Title: What's In A Name?
Series: Foothills Pride Series Book 1
Author: Pat Henshaw
Cover Artist: AngstyG
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Genre: Gay Romance
Length: Novella
Synopsis
A Foothills Pride Story
Barista Jimmy Patterson thinks it's a good idea to get rip-roaring drunk on his birthday after he’s dumped by his boyfriend. When the burly owner of Stonewall’s Bar rescues Jimmy, the night starts to look up.
Now Jimmy just wants to know the bartender's first name since he's worn a different name tag every time Jimmy's seen him. "Guy" Stone gives Jimmy seven guesses, one for each night he takes Jimmy out on a date.
While Jimmy’s trying to come up with his name, he's distracted by the destruction of his coffee shop and what looks more and more like a hate crime.
Excerpt
Falling in love in your 30s, I'm here to tell you, is the shits. Take it from me. You're rolling along, minding your own business--in my case as the working owner of Stonewall Saloon--and then wham! You think you're immune, especially since you see so many crap-ass guys doing stupid shit every night. Maybe it's the bar. Who knows? I never thought good guys went to bars a lot until I met Jimmy.
Along about November a year or so ago, Jimmy Patterson and his stupid as fuck boyfriend started dropping by Stonewall three, four times a week around 8 or 9 and staying sometimes until closing, but mostly for a couple, three hours.
The boyfriend, this asshole named Alex, would parade in wearing whatever passed as the latest style and park Jimmy on a stool at the bar.
Now, see, Jimmy's the real friendly type. Shoot, he was even nice to Gus, a regular left over from when my Grandpa was owner and bartender. Gus can't see or hear too well now and for some reason gets on the nerves of my younger customers all the time. Mostly because you gotta yell and repeat what you say to him about a million times. And then he still doesn't get what you said.
Jimmy never blinked an eye at Gus. Just treated him like all the other guys who sat down next to him to bullshit.
"Good boy, that Jimmy," Gus'd tell me over and over when Jimmy and Dickhead came in.
I had to agree. During slow periods, Jimmy and I'd talk about all sorts of things. He wanted to open a coffee shop in Old Town, around where Stonewall is, and asked me questions about places along the strip. We even talked quarterlies during tax time and shit like that.
There's a few queer-run places now the big city guys have discovered us, and Jimmy wanted to know how they got along. Yeah, sure, there's some resistance from blowhards like Tommy Thompson and a few others, but mostly we're a live and let live kinda place.
At Christmas we laughed about some of the stupid ass holiday decorations along Main Street. Jimmy'd even asked if I was going to decorate. My answer? Blow me. For a minute it looked like he considered it.
The more we talked, the more lost I was. Got to the point I told one of the other bartenders to come get me if I was in the back when Jimmy came in. Go figure. Never done that in my life.
In the meantime, every time they were here, Dickhead the boyfriend was making the rounds. I caught him a few times sucking cock in the back. Made me so mad I nearly hit him up one side and down the other. I didn't though cuz I didn't want Jimmy to stop coming in.
It bothered me though. You know, one of those moral dilemmas. Should I tell Jimmy or not? So I started asking around.
Didn't help when I learned Jimmy'd moved into a condo with the Dickhead. What kind of friend tells a guy his boyfriend's a scumbag? On the other hand, what kind of friend keeps the news to himself? Moral dilemma, like I said.
Okay, so we're coming up to Jimmy's birthday, which I know because after I had another bartender card him, I wrote the date down. I decide to give the Dickhead one more chance. See if he could man up on the big night. I knew a bunch of Jimmy's friends were gonna throw him a party at Stonewall, you know try to get him drunk, all the regular crap. So I'd better be seeing Dickhead stand up and act right.
By that point, I've already been smacked around by Jimmy-love and am ready to beat down walls to make him happy on his big day. He's never gonna see his 20s again and he's feeling the pain. At least that's what he's said. I just want the guy to be happy, real happy.
What happened? Well, yeah, you gotta read Jimmy's side of the story. I mean, don't listen to me. I can't tell a story about love. Shit, I can barely tell a clean joke. Just listen to Jimmy. He's got it covered.
Review
What’s in a name? by Pat Henshaw is a short novella about a Barista by the name of Jimmy Patterson who gets dumped at a bar on his birthday by his boyfriend Alex. The burly bartender who we first know as Alex 2 then later as “Guy”, comes in to save the day when Jimmy gets drunk off his backside and finds himself in the bathroom with his head over the toilet bowl. All Jimmy wants is to know the bartender’s first name. The story starts unfolding when “Guy” makes a deal with Jimmy. He has seven days to guess “Guy”’s first name; one guess each day.While each day for the next week, Jimmy and Guy’s relationship becomes deeper to the point where they end up falling in love and do find their HEA, there is so much more to this story than just your typical boy meets boy, boy falls in love with boy, they live happily ever after type scenario. Jimmy and his co-owner of Penny’s coffee shop learn that not everything is going to be a bed of roses as thriving business owners when someone ends up trashing their mall branch shop. Jimmy and Guy have their own issues that they need to work out through the week that they’re together as well.
What I found interesting as well as refreshing about What’s in a Name? is that right from the very beginning the book had a fairytale feel to it. First there was the feel of a Rumpelstiltskin story in so far as having to guess Guy’s name and getting seven guess’s to figure out out. I’m not going to give away the ending of the book or the answer in this regards but the fairytale overlays continue throughout the book.
There were quite a few twists and turns to What’s in a Name along with unexpected surprises that pop up throughout the read such as Jimmy’s ex boyfriend Alex, who we meet at the beginning of the book, showing up later. There was some mystery to this story as well and the person we thought was the culprit wasn’t the one “Who done it” after all.
The one big downfall that I found while reading the story was that “Guy’s” first name became predictable by at least the middle of the story for me. Luckily that wasn’t the main plot otherwise there was a good chance I would have lost interest in the book. There were quite a few underlying and overlying aspects to What’s in a name that it kept me coming back to see what happened between the two men. What’s in a name is a quick read that I got through in a day and it took me that long only because it was during the weekend when I had other things going on. I would definitely recommend this to my friends.
Buy Link
Meet The Author
Currently living in Sacramento, California, and a former book reviewer, Pat grew up in the middle of the United States and subsequently lived on all three coasts. At various times, she has been a librarian, an English composition instructor, and a theatrical costumer. She's also traveled around Europe, Central America, and Asia.
Follow The Author
No comments:
Post a Comment