Review: As the Ice Melts by RJ Jones (Love for the Seasons #2)
Note: This ARC was provided by Enticing Journey Book Promotions in exchange for an honest review.
It's two for two as far as author RJ Jones's Love for the Seasons series is concerned. I loved the series starter, As the Leaves Fall, which was about Aiden Turner and Noah Walker, and if you've already read it, there's no way you could have forgotten Marcus McDonald, one of the lead interior designers of Spencer and Associates. He was pushy and cocky and he did I mighty underhanded thing to both Aiden and Noah. Here in As the Ice Melts, he regrets his actions and with him being reprimanded for them, he decides to move from London to Manchester, where he'll stay with his beloved grandmother while checking out his job prospects. What he ends up checking out with a huge dose of interest is Adam Radney, the man behind the counter of a family-owned fish and chips shop. They can't stand each other, but liking one another doesn't have to be a requirement for sleeping together...right?
Okay, admittedly, Marcus was something of an ass in the first book, but the Marcus in this sequel gets one hell of an unexpected back story, one that allows readers to better understand why he was the way he was in London and that there truly is much more to him than meets the eye. His initial interaction with Adam had them both looking at each other in distaste, but a second, albeit from a distance, interaction between them made them take a much longer look at one another, and the interest is rather mutual. I think it was inevitable that they got together and when they did, I liked that there weren't immediate declarations of love or that they began dreaming of babies, rings, and spending the rest of their lives together. They weren't even friends when they first ended in bed together, so this was, like the book before it, a slow burn romance, but with an enemies to lovers twist to it.
Twenty-seven-year-old Marcus suffers from dyscalculia and has epileptic episodes, his mother's drug addiction possibly playing a huge part in his health condition. Dyscalculia makes it nearly impossible for him to deal with anything number-related and it's a diagnosis that he does not share freely with anyone outside of his grandmother and his two best friends. He's already had one boyfriend think he was stupid and a freak after he told him he had dyscalculia, and as his feelings for thirty-year-old Adam progress into love, admitting the truth is something he doesn't seem to be ready for, believing it may cost him a burgeoning relationship. There's a part in the book that had my heart breaking for Marcus and while it would be easy to say that he should have simply been open and honest from the beginning, hindsight is always twenty-twenty and that knowledge doesn't really bring comfort.
Aside from the slow burn romance, both the first and second books in the Love for the Seasons series share another thing in common: one of the main characters has a fantastic and protective best friend. Noah had Terry in book one and Marcus has Colin, with the added bonus of Jerry, Colin's long-term partner. These best friends bring a lot of additional flavor to the stories, and I really loved how they never hesitated to tell it like it was and put Aiden in As the Leaves Fall and Adam in As the Ice Melts in their place. In this sequel in particular, two additional memorable supporting characters were Marcus's grandmother and Adam's mother--both women wanting nothing more than to see the boys they've reared into good men live happy and healthy lives. I've become addicted to this series and am definitely looking forward to seeing what else is in store for readers. As the Ice Melts gets five stars. ♥
Release Date: 01 April 2016
Date Read: 01 April 2016
Learn more about RJ Jones.
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