Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Review- The Messenger by KC Blake, Lavinia Marksman

The Messenger (A Lesbian Romance)
KC Blake, Lavinia Marksman
Jan 5, 2014
F-f/ erotica/Contemporary/Romance/Interracial/ May-Dec
54 Pgs
Pub-Self
Kindle Edition

A refreshingly new take on modern lesbian romance!
Lucy Murphy is a corporate shark. She’s a master of the deal and a force not to be reckoned with. For all her power and expertise, however, she lives in a self-imposed bubble. When her work life isn’t as satisfying as it once was, she begins to doubt her powers and wonders if there could be something more.


One day, a tough young messenger comes into the office, who entrances Lucy with her shockingly white hair and her “don’t mess with me” attitude. One gaze from this young woman divides Lucy’s life into before and after. Could this be the beginning of something wonderful, or just another sign that Lucy’s losing it?


Romantic and deeply moving, "The Messenger" is an unconventional love story that will stay with you long after the final page.


This was an amazing, lucky find for me. I was buying another book and Amazon had this on that page as a--you may like this one too. I liked the cover and the blurb grabbed me so I took the chance. And it was well worth it.

As the blurb says, Lucy is a corporate shark. Characters like this can rub me the wrong way depending on how they’re written. You know they can be too hard-nosed with no conscience, cruel and hard to sympathize with. Lucy walked that fine line but was very appealing because while she does have those characteristics, she’s extremely self-aware. And that was the main appeal of this story for me because it’s told from her POV.

Self-aware characters are my favorite. I love a character who is flawed, is maybe not very nice at times, but who becomes aware of it and is very perceptive about how people around them experience that. Maybe they don’t make excuses for their behavior or they even use it to their advantage, like Lucy does for her job. But they have the ability to learn, grow and change from having that innate understanding of themselves and others and that spurs character growth.

Lucy is also willing to let go of what’s she’s been and has felt who she is to break out of a mold she’s starting to feel trapped in. And damn, but I love the idea of saying screw it to all one’s responsibilities and doing something so crazy and off the wall, damn the consequences. It’s a nice fantasy and fun to read since it’s often a dream of many of us.

So, “Rabbit” as she calls herself, is the cause for Lucy’s sudden self-reflection.  Rabbit demands that Lucy come out and sign for a package she’s delivering. Lucy doesn’t have to sign herself, but Rabbit forces her by acting as if she gives a crap about the consequences to her job if she walks away with the package without delivering it. The gall of that piques Lucy; she doesn’t do the bidding of others, they do it for her. But being the first and really only person to ever stand up to Lucy grabs Lucy’s attention.

Lucy finds herself obsessed with finding Rabbit. She can’t stop thinking about her and goes looking for her. She finds her but she’s got a lot of judgments that she unconsciously expresses that she needs look at in order to get Rabbit’s respect. 

Rabbit is just as turned on by Lucy and while being just as proud and resolute, she doesn’t resist when Lucy finds her and they hook up. Like Lucy, Rabbit is written is such a way that she has a lot of pride, and although she wants to have something with Lucy she will not let Lucy get away with disparaging remarks about her and puts Lucy in her place.

The sex is no holds barred hot. While it’s Lucy’s first time with a woman, and she muses that she’s never been attracted to a woman before, she also muses that men and sex in general haven’t been an issue at all, not until she met Rabbit.

Just an FYI, Rabbit is probably almost half Lucy’s age. So there is a bit of the May/Dec thing going on. However, that didn’t seem to be an issue with either and it didn’t come across as squicky in any way. To me at least.

Although a short novella and technically not really a “lesbian romance” as part of the title suggests, it is a provocative and juicy story that hints at a future for these two characters. I would scoop up any other lesbian story this author writes in a heartbeat. I loved the straightforwardness of the characters and the writing.

Heat level: 3-4- one semi graphically written sex scene

Grade: Loved it

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