Lovers

By: Fiona Cole

Narrated by: Greg Boudreaux, Teddy Hamilton, Jo Raylan

Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

When Jackson finds himself in a situation with an old college fling and his new fiancé, complicated feelings arise. Can he handle being with two people?

©2019 Dreamscape Media, LLC (P)2019 Dreamscape Media, LLC

Holy Hotness 🔥 & Heartache 💔

I normally don’t read MMF books, it’s just not my cup of tea. But for some reason, perhaps the male narrators, piqued my interest in this book.

Lovers is a second-chance friends-to-lovers romance but the plot runs a bit complex all because Jake can’t get his sh*t together.

Jake and Jackson are best friends in college, one night of honest passion & awakening caused Jake split and left Jackson without his best friend anymore. Years have come and gone & their paths crossed once more. Only this time, Jake has Carina in his life. Things progressed from there... tangled emotional webs were woven. Inevitable heartaches happened and my god, I felt so bad for Carina.
Jake hurt two people and himself all because he couldn’t get rid of his toxic male idealism. Don’t get me wrong, I get the struggle in coming to terms with ones truth, however, Jake didn’t grow up with homophobic parents nor was he surrounded by any. It was his own paralyzing fear of not fitting the mold of who he’s supposed to be. And when he finally accepted who he is, and was able to be honest with it, he was readily accepted.
It seemed like the years of Jackson hurting, of his inner turmoil and him using Carina to run away from his inner struggles were completely unnecessary.
Carina is a Saint. It hurt what she went through.
And Jackson, he deserved his happy ending.

The story was poignant and well written. The narrators did an excellent job. Greg Boudreaux and Teddy Hamilton are known for being one of the best. Jo Raylan’s narration didn’t bother me at all.

Truth is, this story deserves 5 stars. Truth is, I recommend it, specially if you’re into some crazy hot steamy scenes. This book has plenty! Truth is, while it’s MMF, the emotional connection and component is more of MM.

I dare you to listen and not get hot and bothered. 😉

Missleading!!!!

Be careful with this book! I went in believing It was a MMF romance and It. Is. NOT!!!

I hate cheaters! In real life and in my books, AND that is what we get from this story.

I want my credit back!!!!

Raw, Sexy, Powerful, Beautiful!

I really enjoyed this book! I have listened multiple times. Not only is it super hot with epic levels of steamy sex, but there are personal stories that really connected with me. It was a sex-positive adventure of self discovery and owning your pleasure! I love the idea of Voyeur and a life of exploration and trust. My heart hurts for anyone who feels they cannot express who they are and enjoy life to it's full potential for what they need to make themselves happy (as long as it is consensual). The scenes are HOT AF and I love the narration. I chose this story because of the narrators, and I was most definitely not disappointed. Jo Raylan and Teddy Hamilton are AMAZING! Greg is a fairly new narrator to me, but I really enjoyed his performance and will definitely listen to more. All of the anxiety, heat, anticipation, love, excitement, and everything in between bleeds through with their fantastic delivery. Mistakes are made, but I do love how the characters own their stumbles and move forward. No spoilers, but Carina is a FREAKING BAD-ASS, SEX-POSITIVE icon of a woman!! I listened to her book, Another, immediately following this and will review separately.

I definitely recommend this book. It is MMF with MM, so if you are not okay with that move along. You are missing out big time, though, IMHO!

yum

always love Fiona's books. they can be a slow build but once she's set the groundwork, I can't put it down. and she writes the hottest sexy times. really there should be a trophy...

I liked the story but not all of it...

When this book first popped up on my audiobooks' new release page last month, no matter how attractive the cover, I ignored it because of the 3P. I really hate 3P or 4P stories. I've read my fair share of them and I've never found them fascinating. I've always found those kind of stories lacking one way or another - too many, so so many unnecessary soapy dramatics in those kind of plots and usually fried my braincells numb. So anyway, after surfing for a new book to help me pass my long work hours with, and not finding anything I really wanted to sink my teeth into, I finally huffed and decided to pick something I usually wouldn't. Hence this pick.

Honestly, I rather liked some aspect of this story while I thought other parts were...well, just really stretching. I know the stretch was done to pull the story along and make it to look like more than the simpler subject it was. Which was, a straight man falling for his bisexual male friend. Which in my book is bisexual x bisexual. But this book went all around it about how labels don't need to be used or just because a guy likes another guy doesn't make them gay. Um, yeah ok sure. But what do I know.

Also I second the comment below by agreeing that the narrator, Jo Raylan, was NOT likable. Thank god, she only had a few chapters. But really, what's the purpose of this 3P, if the girl is only going to be put in the story as a dummy prop between Jake and Jackson? BELIEVE ME, Carina's chapters are almost irrelevant to this story. You can practically skip her chapters and still understand the ending. Like I said, dummy prop. So Do Not get fooled by the FMM label. Yes it was 3P for the kinky sex but the intense real love making, more substantial and emotional story line is between Jake and Jackson. I absolutely hated Jake. He's quite the douche. I don't mean men's fear of their sexuality isn't a real thing but usually in life, people have more dire situations piled against them like hateful bigot parents, relatives and friends. Jake had none of those other than some self-concocted idealism of what manhood is. Jake is a man stuck in his head and only his head. Neither his friends nor mother, nor co-worker cared that he loved a man. Yes they were shock but after the initial ten second trance, they all got over it. And by god, Jake put Carina and Jackson through hell because of his own insecurities. Carina, though I feel for her, it wasn't so bad because she knew what she was getting herself into and when the signs painted themselves in her face she decided to ignore them. I don't mean she deserved what she got but she should have put her foot down and taken the bull by the horns when she had the chance. She wasn't going to win but at least she wouldn't have hurt that much. The person I felt for was crazy-ass Jackson. See this is where I said, I liked the story but not all of it. Jackson through all of it, endured everything because he was so pitifully in-love that he dove in head first and consequences be damned. He'd been burned by Jake before but again desperation had him at both Jake and Carina's beck-and-call. I liked the ending and how each of the 3 characters came around. However I thought it wrapped up too cleanly between Jake and Jackson. I'm someone who likes to see some major groveling. The plot should have given a way for Jake to have gone miles and more miles to win Jackson back. But Jackson, damn Jackson was like a firefly chasing after a meteor and he was relentless in his chase, always the one making the first move until his idiot meteor finally stopped and tracked back to him.


Overall Story - 3 stars

Overall Narration:

1 star - Jo Raylan. Her voice is too breathy and soft for male roles. She should never ever narrate a book where she has to act out a male character. She sounded like an out-of-breath dying grandma.

5 stars - Greg Boudreaux and Teddy Hamilton. Seriously two of my all time male narrator. My only complaint is, when are dual/or more narrations ever going to be done right! I've recently listened to "His Boy" by Bink Cummings and I wish all narration would follow that sort of format. That story got its dual narration right. Sadly, it's probably the only one. Seriously, each narrator should stick to their character lines if you're going to have dual+ narrations.

A DIFFERENT ENDING TO THE STORY, I LOVED IT!

Lets be real with each other. If the passion in your relationship isn't working, the last thing you should do is invite another person into the mix, trying to bring back that passion. For at the end, someone is going to get burnt. I like Carina, but her idea was missed guided, to say the least. I like Jake, he among so many fighting their sexuality, he was lost. I liked Jackson as well. I can not blame him, for anything that went down. That man was truly in love with Jake. If someone is going to invite you into their life whereas, you could get the opportunity to touch that passion with the one you love, some people will take that invitation and run with it. Sometimes, loving someone deeply makes it hard to see the forest from the trees. At the end, everyone in this story learned a valuable lesson. It's called the way of life. I thought the story was realistic. I enjoyed it tremendously. I so highly recommend. The narrators were outstanding! ENJOY!

Grammar alert!

If bad grammar bothers you, this is not your audiobook. Please hire an editor or proofreader. Several examples: “...me and Jackson’s relationship,” “...giving Jackson and I hugs.” And improper word usage: “...I’m not sure IT wasn’t a dent in the wall” as opposed to “I’m not sure there was want a dent...”

The grammar issues and the female narrator definitely brought my rating down, but other than that, I enjoyed the book. It got super cheesy at the very end, but it’s a good listen.

hot but full of angst and heartache

read the book multiple times and loved it. I just got the audio version. It's HOT!! (and heartbreaking)
Greg Boudreaux & Teddy Hamilton were great as narrators.
The biggest problem - HATED the narrator for Carina (Jo Raylan). Every line was read in a breathy moan type voice and it was weird listening to it for the entire chapter and not just the scenes where it would make sense. She also talks too slow. If the option to return the audiobook was available I would seriously consider it. She bothered me that much. Luckily (for me) she doesn't have many chapters.

So intense it made me sick

I purchased this book for the narrators. Due to it being MMF, I didn’t have high expectations. I thought it would be fluffy but it wasn’t. I related so intensely to the characters that I got physically sick because of their cheating. This is one of those books that I wish I had never listened to.

Trigger warning about cheating.

Loved the connection of the stories

I feel it was so sexy and turned me on as me a reader I am bu so intrigued my fantasy but I feel it was a bit unrealistic and was too eager but the audio was perfect and the descriptions of everything made me feel like it was so real! Absolutely loved it!

I couldn't get past the cheating

I love Fiona Cole but I couldn't connect with the male main characters because of what they did to Carina, I just couldn't forgive them and consequently stopped caring about the story or the HEA. On the plus side the next book made up for it.
Outstanding narration!

Omg

This book was pretty darn perfect. I’m a big fan of MM books, so the MMF dynamic was def fun. There were many many sexy times in this book which is always a win if you ask me! Liked it more than the first as there wasn’t the previous trauma storyline of the first. Got it on audible as I adore Teddy Hamilton!

Truth or Dare

Only milking stools are stable with three legs; relationships rarely survive the three way pressure, this one did not. A better title for this book would've been Truth or Dare, as Lovers just doesn't encompass the journey these MCs have been on.

Quaint kitchen sink drama well scripted and well narrated.