary about gay community, which is needed especially among the more conservative minded gays who want some kind of comfortable conformist standard. Sometimes, gay men in our search to be accepted by larger society are repressing ourselves and each other, creating horrible vicious cycles of self-loathing that resemble us being in the closet again as we were a generation ago. I love the meta-commentary and the ugly reality she highlights.

On the other side of the villain spectrum, I thought Leta Blake made a fine poke against substance abuse support groups and some of their methods, like AA infamous “color coded coin” system to represent sobriety breaks based on periods, i.e. if you start drinking after a month, you get a white coin or if you go six months without a drink, you get a silver colored coin. Owen represents a well-meaning character, I don’t doubt he truly believes he is helping Will. I am grateful he is not a homophobic character who wants Will to be alone, it also heightens his villain credentials as being a decent human being with blind faith. His issue is that he puts too much emphasis on “group therapy” rather than individual worth or the bonds of partnerships. Reminding people of their failures reinforces a negative narrative in some people’s mind. He supports Will mechanically, but he is not someone who Will needs to maintain sobriety indefinitely or someone who can stop him from an abusive relationship, in fact standing by as it occurs in the case of Ryan's poisonous speech. As the books progress, his nature as an anti-villain becomes far clearer, especially in Book 6. We start seeing part of it here, his blind allegiance to the “steps” and “group” makes him neglect Will as a “person” first, while also unable to acknowledge the core issues within members of the “group” like Ryan, who has morphed from an alcoholic into a Sociopath, who gains pleasure by seeing Will fail. I hate this man, but love what Leta Blake has created in his character and her commentary against established protocols being dogmatic.

The sign of a good story is an anti-villain. I have rarely read gay romance fiction with anti-villains, I have read villains like ex-lovers, homophobes, and authority figures, but a well-meaning harmful character is something only a handful of good writers in any genre have ever created. Leta Blake's use of an anti-villain made this story stand out starting here.

My minor complaints about this book was the lack of details, which hindered the full enjoyment of all the story elements we get surrounding Will’s life and history. We may have seen the toxic nature of Ryan, but Owen’s seemingly benign demeanor isn’t revealed to be wrong until you read book 6. Kimberly and Kevin only appear briefly with only a brief view of their natures, while there’s so much promise that won’t be delivered until book 3. Also, the Molinaro spy that stalks Will and Patrick is just a phantom without any words or implied actions, there was no cathartic release of tension.

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5, I loved book 2 despite it being slower than the other books, along with lack of conclusions. There was no sex, but the sexual tension was palpable. The care that Patrick had for Will’s diabetes were amazing human moments throughout that helped elevate their romantic chemistry. The villains on the other hand defined the story’s conflicts: Ryan is a sociopath, whose gains pleasure by seeing others fail like Will. Owen on the other hand is an anti-villain, a good meaning man, who does evil because he views the cause to be right and just. The best stories in fiction have both villain and anti-villain, so Book 2 caught my attention.