REVIEW: Taste- London Love Book #2- Sophia Soames

Title: Taste
Series: London Love Book #2
Author: Sophia Soames
Genre: Gay Romance, Gay Fiction, LGBTQ Romance
Publisher: Independent
Release Date: Nov 1, 2021
Format: Kindle
Pages: 246
Source: Amazon

Emotional, funny, gripping, and heart-wrenching, Sophia Soames’ books pulled me in and stuck with me well after. Highly recommend.” —Jennifer Cody, author of the Diviner’s Game and Shattered Pawns universe.

Finn Christensen doesn’t do feelings. He doesn’t do relationships. When he has an itch to scratch, there are always clubs and hook-ups. Quick, dirty encounters in dark places that feed the need that brews in the pit in his stomach. He works every hour of the day as the front office manager for the Clouds Westminster Hotel in central London. He’s a good boss, and he knows his shit.
Then Mark Quinton swans in like he owns the bloody place, and Finn’s carefully managed world starts to fall apart.

Mark Quinton is impulsive and stupid and childish. He’s the last person in the world who should be allowed to run the food and beverage department at the Clouds Westminster, however many brilliant ideas he has and somehow miraculously pulls off. He needs…something. He needs Finn Christensen.

It’s a match made in hell. A recipe for disaster. There will be a bloodbath one day. They both know that. Everyone knows.

TASTE is the second book in the London Love series, following four extraordinary ordinary couples living real fairy-tales in the city of London. TASTE is a hurt comfort, enemy to lovers romance set behind the scenes in a busy inner city business hotel. The books are all Standalone and can be read in any order, apart from EXHALE which is best enjoyed after BREATHE.

Trigger-warnings for off page mentions of domestic violence, depression, kleptomania, ADHD and culinary crimes involving cheese. HEA.

Review by Xanthe

Member of The Paranormal Romance Guild Review Team

Taste took me a minute or two to get into. I have to say I wasn’t really a fan of either man to start with. Both are making life harder for themselves with how they interact and react to the other, but it builds into an interesting and emotive story that I enjoyed reading.

Finn comes across as very isolated in his world, focused on his job with no family and no social life that I can tell. I think he is equally respected and feared by his colleagues, except when it comes to Mark Quinton. They both rile each other up, which may be funny for others to witness but it also creates more and more tension between them as well as within themselves which eventually explodes into heated moments. The constant battles between them start to weigh on both men’s mental state and plays games with their emotions. One man is more open to what he is feeling than the other which also brings drama to the goings on.

I like the openness that Mark has regarding his mental health. At least two of his staff know what to look out for and he says that his mum is a big source of support. Signs and symptoms are discussed as well as those in the know, knowing how to help him. Finn is a lot harder to get to open up, even for the reader to discover the source of his ire, which is a good twist in the character’s story. Finn’s childhood is a source of pain for him and is something he has worked hard to move on from. Both men are dealing with abandonment issues by their parents, though under different circumstances.

The story mainly takes place in the hotel that they both work at with many an entertaining/annoying customer to contend with and coworkers who range from those who, in Finn’s opinion, should be fired, and Mabel, the Maitre D’hôtel, who, according to Mark, is god’s gift to the right-hand man. It makes for an eclectic group with some highs and lows experienced together. It may surprise some but not others as to just how intense and crazy behind the scenes of the hotel world can get but it makes for a great read that I look forward to more of.

Overall, this is a strongly emotional story with a few heated scenes, of both the argumentative and naked kind. The enemies to lovers trope is strong with these two, as well as the hurt/comfort with both men having avoided relationships because of past hurts.