Four Love By Numbers Book 2
M/M Romance
Dreamspinner Press LLC
July 23, 2019
When unlikely attraction blossoms between a twentysomething genderqueer tattoo artist and an older, small-town veterinarian, both are forced to face their pasts for a chance at a loving future.
Four years ago Padraig Donovan lost his husband, the only man he’d ever been with. Now his life consists of the work he loves, a big empty house, and the possibility of a lonely future.
Kaos’s experiments with makeup landed him in the hospital at the hands of his disapproving ex. With nowhere else to turn, he flees to Acker, Wisconsin… and runs into a sexy widower and the kindest man he’s ever met.
Padraig and Kaos know there’s something worth exploring between them, and as they raise a puppy and deal with the ups and downs of their respective jobs, they fit into each other’s lives in ways they never expected. Being with Kaos—who is so different than the guys he’s always been attracted to—opens up an exciting new world for Padraig. But can he convince Kaos to trust another man with his body… let alone his heart?
Reviewed by: Linda Tonis
Member of the Paranormal Romance Review Team
Jeremiah White (Kaos) has had a very difficult life made even more difficult by the fact that he is genderqueer and identifies as non-gender, one day feminine and one day masculine depending on his frame of mind. Unfortunately when he started putting on make-up and acting feminine it outraged his boyfriend Trev who began using him as a punching board. His troubled life began as a child when his mother had him at seventeen and decided that being a mother was not her thing leaving him to be raised by his grandmother who would forsake eating in order for her beloved grandson to not go hungry.
When his grandmother got sick and couldn’t afford her medicine Kaos began dealing weed but young and stupid he got caught and spent four years in prison. It was during his last two years that he met Makai who looked after him and who he loved like a brother. When released he returned to Trev until he couldn’t take the beatings any more. Leaving Missouri and heading to Acker, Wisconsin to be with Makai he was ready to begin his life over again, getting his tattoo license and setting up shop and living with Makai until he was able to be on his own. Makai had no problem with the nail polish and make-up and most of the little town didn’t either.
Padraig Donovan the town veterinarian lost his husband four years ago and has been existing ever since, he and Marcus were together from college a time when AIDS was everywhere and people were dying around them. It was a scary time and it pushed Padraig and Marcus to cling to each other and no one else but although Padraig gives every appearance of mourning the one he loved there was another part of the relationship that no one knew about.
When Padraig and Kaos met there was an attraction, Padraig never was attracted to a man who wore make-up and dressed in feminine clothes but for some reason he was totally taken with the young man who just moved into town. Not only were the two men different in their personalities, there was a huge age difference meaning the music, movies and other things they liked would be as different as night and day.
I was very taken with this story since it was my first introduction to a nonbinary person and I had to actually look it up to understand what it meant, saying that I did totally enjoy the book and the characters and have a new understanding of what being nonbinary is and could understand it when Kaos changed from day to day. Can two men both beaten down by circumstances in their lives find love and help heal the past.