I really wanted to give this book a five star rating, because of its handling of mental illness and child abuse themes (even though some of it didn't ring as necessarily accurate, it was obvious the author was working very hard at accurate, sensitive renderings of these themes and it rang true enough for me, someone who has PTSD for similar reasons). However, I can't really give it 5 stars* because of the bevy of basic spelling errors that I feel like a beta or two could have picked up: dieing instead of dying multiple times, a lot of to/too / their/there / your/you're misuses and so on. They were mentally jarring for me, to the point where I felt like I was reading a friend's manuscript that needed editing, and that sometimes brought me out of a story that otherwise had really compelling characterisation, and a really visceral attention to detail. I don't like reading as an editor, I wanted to read as *reader* - and I couldn't always. I can ignore it one or two times, but the word 'dieing' was literally used three times in a matter of two pages - a basic spellchecker would pick that up.

This book was just a shade off being one of those tomes you could really sink yourself into and just lose yourself in, with plenty of hurt/comfort and some really gorgeous attention to pacing (i.e. moments of intensity followed by quieter 'recovery' moments). For the basic editing issues alone, I want to give it three stars, but for the actual story itself that kept me going despite the errors, I want to give it five. So I'm settling for a rough four. Definitely going to look into more of Tara Spear's work though (and hope that some of those basic errors get picked up / erased!)

I really think though, that the error/spelling/grammar issues shouldn't put readers off if they're looking for angst, hurt/comfort or child abuse themes. It really shouldn't. There's a lot of richness in this story, a lot of potential for future development in the sequel (wow am I looking forward to Trey's masochistic side being explored), and really interesting handling of a lot of sensitive issues from BDSM, to prostitution, to child abuse, and so on.

NOTE: Outside of the obviously difficult themes, I will warn for some moments of misogyny from one of the main protagonists (who even though he likes women, also objectifies them like hell, to the point of thinking things like 'there are two types of women' or reducing them to words like 'sloppy' and 'take too long' -> amazing, but in this day and age gay folk don't have to justify their lives and choices by demonising how the opposite sex is in bed - and I say that as someone happily on the queer spectrum) - I know that misogyny from gay men is like a 'thing' - but the character is never called out on this, and never calls himself out on it; and indeed is described as loving women outside of this and treating them (mostly) with respect. So be careful here, because I think the objectifying misogyny is really invisibilised because of this. I hope it's explored in the next book, considering it could be explained because of possible psychological issues due to an absentee/addicted mother.

*EDITED TO ADD: On second thought, after spending a lot more time thinking about this book and all its little errors, I've decided fuck it - it deserves five stars anyway. Any book that makes me think about the characters and the story this much? Five stars. Hands down. Who cares if your inner editor gets some exercise, maybe it needs some! I hope Tara Spears writes more works a lot like this in the future, I think it's a good area for her (if she wants to be in this area, that is) - and I think I'd love to see a lot more characters experiencing these issues, written from her perspective. ( )