REVIEW: Where There’s Smoke by L.A.Witt
Anthony Hunter wonders what the hell he’s gotten himself into when he agrees to manage an unproven candidate’s campaign for governor of California. As soon as he meets the gorgeous, charismatic—and married—politician, attraction gives Anthony’s rock-solid professionalism a run for its money, and Anthony knows he’s in way over his head.
Jesse Cameron doesn’t like the idea of putting himself out there as a happily married, wholesome candidate, but his retired senator uncle insists it’ll give him an edge over a challenging rival. The only problem is that Jesse’s marriage is over, existing only to maintain his heterosexual façade. Oh, and there’s that minor detail about his undeniable attraction to his smoking hot campaign manager. Or the fact that the attraction is very, very mutual.
Before long, temptation explodes into a sizzling, secret relationship, but under the microscope of the media and the relentless scrutiny of the voting public, Anthony and Jesse can only keep their secret for so long. And this is one scandal a campaign won’t survive…
This book was previously published and has been lightly revised from its original version.
111,000 words.
Dear LA Witt,
I bought (I guess I should say I downloaded since I got this book when it was free on Amazon) the second edition of this book. I never read the first one, but the note says that the second edition has been only slightly revised, therefore I am assuming that there is not much difference between two editions.
The blurb gives you a nice idea of the setup, but unfortunately, the book put me in a ranting mood pretty fast. I have been reading m/m romance for at least nine years now and am not planning to stop any time soon, however I am still unable to understand the attraction of two grown men forgetting their grown-up responsibilities and acting like a pair of horny teenagers. To be clear, I get the attraction of *love prevails over everything*, when people decide that their career should be abandoned in favor of love, in favor of being together. I get that. What I do not get is when the characters want to have it all: they act like complete idiots and irresponsible fools but still keep their jobs. And this is how these two guys acted as far as I am concerned, for the vast majority of the story. Variations of this trope pop up in m/m a lot and I still do not understand it. Maybe somebody can explain it to me? I just really want to understand!
Anthony Hunter, an experienced campaign manager, agrees to run Jesse Cameron’s election campaign to become a governor of California, and it all goes south from there. Jesse is gay and in the closet. He may have all the best intentions in the world, but he reluctantly agrees to take his uncle’s advice and present himself as a happily married candidate even though for all intents and purposes his marriage to Simone is pretty much over now. Simone agrees to help him .
Anthony is gay as well, and he has been attracted to Jesse almost from the moment they met, but until about thirty percent of the story he has no idea that Jesse is gay. He is able to keep his attraction at bay while he thinks Jesse is straight, but when Jesse finally decides to spill his guts (because Anthony as his campaign manager really needs to know everything that could be used against Jesse by his opponents and the media), what does Anthony do? Oh yes, he kisses Jesse pretty much right away.
And then a heated love affair takes place. Do you know how many times throughout the book I was treated to different variations of the following conversations? Let’s just say it happened way more often than once or twice or three times. This is a close paraphrase, not a quote.
“Oh no, I think this is a bad idea.
We must wait till the campaign is over.
Oh no, but we can’t. We want each other too much.”
This is just this reader’s opinion, but I did not find their behavior romantic. I found it idiotic.
The most disappointing thing for me was that except their inability to control their desire to have sex on the campaign trail no matter how dangerous it was or who could discover them, I really liked both Anthony and Jesse. They may have been flawed people, but they both went into politics because they seemed to care about people around them and care about the issues. Anthony may have helped to elect candidates whose stance on certain issues was lesser of two evils, but he did care about those issues and wanted to help worthy candidates. Jesse decided to run because he truly believed that the other candidate would be an awful choice for California, because he always had the desire to “fix things” and because he was passionately devoted to improving the situation for domestic violence survivors. These two are likeable good guys, I liked them, but I could not like them completely and I was annoyed about that.
The way author dealt with Jesse’s marriage and its dissolution was a pleasant surprise for me. I expected something much more stereotypical and cliché after reading the blurb, but I was surprised and I liked how the author chose a different angle to explore. Jesse’s wife and soon to be ex-wife Simone was a likeable and sympathetic character to me. There were definitely issues between Jesse and Simone (and not just the fact that he was gay – she had been aware of that for a while when the story began) but these issues were not necessarily what one might expect.
I liked the resolution of the story, but it was too little too late for me.
Grade C.
AmazonBNKoboAREBook DepositoryGoogle
mmph.
Adultery is almost always an automatic “no go” for me, unless there is a really, really good justification for it.
I don’t care if Simone “agreed” to Jesse’s cheating on her. If he can’t honor solemn vows long enough to get a divorce (let alone the cynicism implied in “staying married for the election” — really? In other words, you think that you have to LIE to the people you’re promising to represent? ) then I don’t trust his commitment to the HEA … or to his campaign promises either, for that matter.
@hapax: there is no adultery in this book I can promise you that! If you want spoilers I can email you. Stay married for election is another thing but they are completely honest with each other and Simone had affairs too – with Jesse knowledge and blessing .
I also wanted to add that Jesse absolutely puts Simone in a vulnerable position because of the campaign and deserved smacking for that even if it was done with her consent, but I cannot say more without spoilers.
Amen. I haven’t read this one, but I really dislike this behavior in romances, m/m and m/f.
LA Witt is hit or miss for me – most of her books that are misses for me have multiple variations of the we-can’t-do-this-but-I-want-you-too-much and the-no-one-can-know-or-we’re-doomed conversations. And my very least favorite LA Witt was some rock star book where lust made both MCs stupid. (I keep reading her because even though she’s hit or miss, her hits are really good and her misses only make me roll eyes and don’t make my head explode in rage – and because she’s genius at coming up with interesting, what if scenarios that make great blurbs)
What I find astonishing is that the same readers then reject the Regency variant of this for being too dour, where public figures who’re gay wisely keep up the facade at all times. Excluding or including marriage. Or want their romances realistic, but then reject the realism of an Anthony Weiner or Larry Craig, who both behaved like sage little school marms all their lives. Sort of a damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.
@Drano: clarify your comment for me please? I mean it looks like you disagree with my review because you find such behavior realistic for politicians but I am not hundred percent sure. If I am reading you correctly – I don’t know if you read the book or not, but in my opinion none of these characters were portrayed as Anthony Weiner was by those who criticized his behavior on the news and wherever else. These were portrayed as good, honorable guys and the biggest mistake Jesse made according to narrative was to run in the first place not because he was unqualified but because of what was going on with Simone. That was what he regrets – not his affair with Anthony during the campaign. If narrative at any time hinted that they are like Weiner – sure, I would know what I was reading but this was not it.
@cleo: same here – I keep reading because her hits are good and because her books have so much potential, but even in her best books it is like she cuts corners you know? Like there is a possibility to explore something in so icy more depth and she chooses easier angle – maybe because she is so prolific as a writer? I don’t know.
@Sirius – yes! I also feel like she stays on the surface. I got a glimpse of what she could do in Out From the Cold, which is one of my favorites by her. And even that one felt like she could have gone even deeper, iirc.
Have you read Razor Wire? (ff by one of her other pen names, Lauren Gallagher). I’m curious about it because it looks like it could be similar to Out From the Cold, but cautious because of the topic.
Great review as always, Sirius. I find LA Witt hit or miss too and just read a miss by her — Walls of Troy. It had a similar set up, with two guys who “shouldn’t be together,” but this time with a bodyguard and the guy he was guarding (who was also much younger). The “we shouldn’t be together” and “this is wrong” internal dialogue went on and on and on. It got to the point where I found myself agreeing with him, that, yeah, they really didn’t belong together, so the romance didn’t really work for me.
I just looked at my GR shelf and the LA Witt books I really liked are the co-written ones (The Only Series written with Cat Grant and the Market Garden series with Aleksandr Voinov).
@cleo: I enjoyed “Out from the cold” too. I have not read “Razor wire”, no.
@Liz (Bugetta): You know, it is interesting you mention “Walls of Troy” because I have read it – I agree, there is a lot of the same thing goes on, but I just liked the characters so much. I still found it annoying, but I think I graded it high, like 3.75 on Amazon, should check. I like her characters, I just wish they would stop with this behavior.
“The Only Series” I loved and even there it all started when one of the guys was a trainee, wasn’t it if I remember correctly? But at least there I remember them taking responsibility and deciding that this was a risk they are willing to take and in the second book they were in very different positions .
@Sirius @Liz (Bugetta) – I liked the first one in The Only series OK, but didn’t care for the others.
I also like The Market Garden series – especially Tristan and Jared and If It Flies.
My other favorite by her (besides Out from the Cold) is Finding Master Right. There’s a certain amount of “I want him but I can’t have him” whining, but I still just love it.
@Sirius:
That’s right. I forgot that they were a “shouldn’t be together” couple at the beginning. I don’t remember being annoyed by constant inner dialogue about it not being right though, but maybe I blocked it out. :-D
@cleo:
I loved the Tristan and Jared stories too and just got the one about Rolex but haven’t read it or any others in that series yet. I enjoyed Finding Master Right too. I’d say that’s my favorite solo LA Witt book. It’s friends to lovers, so that might have helped.
@Liz (Bugetta): Re: ‘The only” series – oh yeah, I do not remember “this is not right” dialogue either, just “we should not, but we are willing to risk it”.’
I have not read “Finding Master Right” but since both you and Cleo recommended it – click.
@Sirius – I hope you like it!
@Sirius:
I hope you like it too! :)