It has been quite some time since I really enjoyed YA. And this one did it, somehow. Or maybe I'm such a sucker for wonderful grandparents story.

Another thing going for it is the subtle antipropaganda indoctrination which one can see around the text. Q: No longer a child, I now knew why I’d been shown the images, and I also knew they weren’t all true. (c)
Warnings should go with this!
1. The political background here is abismal. America is a bodygard to some invented Olissa country. It's bodygarding its citizens quite a lot, in some cases supposedly straight to death. But in death they are allowed to keep their cultural diversity. Which is totally generous.
Q: They were just a bodyguard of sorts. It wasn’t the US government’s fault American companies were behaving badly. Companies behaved badly all the time, all over the world. (c) Yeah, right.
2. The US guards Olissa against Iraq and Russia. And I won't even go into the geography of this. Obviously it's difficult to invent a country and place it somewhere not laughable.

Q:
Albert grinned ear-to-ear. “I got a call today.”
“Yeah?”
“It was from my friend at Princeton. You got in! You’ll get the formal offer of admission in a week or two. Lex, I’m so proud of you,” said Albert, reaching across to pat my hand. “You’re going to make a wonderful addition to the school, and I know you’ll love it there as much as I did.”
I threw a hasty smile onto my face and somehow found some enthusiasm for a response. “That’s awesome, Grandpa. I can’t believe it.” My stomach was knotted. I should have started with Albert’s bad news. With only a few days left of being Alexandra, good news about the life I could have had felt like being kicked in the gut. I would never go to Princeton. I wasn’t even going to finish high school.
“Princeton’s playing football against Harvard in a couple weeks. The Ivy matchups are always fun, and I was thinking we might do a little road trip and catch the game? I know you probably don’t think it’s super cool to hang out with your grandpa, but I can treat you to some Princeton sweatshirts and show you the best place to grab pizza. What do you say?”
I could feel my face burn as I fought back tears. It hurt to see Albert so excited. He was going to be devastated when I simply vanished. “Of course I’ll go to the game with you. And Grandpa, you know I love hanging out with you. You don’t need to bribe me. I’m going to miss you so much when I’m gone. I lo—”
“Good, I was hoping you’d say that,” said Albert, reaching into the front pocket of his blazer. “Because that brings me to my second bit of good news.” Albert reached across the table and handed me an envelope. “I know you’ve wanted this for a long time, and I’ve been putting you off, but with the news about Princeton, I thought it was time you got your way.”
Without even opening the envelope, my heart caught. I knew what was inside. Since coming to live with Albert, we’d taken two trips a year, one over Christmas break and the other during summer. Although Albert was democratic about book club night, he hadn’t been regarding our trip destinations. He always asked for my opinion, but then chose to ignore it in favor of trips that were educational and thought provoking. For the last three years, I’d been begging for an adventure vacation in New Zealand, full of hiking, white water rafting, horse trekking, and bungee jumping. I’d campaigned hard, but Albert had always put me off. Given his age, I never really blamed him.
Despite my best efforts, a few stray tears escaped. “You didn’t,” I said, opening the envelope.
Albert laughed. “I most certainly did. We’re going this Christmas. Two weeks in Godzone. That’s what the Kiwi’s call New Zealand. It’ll be summer so the weather is going to be great, and we’ll do all those activities you’ve wanted to do, although I’m absolutely not bungee jumping. You can do it, but don’t try to pressure me into it with one of your bribes or bets.”
I laughed, wiping away a few more tears.
“I hope those are tears of joy and excitement,” said Albert.
I smiled and nodded. Although I had to leave him, I knew I’d made the right decision in choosing to save Albert. I was lucky to have as many years with him as I did. “You need to bring me down off the high I’m on. What was your bad news?” I asked, grabbing my can of ginger ale.
Having just deposited a forkful of food into his mouth, Albert held up a finger as he quickly chewed and then swallowed. He wiped a napkin across his mouth as he cleared his throat. Albert’s expression was pained. “I’m afraid I have to rescind my invitation to the gala. I know you were excited to go, but I learned today the threat level surrounding Kasarian’s visit was increased. There’s chatter a group called Perun will strike. All plus-ones for lower-tiered guests have been elim—”
I choked on my ginger ale at Albert’s mention of Perun and had to pound my chest to clear it. My mind immediately swam with questions. How did Albert know of Perun? Made up of sleeper agents, Perun’s public profile was almost non-existent. There shouldn’t have been any chatter unless… I stared at Albert dumbfounded, my thoughts spinning out of control. Was I wrong about Varos? Had he actually been caught? Had he caved under torture and given me up? Did the man sitting across from me know who I was? Was he testing me?
“Oh,” I said, not really knowing how to respond. Although I kept my face impassive, my muscles coiled, ready for flight. I had a “go” box buried near the dog park. If I ran at top speed, I could grab it and be gone in less than ten minutes.
Albert patted my hand again. “I’m sorry.”
I trembled at his touch and slid my hand away, hiding it in my lap. Needing to run from Perun, I’d been in an impossible situation, and Albert had just handed me an out. His news about the gala was good, if true. But that kind of luck didn’t just happen in the spy world.
“Per-en?” I asked, purposefully stumbling over the pronunciation. “Never heard of them.”
Albert nodded solemnly, “Pear-une. A group of radical Olissan rebels. They’ve been silent for years, but with Aroyan narrowly losing the election… Well, I guess they see an opening.”
“Hmmm,” I said, shaking my head in understanding. Albert looked calm and collected and not at all like someone who was about to jump across the table and slap on some handcuffs. “Well, that’s disappointing about the gala, but I understand.”
I smiled at Albert hesitantly. Had I really just won the spy world’s version of the lotto? Was I really that lucky? Could I allow myself to get excited about Princeton? About New Zealand? My heart quickened at the thought of keeping my life as Alexandra. And what if Grant got into Penn? He’d only be an hour away.
I picked up the tickets to New Zealand and tapped them on the table. Surely, Albert wouldn’t have shown them to me if he knew. Or told me about Princeton. I knew Albert. He wouldn’t bait me—he wasn’t that cruel.
I smiled again, this time with measured excitement. “You know how you could make the gala up to me,” I said, grabbing my fork, a sense of relieved giddiness taking hold.
Albert eyed me. “And how would that be?”
I held my fork high in the air and then swooped it down to my plate. “You could go skydiving with me in New Zealand,” I said with a laugh.
Albert rolled his eyes. “I love you, but I’m not doing that either. Not in a million years.”
I studied Albert for a moment; studied his look of loving yet annoyed affection. My giddiness dissipated, replaced by feelings of warmth and peace. I reached across and put a hand on Albert’s arm, “I love you, too, Grandpa.”
(c)
Q:
“Your grandpa is awesome. He told everyone it was not the time or place for an argument. An eighteenth birthday only rolls around once, so we needed to spank our inner moppets.” Martine paused. She looked like she wanted to ask something, but wasn’t sure if she should. Finally she spoke. “What the hell is an inner moppet? I mean I get the gist, but still…”
(c)
Q:
...I like my job. It has its perks.”
“What are those? Distrust, fear, isolation, an early death?
(c)

“The past is not dead. It's not even the past.” William Faulkner.

This video was taken a few days ago. A teenaged girl of color took out her phone in class and refused to leave. The police were called, and, when the girl refused to leave her desk, the officer choked-slammed her to the floor and dragged her across the floor. He could easily have broken her neck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UQY8...

This is one of a million examples of recent racism, but it resonates particularly with this book, because at one point Joseph, the slave, is beaten for refusing to do something fairly minor. Today, a black person can be brutalized - even killed - for a small bit of stubbornness, with no repercussions. In fact it happens all the time.

I feel for the author of this story, because I can tell that she did a lot of research and tried hard to depict the horrors of black slavery in the U.S. Sadly, she was blind to how she was trivializing those same horrors, and the story is unintentionally painfully racist. Others have discussed why in detail, so I will just bring up one aspect that hit me especially hard. Joseph is in a completely powerless and dependent position with respect to Henry, from beginning to end. Every bit of safety, comfort, life necessities, and health depended on Henry. It felt more like lifelong Stockholm syndrome than a romance – and this is never addressed. 

This story was written for the Love is an Open Road event sponsored by the M/M romance group on Goodreads, and unfortunately, none of the beta readers or the LOR editors who looked over the story saw it either. It was only when the story was published that the racism in the story was spotted and made public, the outcry began. 

Here I think the MMR group did the author a severe disservice. Instead of saying, “it was obviously quite unintentional, and we failed to spot it too, but this story is racist and we need to acknowledged that and remove it,” they closed forces and told those offended to get out of the group and stop disturbing their beautiful minds. Now the author will forever be known for this offensive story, rather than it being a footnote in her career. Most people would have forgiven her – and the MMR group – for making a mistake and correcting it is soon as they realized. What is much harder to forgive is the choice they made to ignore how much they were hurting people and “get past it” by shutting down all conversations relating to the problem on the MMR group.

Edited to add: in case anyone missed it, there is an excellent discussion of this book here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Thanks to the author for the effort and participating in this event and offering this freebie.

I'm going to hide most of the review with a spoiler tag because I give much away in my comments.

Things I liked:

The alternating POV of both MC's. For me to invest in a love story I need to hear from both characters, I need to get inside both their heads or it almost never works for me.

The realistic portrayal of the period without either gratuitous violence or window dressing.

That one MC didn't save the other. It was the strength of their love and seemingly unbreakable bond that kept them each alive at different points of peril throughout their lives.

That there were elements that surprised me - I did not see the blackout coming at all. I was not happy about it either, I couldn't believe you did that to Joseph. But kudos on being able to surprise a reader who doesn't get surprised very often.

The HFN that got them both out of the country before the war even though with Henry's health a HEA might not be long lived. I was glad there was no epilogue 10+ years later that showed Joseph on his own finding his way after Henry's death ...


Things that took me out of the story a little:

Sometimes when the POV switched it seemed like the other MC was still speaking, for example it would switch to Joseph but then he would think or say something that sounded like Henry to me. I had to page back just to verify which character was narrating and it pulled me out a few times. Nothing really significant.

The only other thing that niggled at me was Henry's father hiding his maternal inheritence from him. Not sure I grasped the motivation for that but the revelation coming at the end of the story makes it a moot point for me.


I'd like to commend the author and event staff involved in producing this story. This is only the second story I've read that has come out of the Love is an Open Road group event and I can honestly say I am pleasantly surprised at the caliber of it. I have to admit the event is something I would ordinarily avoid because my biggest pet peeve with the writing in this genre is the writing itself. If you guys can create stories that are better written and edited than many books I see coming out of so called professional publishing houses, I need to take a closer look at some of these stories. Thank you for that. :)

I read it because of all this fuss. Now I know:

1)IT IS A ROMANCE. JUST SIMPLY-AN-ORDINARY-HISTORICAL-ROMANCE.
2)I really wished it could be MORE PROVOKING for my taste.
3)IT is a love story between two different men, a well written novel, not offended at all. Believe me, there are much much much worse books in this world that might make you feel uncomfortable. This one doesn't belong to those books. Unfortunately. I adore to read books that split our society. I don't understand why this one did it.


The plot:

A big plantation owner lost his wife shortly after she gave a birth to their daughter. He needed a wet nurse urgently. It is how Joseph, his baby sister and his mother landed at the house of Henry's father. Henry was the same age as Joseph when they met(5 years old), but a very lonely child. His father was too busy to pay attention to him, his mother too sick to pay attention to him. It is how Joseph and Henry met and became friends. And much much later- lovers. A big plantation owner was not amused about their friendship(even though they tried to hide it, because yes, they were aware that it was not the way how the things were ruled at that time, and it is why this so called-father tried to do everything to bring them apart. It didn't really work. When Henry got badly sick, his father ordered Joseph to make a coffin for his "dying" son. Joseph rejected, it is why he was beaten and left half-dead. Luckily our Henry waked up and saved Joseph from being dead. To a big surprise of his father. And even more- Henry found out that he was an actual owner of EVERYTHING, an official heir, so to say, so....it meant he became an official owner of the plantation and his father couldn't force him to do ANYTHING, inclusive to marry a woman. The end.



WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?! WHY THIS BOOK CAUSED THIS strange REACTION?! MAYBE YOU SHOULD READ IT TO DISCUSS IT?!

I really wished it would be MORE provoking, more creepy. But it is an average MM-historical romance.
Nice, but not even close to compare with the intensity of [b:Schadenfreude|10711584|Schadenfreude|XIX|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1398491224s/10711584.jpg|15622045] or [b:Purgatory: A Novel of the Civil War|13402316|Purgatory A Novel of the Civil War|Jeff Mann|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1403221238s/13402316.jpg|18634185].