Taught by Two by R. Cayden

Failing Straight (Taught by Two 2) by R. Cayden

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Blurb

A straight tennis jock. 
The sassiest guy on campus. 
One very special outdoorsman. 

Love turns the world upside down in this Gay-for-Two romance. 

Teddy: I’m pretty comfortable with who I am. I’m the star tennis player at a small college, a good friend, and I’m definitely straight. So it’s one thing when I get turned on by sassy Isaac, but after I meet his butch boyfriend? Suddenly, I’m having a lot of trouble focusing on my tennis game. 

Isaac: I really do want to let go of my gay playboy fantasies, but there’s a flirt inside me that won’t shut up, and a new hot jock landing in my lap. I’ll never break the rules of my open relationship with my boyfriend, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have fun toying with confused Teddy when I see him around campus. After all, he’s straight, so it’s not like it could really go anywhere… 

Rick: I chose to skip college, preferring the solitude of the woods to just about anything or anyone. And then I met Isaac. Now, I’m driving my truck into Mayerville to visit my college boyfriend twice a week, and dreaming of a future together. But if I thought Isaac turned my world upside before, once he introduces me to Teddy? Hell, I guess we haven’t even gotten started yet. 

Failing Straight is a 60,000+ word standalone MMM romance novel. It features passion in the mountains, locker room fights, and a straight-to-gay Happily Ever After. It is filled with heart, lots of heat, and a little bit of kink. Enjoy! 

Review

On the surface, this is a pretty easy read. It’s a young guy who thinks he’s where he wants to be, but he’s not entirely content. He’s spent his whole life striving to get to this point, but something’s under his skin. (This would be Teddy, by the way.) He has an encounter with Isaac, who has a bit of a reputation, and it’s a clarifying moment for him.

So far, so good.

I liked Teddy. I genuinely liked him, and while a lot of gay-for-you romance can be pretty toxic this came off as genuine and sweet. Teddy was a decent guy, and his world and identity weren’t somehow oddly destroyed by the realization he was attracted to men. There was no big gay crisis.

Rick was interesting too. I wasn’t quite sure why he was interested in an open relationship with Isaac, since it seemed to make him kind of anxious, but he made the choice willingly. He was harder for me to wrap my head around, but I liked him.

Isaac left me a little more torn. On the one hand, it was good to see a gay man in m/m fiction who wasn’t Super Masculine ™. It feels more reflective of the community I know. Isaac had a lot of self-destructive behaviors, and a lot of other-destructive behaviors, and it was hard to have a lot of sympathy when he didn’t seem to take others into account. At the same time, I got the sense he was trying, and I have to say that’s hard to convey through the written word. He’s a complex character who might not always have the best motives, but is delightfully crafted.

Failing Straight is a deeply sexual book, so if you’re looking for something a little raunchy to add to your summer reading list this is the book for you. It’s not erotica, but it definitely has a strongly sexual component.