R.D. Hero

Don’t Name the Puppy was written for the Goodreads M/M Romance Group’s 2014 Love’s Landscapes event. It is told in third person through the eyes of Scott, a grad student.

The story starts with Scott walking down to breakfast at the house he shares with other roommates to find eighteen-year-old Travis sitting at the table eating Scott’s cereal. Scott has a roommate Paul, and Travis was Paul’s one-night-stand that Paul is no longer interested in after popping his ass cherry. Travis strikes me as naive and friendly like a lost puppy (hence the title), possibly hoping for a relationship with Paul. It’s implied that Travis was a virgin when he met Paul. Travis was f***ed, but hasn’t f***ed.

After Paul gives Travis the brush-off, Scott finds Travis outside, his eyes red like he's been crying, and he's watching some feral kittens. Travis enlists Scott’s help to rescue them. From this point the kittens are a reason for Travis to visit Scott. However, Scott still thinks that Travis is interested in Paul.

It turns out one of the reasons Travis’s hints of interest weren’t working on Scott, was because Scott likes to bottom and he likes aggressive men. It takes a while for Travis to figure this out but Scott and Travis go their separate ways before they meet again.

I didn't understand why Paul wanted to hook up with Scott after Travis left. Paul encourages Scott to go to the club and appears to be making a move on Scott. Why? Because Scott is emotionally vulnerable right now? Then all of a sudden Travis is at the club going after Scott. How did he know Scott was at the club? Was Travis hanging out at the club during the last two weeks? This whole sequence of events confused me.

The thing I didn’t like about this story was that Travis had to change a large part of his self in order to be with Scott, and that Scott didn’t seem to be all that keen on being with Travis other than as a friend. I never quite bought the turnaround with Travis’ actions at the end, nor Scott’s change of heart. However, this is a cute story with kitties and a silly hat. I give this 3 stars
… (meer)

This story...*stares**sighs*

If this story was supposed to be serious, then I'd rate somewhere between 2-3.

And I am hoping it was supposed to dark humor-ish. I'm not in love with the book (though it has the elements that are up my alley) probably not for the main reason of stalking but for the weird sense of character that was not as clear as I'd like it.

I'm just going to spit out my thoughts as I go along and be done with this.

Don't hate the book. The writing was okay. Sometimes the main characters knew more than I did and when they shared, I was left scratching my head. He thought this was funny?" or "How could he know how he felt when he only showed desperate stalker or angry stalker in the personality department?"

Abel is a lonely, stalker on the Las Juntas Community College campus. He's been stalking Eric, the golden god football player deity on campus since freshman year. And when I say stalk, it's not the light I'm going to try to get my classes to match the object of my desire or we have the same lunch period, let me make sure I invest in tight jeans so my ass looks good kind of stalk. Abel would be locked up in an institution with supervision and medication kind of stalking. He devotes his entire being around Eric, has a wall of his pictures.

Enter, Eric's best friend, Pacer, who recently left the football team. We barely get an explanation why he did this, if he joins the team in mid story.

Forgive me, I'm getting towards the serious end of the pool, let me swim back.

Face Value, the main characters...they are playing with kink. Someone likes to be dominated and spanking a lot. I won't call their play BDSM. There are hints of Domestic Discipline. Oh and a dubcon scene (it might've been noncon depending on who you ask).

MANTEARS?! My pet peeve...did not care for the weird tears. And both parties cried. *rolls eyes* At some odd times. :-

Funny? Yeah...I guess?

Kinky I liked spanking. I liked it when they didn't talk and fucked. I like the weird possessive sort of 'courting' Pacer did.

I liked the ending. Sometimes there were parts that flowed quite nicely.

I think I liked Pacer more than Abel. One thing I am sure of those two crazy kids deserved each other.

I'm going to assume it was supposed to funny, so: 3.5 Stars"… (meer)