WL's Mainstream Gay Book Reviews - 28. Will and Patrick Happy Ending, Book 6 Wake Up Married Series by Leta Blake

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/28580293

The most important thing for any gay fiction story is a proper ending. As a reader, I love happy endings, but I can also respect sad endings or even realistic endings. Leta Blake gave me a “complete” ending to the romantic courting and love life of Will and Patrick in this book. Everything that had happened to them has come full circle and love is finally within grasp. I know there’s a 7^th book, which is longer and portends to open even more possibilities if Leta Blake wants to give Will and Patrick additions to their family. However, after book 6, I think these guys are the definition of “Ride or Die”.

At 111 pages and around 4 hours again on audible, it’s still quite a manageable reading for most people.

Plot: Will mulls over the possibility of a potential divorce with Patrick after his grandmother delivers the news. He questions the possibility of Patrick being involved with him in a long-term relationship, so he asks for Owen’s advice. Owen suggests Will may be jumping too quickly into commitment with Patrick, he also insinuates that Will may be replacing his alcohol addiction with sex addiction. The possibility of being a sex addict frightens Will, since he reflects his behavior and sexual interests as being unnatural, including the BDSM sessions. Will decided to attempt a hard break from Patrick after his encounter with Owen. Patrick, on the other hand having returned to his job as a neurosurgeon after the lawsuit ended, was ready to commit to a relationship with Will. He set out to tell Will in a straightforward manner that he truly loved him that very same night. After a very tender sexual encounter, where Will tops Patrick for the first time, they confront each other. Patrick is shocked at being rebutted, Will is awed by Patrick’s love for him. Patrick forces Will to compromise with him to have a limited break of 1 month, instead of ending their relationship, because of Will’s fear of being a sex addict. However, during their time apart, Patrick loses a patient and in a fit of misery runs off to his foster parent’s home in Alabama. Will during this time discovers through his friend Jack that what he feared as being sex addiction was in reality just his way of expressing love, but Will was not completely certain. Along with confronting Ryan again, Will realizes that what he and Patrick shared wasn’t shameful at all. Just as Will discovers his personal truth, he finds out Patrick had left Healing, South Dakota. He runs off in a frantic search for Patrick, leading to a magical reunion of the lovers in Alabama. Patrick and Will had their vows renewed fully conscious in Healing with all the characters in attendance.

Review: I make no secret that I love this series, despite its outlandish premise and over the top characters. As a reader, I enjoy surrealism, being someone who has lived on the edges of various strata in society, having small town New Hampshire and Big metropolitan Boston Massachusetts background gave made me an appreciation for dueling outlooks/views. Leta Blake took that concept and upped it to the nth degree with Will, a do-gooding mafia family fortune heir with kinky submissive sexual interests, and Patrick, an autistic introverted neurosurgeon with a horrible history of child abuse and prostitution. These are compelling characters, once you give them a chance and read their full story.

One thing I can say I learned after reading this series, you can never truly appreciate an author until you read a “full” story like this from them. These 6 books may be short reads in on themselves, but together they represent several days of reading. There’s also the re-reading after you finish the series to pick up things you missed initially.

Like I said in the early reviews, Ryan’s psychological abuse of Will is something that plays an important role in Will’s low self-esteem and issues. I think at the heart of Will is a very sensitive and loving gay man, who is not different than anyone else, except his sexual fantasies are uncommon. There’s nothing wrong with being a submissive partner, but Ryan made him feel that his desires were unnatural. There are other psychological components to it, such as Will’s gay uncle causing him to fear expressing intimacy and his mother’s sexual openness with men. Maybe they contributed to why Will prefers what he does sexually, but even so, what Will desires sexually should never be judged or be used as weapons for an abusive lover.

Owen as I had noted in earlier books has come out in book 6 as the anti-villain of the series. He believes in what he tells Will, pushing him to leave Patrick out of fearing sex addiction. Will doesn’t know what he is and wants is normal and healthy, but to a person like Owen, who is heterosexual and conventional though not socially conservative, Will is not in the right mind with his expression of love and trust for Patrick due to the sex they have. I think that’s a core issue with conventional people; even if they tolerate gay relationships, they can’t understand the nuances of what makes love work for partners. The trust involved in sexual acts, especially BDSM activities like breath play that Will and Patrick engages in, goes beyond normal sexual desire and probably can be looked with the deepest levels of trust.

Will in book 6 made a stupid mistake to listen to both his innate fears caused by Ryan’s long-term abuse and Owen’s prying into his personal life. Yet, I cannot fault him for his fears of being a sex addict, because those were the lessons he absorbed. Of course, his realization that Patrick and him are “normal” came about a bit quicker than I think would be realistic; it was narratively needed to complete their relationship cycle. That part of the book did make me feel a bit off, Will should have known by the point Patrick admitted he loved him that this was a man he already gave his life to, he was already in love with. Sex might have deepened their trust and love, but it was obvious to me as a reader that it wasn’t addiction.

Patrick in contrast to Will was perfectly written in this final book. From the loss of Addison due to her cancer to the reunion with Will, he was in character. His autistic need for precision, his fears of being abandoned by Will, and his need for his foster mother were touching. I never considered Patrick to be someone that could be as sensitive or easily hurt as Will until Book 6, but he was.

There’s still several patented Leta Blake comedic scenes in this book, little things like Patrick mouthing off to foster kids about his teenage love of rednecks with “dirty looks and dirtier minds” and Will’s father antics at their renewal ceremony with a limo in the driveway. It was enjoyably funny at times, when you needed a break from the heavy drama and tragedy.

My Rating: 4 out of 5, it was a good ending with some minor imperfections with Will’s character being a bit too narrow-minded. However, Patrick and the rest of the characters were played off with great pay-offs.

My Original Series Rating: 27.5/30, it’s a really fun series with rich characters, amazing sexual exploration, and great plot set ups that are both dramatic and comedic.

Book 1: 5/5

Book 2: 4.5/5

Book 3: 4.5/5

Book 4: 5/5

Book 5: 4.5/5

Book 6: 4/5

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Next Week, I will be starting the new schedule of Monday and Friday Reviews starting with Bill Konigberg's award winning book Openly Straight