Not a Game

A Contemporary Gay Romance Novel

By: Cardeno C.

Narrated by: Michael Ferraiuolo

A new job, a new city, and hopefully a new life. When chubby gamer Oliver Barnaby receives a job offer from the best boutique game developer in the country, he leaves his family and his less than spectacular existence in Oklahoma without a second's hesitation. Determined to change more than his career and his geography, Oliver implements a plan to finally land a boyfriend. Step one is improving his skills in the bedroom.

Attractive, successful, charismatic Jaime Snow has a life other people envy. His already booming business is growing. He isn't lacking friends. And he has no trouble finding a date. But there's an emptiness in Jaime's heart and a hole in his life that only the right man can fill.

When Oliver and Jaime end up at the same bar at the same time, they each see something they want in the other. Going to bed together that first night is easy. Building the lifetime relationship they both desperately crave will require trust, time, and a little understanding.

©2016 Cardeno C. (P)2016 Cardeno C.

First impression

This is of this genre and I enjoy it. I like the one of the MCs has real life concerns like his insecurities about himself. It did get annoying however it seem to be realistic and later he does display growth in himself from being in a relationship. I just enjoy it. The narration was excellent, no complaints.

Sweet!

couldn't put this down. incredible, improbable but believable storyline. characters were so likeable. cardeno c did it again.

Oliver and Jamie

Oliver is one of the sweetest, kindest, most selfless characters I've read in a long while. He also has a poor view of his own worth. Positive no guy could be interested until he loses weight and gains some skills in bed. Jamie grabs hold of the chance to get to know Oliver. I like how insightful and in tune he is to Oliver's needs and motivations. His attraction for Oliver is from the first glance and only becomes more intense as they spend time getting to know one another. These two have chemistry and Jamie is determined to fix the misunderstanding he's allowed to grow between them. The ending is sheer perfection.

Audiobook: fantastic narrator

So Effin' Sweet!!!! 6 stars!

Oh my goodness this is SO effin’ SWEET!

The blurb tells the basics: Oliver, an overweight game designer, has moved to Seattle and has decided to do a make-over with his life.. He hires an escort to teach him how to be a better lover since he was told by an ex that he lacked skill. When Jaime, a very attractive older man, comes over and notices the book he’d brought in to signal the escort, Oliver assumes Jaime is the escort.

Jaime is just a man who’s finally realized his passion leans toward bigger men and he’s finally embracing it and he approaches Oliver out of real interest, not professional, but he realizes that Oliver needs the “paying for it” to overcome his shyness.

Just as can be predicted from the beginning – the deception can only go so far before someone gets hurt.

But… it’s so much more than that. There are layers, and a sad ex and growth and laughter.

**

Unlike SO MANY books with overweight characters – this is NOT A MAKEOVER STORY! Thank GOD! Oliver is PERFECT as he is and Jaime shows him that he can be loved exactly as he is.

Even disguised as “just getting healthy”, books that show the MC changing their bodies and finding love are really telling everyone that only the physically perfect can find love. Even if the author tries to show differently. Cardeno C doesn’t do that and it’s so beautiful!

Another GORGEOUS part of this story is that there is no BIG MISUNDERSTANDING! Instead of drama and angst, we have two grown-ups having conversations about their concerns. Despite the way they met. It was so refreshing!

The writing is excellent as always. I couldn’t put this down and in fact started reading it again as soon as I’d finished.

I highly recommend this to anyone looking for a sweet, somewhat unique, low-angst romance. It’s funny, terribly sweet and somewhat thought provoking.

Highly Recommended

Audio

Michael Ferraiuolo does an excellent job with this. He gives both Jaime and Oliver very calm, serene voices and nobody has any over the top accents to add drama to this lovely story. He’s excellent with pacing, is easy to listen to and adds just the right touch to bring this story to life. Highly recommended.

6 of 5 stars

A definite must-listen for M/M romance fans!

For me, the characters-especially the main characters-are the driving factor in determining if I like a story or not. That's one of the reasons I keep coming back to Cardeno C.'s books...I know I'm going to get wonderful characters who are complex and deep, and with distinct personalities. I'm also going to get characters that are easy to relate to, and that is clearly illustrated here in Not A Game with one of the main characters, Oliver.

Oh my goodness, Oliver is just so sweet and adorable. He's insecure, extremely self-conscious and not at all confident in himself, with the majority of these things being caused by the size of his body (all of these things struck a huge chord with me). Then we have Jaime, who is the exact opposite, and is Oliver's dream guy in pretty much every way. They meet under some interesting and unique circumstances, setting up some complications for their relationship right from the start.

What Oliver doesn't realize? He's Jaime's dream guy too-something Jaime has to help Oliver understand and accept. This is complicated by a little...well, maybe not so little...secret that Jaime has.

It is so heartwarming to watch the relationship develop between them, especially as we watch Jaime help Oliver open up. And while things between them are sweet and evolve slowly, there's also a nice bit of spice to complement that as things grow ever more serious for the two of them. I loved every moment of their interactions, though for me once Oliver discovers Jaime's secret, it felt less strained than I expected given what Jaime was hiding.

Not A Game is classic Cardeno C. storytelling at its best, and was a 4.5-star read for me. I'd recommend this for any M/M contemporary romance fan, and it's for those readers 18+ due to the M/M sexual content. I hope we get to read more from this world, as I'd love to get Jack's story as well! As Jaime's best friend and somewhat pining ex, I'd really like to see him get his own HEA :-)

The narration: I thought Michael Ferraiuolo did an outstanding job with Not A Game. His smooth, even voice and well done characters kept my head in the story--even when I was listening at work. He did an excellent job bringing Oliver and Jaime to life, and made me love them both even more I truly enjoyed listening to his narration of this book, and am now looking for what other stories he's narrated. 5 stars for the narration!

So sweet!

I loved this story between Jamie and Oliver! So sweet and perfect. Although there was a misunderstanding, there wasn’t any angst or immature behaviors, just two grown men wanting to make it work with each other. So prefect! And I love the husky man getting love and attention! We need more real characters like this please!

One of my favorites by the author

The vocal performer was pretty good. He had a slight variation in voices between most characters. There were a couple of times it was hard to distinguish who was talking but it became clear quick enough that I wasn’t too bothered.

My relationship with this author is tenuous at times. I literally almost DNF one of her books at like 90% because I was SO mad about what happened (and yes, I’m still bitter about that). BUT, I really liked this book. Is it perfect? No. Are there issues that might be hard for some to overlook? Yes. It’s not earth shattering either. Is it light, entertaining and low on angst? Yes! And the premise is unique enough to hold my attention and keep me from putting it down.

I liked both characters a lot. Oliver is a self-conscious, cubby, inexperienced geek that moved to a new town to try to makes some major changes in his life. He’s super smart, quirky and cute but is completely socially inept at times due to lack of experience and self-confidence. Jamie is the exact opposite – he’s confident and well experienced in relationships. I love Jamie’s patience with Oliver. I love that Jamie wants Oliver as is instead of wanting him to change. I love that Oliver didn’t over react when he learned the truth.

They do move fast in their relationship after the first couple of times they get together. It’s almost insta-lovey but it worked for me. The first few times they meet are very descriptive, lengthy scenes and the rest of the book sort of flies by but I didn’t have a huge problem with that.

Overall, and possibly because of my history with this author, I liked this book a lot and would totally recommend it.