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A review by ivanareadsalot
Heart First by S.B. Barnes
4.0
I would like to thank GRR for the opportunity to read and review this ARC.
So i let this bit of mm murder mystery with a side of sexy loving do its thing and i have to say i really enjoyed it! I don't typically read the sub-genre but i thought it would be less creepy and basic enough for an intro tier reader like me and it was a good time, so yay!
Sure it wasn't the most complicated murder to solve, because this was a romance and went like 5 characters hard so even i knew one of those would be the killer. But i loved the atmosphere and the moody, sinister vibe lurking beneath the narrative, colouring even the most mundane and ordinary things. Then again, a murdered sketchy prof at a private college situated in a quaint NY town on the Hudson, with that Kingston-Rhinecliff bridge commute (i googled it) gives vibes for days!
Obvs ymmv but it was easy for me to get caught up in and i liked where my imagination went with this, which is always a good thing imo!
On the flipside, this was a bit emo (i mean which melodrama isn't?) and Daniel was a bit of...a take. But i LOVED Tony and he really gave this story the heart it needed for me to get behind this. I loved them together and they were on the right side of sweet and sexy hot, and though this wasn't a breakneck dynamic thriller, their solid partnership offset the creepiness and grounded this story in their tender affection for each other.
But also, their bedroom game was hot as fk, and i thought their relationship really enhanced the narrative with their intimacy.
Overall this was a great introduction to this series, and for a debut i thought this was very well done! Excited for Book 2 Second Chance and for more Hudson Valley Murder Mysteries because this was such a mood and i 100% want more of it!
So i let this bit of mm murder mystery with a side of sexy loving do its thing and i have to say i really enjoyed it! I don't typically read the sub-genre but i thought it would be less creepy and basic enough for an intro tier reader like me and it was a good time, so yay!
Sure it wasn't the most complicated murder to solve, because this was a romance and went like 5 characters hard so even i knew one of those would be the killer. But i loved the atmosphere and the moody, sinister vibe lurking beneath the narrative, colouring even the most mundane and ordinary things. Then again, a murdered sketchy prof at a private college situated in a quaint NY town on the Hudson, with that Kingston-Rhinecliff bridge commute (i googled it) gives vibes for days!
Obvs ymmv but it was easy for me to get caught up in and i liked where my imagination went with this, which is always a good thing imo!
On the flipside, this was a bit emo (i mean which melodrama isn't?) and Daniel was a bit of...a take. But i LOVED Tony and he really gave this story the heart it needed for me to get behind this. I loved them together and they were on the right side of sweet and sexy hot, and though this wasn't a breakneck dynamic thriller, their solid partnership offset the creepiness and grounded this story in their tender affection for each other.
But also, their bedroom game was hot as fk, and i thought their relationship really enhanced the narrative with their intimacy.
Overall this was a great introduction to this series, and for a debut i thought this was very well done! Excited for Book 2 Second Chance and for more Hudson Valley Murder Mysteries because this was such a mood and i 100% want more of it!