This was an incredibly touching story about how an obsession with anything can take control of and ruin your life. I hated the way that losing a competition filled him with self loathing. The poor guy had so many demons that sabotages himself. The six months that Matty and Rob had together in Montana together were perfect but skating pulled them apart. The last part of the book finally brought reality crashing down on Matty. I think that the epilogue took away from the sweet ending. The BDSM scenes were beautifully written and were hot. Highly recommended story. ( )

This erotic romance surprised me in several ways. I was delighted with the author's style. The writing is accomplished. She rarely falls into the trap of repetition, which is difficult with instant attraction sexcapades. The characters are given enough time for this attraction to go deep. The inevitable separation is hell. I knew it would be bad, and she held nothing back. What Rob teaches Matty helps, but it is still hell.

The author did her research. I lived in Montana for eleven years. Went to college in Missoula, visited Whitefish, and was also amazed at Flathead Lake. There's more to living in the Rockies, but she catches the romance of it, and the people Matty meet were realistic; curious, sometimes snide, and often clueless about someone so very out.

We are only following Matty's point of view, so the twists and changes sometimes hit hard. If you are averse to kinky sex because you don't get why anyone would want that, you may find you learn a few things about the whys. I confess, one or two points of personal growth through kink escaped me, probably because I saw where Matty had to go. Not the writer's fault necessarily, mine certainly. She didn't spell everything out because Matty doesn't necessarily understand it until later.

I also followed Olympic figure skating in the past, and that part of this story rang too true. Painfully true.

To sum up: the writer used her research to great effect, writes very well, and tells a compelling story that is neither simple nor shallow. There is a lot of pain, but it serves the story perfectly. And how Matty's actions affect Rob. Damn. I mean, I knew, but I didn't understand, and that is the beauty of single point-of-view stories. ( )

A free copy of Training Season was provided by the author for an honest review through ‘M/M Romance Group’s Don’t Buy My Love.’



Oh.My.God. I have no words. I don’t know how to describe how much I loved this book. How it reached into my heart and made me feel How it made me laugh at the amazing banter and flirting between Matty and Rob, how I fanned myself at all the delicious hot, hot sex and then the story made my heart shatter when Matty made his heartbreaking decision to continue to pursue his skating dream thus leaving Rob behind. I have no words. Training Season is one of the most amazing books ever. Can you say fan-girling?

So many of the reviews have covered and waxed poetic about this story that I’m certain I’ll only repeat myself. What ‘Training Season’ did to me is make me feel, I mean really feel. I was completely sucked into this story within the first few pages. I couldn’t stop wanting to know more of the characters or to stop feeling what they were feeling. They are so alive it’s hard to imagine that they’re not real live people. In fact Matty reminds me an awful lot of Johnny Weir.

Matty Marcus is a world class figure skater. He’s talented, flamboyant, bratty and gay. He’s also very undisciplined and lazy, not willing to knuckle down and put in the effort to really reach the top. He believes he’s not manly enough to reach the top because the judges always favor the more dramatic, strong skaters. But deep down inside he knows his flaws and he beats himself up for it and at the unfairness of the judge’s scores. He’s caught in a trap, angry at the skating world, but still dreaming that one day he’ll capture that elusive Olympic gold medal and then everyone will see how truly amazing he is.

But before that happens, Matty suffers an injury that could end his career. Instead a patron offers him a job at her Montana home for six months. Six months of watching the ranch while her and her husband travel the world. Matty will be paid, he can practice at the local rink and have peace and quiet to recover. Of course Matty is sure he’ll go mad with boredom in Montana. That is until he meets the rancher over the next hill, Rob Lovely.

Rob Lovely. What can I say except he’s sex on legs, an alpha male. Sparks fly at Matty and Rob’s first meeting when Rob brings ‘wood’ to Matty for a fire *snicker*. We find out later that it was love at first sight for Rob and lust at first sight for Matty.

What I loved was the amazing banter and flirting that went on between the two. I could feel the connection they had with each other, that they were an excellent fit. I loved the sex they had and oh, the sex! There was plain vanilla sex, dirty, nasty sex and edgy kinky sex. As the story goes on, we find out how kinky Rob really is and that Matty loves it. He loves giving up control to Rob and Rob loves having that control. There is a particular scene, the enema scene that I know some reviewers have difficulty with, but I see what Rob was trying to do in that scene as with every other kink scene he played with Matty. I loved the way the author coordinated the kink with what Rob was trying to achieve in his desire to help Matty overcome the issues that blocked him from becoming the champion that Rob already knew that he was.

It brought tears to my eyes with the way Rob cared for Matty. In fact this book brought tears to my eyes a lot. I cried when they were happy. I cried when they were sad. I cried when they broke up and I cried when they finally got back together again. I don’t remember the last time I cried so much over a book. But the author’s final scenes of reunion made it all worthwhile.

Not only were the MCs awesome characters, but so where the secondary characters that peppered the story. There was Ben, Rob’s son, who appears in the story at the age of twelve and has a great desire to become a figure skater. With Matty’s help, his desire is flamed even higher and his talent becomes even more evident. There’s Donna, Matty’s mother who offers unconditional love, support and wisdom. Then there’s Elliot, Matty’s BFF. Elliot doesn’t care that Matty is a world class skater; he loves Matty for just being Matty. Numerous other characters of Whitefish, Montana put in an appearance all with distinctive personalities.

The only way that anyone can truly understand the awesomeness of Training Season is to read the story and experience it. I can honestly say this is one of the best books I have ever enjoyed, and I recommend it highly to everyone except those who do not like BDSM especially the harder, dirtier parts of kink.

Training Season is first and foremost a story about Love. Close behind are the lessons of facing your fears, be they about yourself or your goals, about being fearless and chasing those dreams. It’s about realizing that maybe those dreams will never be the right ones for you. And finally about growing up by carving out a new life with a new dream, a dream that you can love and that loves you back. Training Season gets 5 Stars from me.


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Decent romance slightly spoiled by gratuitous, over-long BDSM scenes. ( )

Matty Marcus was at the height of his figure skating career when he suffered an injury that took him off the ice and out of competition. Now, as he's completing his recovery, it's time to start thinking about how to get back into the game. Though he never expected that he'd be taking a house-sitting job on a Montana ranch to raise the funds to hire a new coach and start seriously training again. And he certainly didn't expect to spend that time next to an incredibly handsome neighbor who somehow seems to know exactly what Matty needs. But as the two of them grow closer, Matty knows he will need to make a choice - even though he's certain there's no choice to make at all.

I really enjoyed this one. It's an M/M romance with a well-developed and believable story (while still having its moments of heat along the way). Even though Matty seems a bit over-the-top at first, it's to quickly connect with him and the other characters and be cheering and yelling at him as the story progresses. There's so much about this story and its characters that is unexpected, too, that it really kept my interest and, in many ways, I really would like to know what happens next for everyone involved. (This is also one of those books that I would give a great deal to see as a film, if only more people were optioning and adapting LGBT-themed literature.)

Content Warning: A few brief BDSM scenes.

(eGalley provided by the author via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.) ( )