Book Reviews: The Will Darling Adventures by K.J. Charles

I downloaded the ebook of Slippery Creatures because a bookstagrammer I follow shared a post (probably from the author) saying that it was free. I am not immune to free ebooks, especially if they're mysteries, about bookstores, and/or queer; this one was all of that! True to form, I forgot about it until I downloaded the Nook app (longtime readers* may remember my Nook usage and loyalty) to my phone in preparation for my trip to Mexico so I could have something to read without bringing physical books with me. I downloaded SC so I could read it and LOVED it so much I purchased the other two ebooks in the series, The Sugared Game and Subtle Blood. These books all have the tagline (?) "A 1920s m/m romance trilogy in the spirit of Golden Age pulp fiction." 

 
 

Slippery Creatures

Will Darling came back from the Great War with a few scars, a lot of medals, and no idea what to do next. Inheriting his uncle's chaotic second-hand bookshop is a blessing...until strange visitors start making threats. First a criminal gang, then the War Office, both telling Will to give them the information they want, or else.

Will has no idea what that information is, and nobody to turn to, until Kim Secretan--charming, cultured, oddly attractive--steps in to offer help. [...] Enemies are closing in on [Will] from all sides--and Kim is the only man who can help.

You all know how I feel about bookstores. I mean! Just that alone had me. Plus it's a mystery, plus it's queer? Come on. This was SUCH a good, suspenseful story, with lots of twists and turns. It felt grounded and lived in, and I learned some stuff about the period. I suppose it shouldn't surprise me given how we treat our veterans today, but in England after WWI there were no jobs for returning veterans, forcing tons of them to pawn even their medals and do menial jobs if they could find them and beg in the street if they couldn't. That makes no sense to me; so many men died in that war. Like in WWII, women stepped up (I'm sure) and then stepped back so the men could have their jobs back, but there weren't any? I'm sure it was the government's choices screwing them over. Will is so lucky to find his uncle and inherit the bookshop when he died. I liked him as a character; the war changed him, but he's a good and decent man. All three books in the trilogy are told from his POV. The love interest aspect of the book kind of jerks you around a bit, not so much "will they/won't they" but "will this become a real relationship? Can Kim be trusted?". In my reading log notes I wrote "interesting, exciting, and sexy", and that really sums this book up. I really enjoyed it.

 

 The Sugared Game

It's been two months since Will Darling saw Kim Secretan, and he doesn't expect to see him again. What do a rough and ready soldier-turned-bookseller and a disgraced shady aristocrat have to do with each other anyway? But when Will encounters a face from the past in a disreputable nightclub, Kim turns up, as shifty, unreliable, and irresistible as ever. And before Will knows it, he's been dragged back into Kim's shadowy world of secrets, criminal conspiracies, and underhand dealings. This time, though, things are underhanded even by Kim standards. This time, the danger is too close to home. And if Will and Kim can't find common ground against unseen enemies, they risk losing everything. 

I feel the same about this book as I did its predecessor. Maisie, Will's sensible best friend who is Black and a ray of sunshine, and Phoebe, Kim's best friend and beard fiance who could have stepped out of the Jeeves books, are back in this book too, and they're so fun. The bookstore comes into this story much less, but it can't be helped. All three books have danger that feels real, and the girls end up being threatened by the bad guys too. It makes sense historically, but it really bums me out that the bad guys' go-to to try to threaten the guys/control the outcome is to threaten to rape and murder Maisie and Phoebe. Nothing really bad happens to them, but it sucks. I also got a bit sick of reading the phrase "cut-glass accent" over and over again. Like I get it, Maisie has to pretend to be upper-class to fit in with Phoebe and Kim's crowd. Maybe use a different phrase sometimes though? The class differences between the characters are discussed and come up a lot, unsurprisingly. Working-class Will often pretends to be stupider than he is in order to be underestimated. It just struck me that Kim's last name has Secret in it, ugghghghhhh. To be fair, Will's last name has Daring in it (eyeroll). There is a lot of violence in all three books, as is expected when you come up against organized crime, and there's a good analysis of Will's enjoyment of and facility in killing. It makes sense that the war would make him feel it's the only thing he's good at.

 

 

Subtle Blood  (spoilers in book summary)

Will Darling is all right. His business is doing well, and so is his illicit** relationship with Kim Secretan--disgraced aristocrat, ex-spy, amateur book-dealer. It's starting to feel like he's got his life under control. And then a brutal murder in a gentleman's club plunges them back into the shadow world of crime, deception, and the power of privilege. Worse, it brings them up against Kim's noble, hostile family, and his upper-class life where Will can never belong. With old and new enemies against them, and secrets on every side, Will and Kim have to fight for each other harder than ever--or be torn apart for good. 

Kim's family SUUUUUUUUUUCKS. I hate them. The class differences/issues are even stronger here, unsurprisingly. It's more of the same, in mostly a good way (see my previous note about the girls in danger). Will and Kim's dynamic reminds me a bit of Holmes and Watson's, except Kim is not significantly smarter than Will and Will doesn't go around all "wowzers!!" all starry-eyed. Both men have their strengths and weaknesses that complement each other. Kim is better at smooth-talking and intrigue, while Will would rather choose violence, plus he's good at fighting and doing the right thing when Kim would rather take the easy way out. It made me sad to finish this book; I wanted more!! Psst KJ Charles, please write a companion trilogy from the girls' point of view, and/or a continuation trilogy set right after the boys' POV books. I want to hang out more with all the characters. Spoilers, highlight to read: unsurprisingly to me and my gay goggles, Maisie and Phoebe pair up together too, which made me happy. But they basically just tell the boys and the reader. I wanted more build-up, more details like the boys' relationship got!

Anyway, I loved this trilogy and wish it were a series of 45 books instead. Read them if you like the aforementioned genres and don't mind books with spice/s3x scenes.

Cover notes: I like the book covers, although I hate the (not even historically correct) sideburns the artist gave Kim. Lmao at Will holding his knife in each one. Very cool and perfect font. The Sugared Game's cover is my favorite.

Score: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Read in: February 19-23
From: Barnes & Noble (Nook)
Status: keeping

See my aesthetics moodboard for the Will Darling Adventures!

Representation: bisexual main character and side character, gay character/love interest, lesbian side character, Black side character, veteran with PTSD

Trigger warnings: murder, death, gore, violence, torture, gun violence, war-related violence, trench warfare mentions, kidnapping, rape threats, murder threats, veteran with PTSD, period-typical homophobia, period-typical racism, period-typical misogyny and sexism, a character self-harmed in the past, self-harm scars, drug mentions (heroin), suicide mentions, 1918 flu pandemic mentions, infectious disease bioweapon mention, emotional and physical abuse of child (past), homelessness mentions, poverty, hunger, miscarriage mention (past, vague), period-typical classism, vomiting, an elderly character died from a stroke off-page, probably other stuff. KJ Charles has kindly included lists of content warnings for her books on her website!

*do not exist

**it was literally illegal to be gay in 1920s England. Men could be sent to jail for having gay s3x. See Oscar Wilde's Wikipedia page. RIP Kim and Will you would have loved pride

HarperCollins and subsidiaries books of 2022

The HarperCollins strike is over, so I'm going to publish short book review blurbs about the HC books I read since the strike started. TBH, it's been a while, so I may not remember everything about the books.

 

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew (read in November) is the first Narnia book I ever read and as such I have a soft spot for it. Such a good story. Two English neighbor kids in 1900 set out to explore their townhouses and are forced into a magical experiment that will show them the end of one world and the beginning of another, setting in motion the rest of the series. To me it has some of the most creative and rich imagery. Uncle Andrew should be in jail and deserved a lasting comeuppance. More males acting stupidly again; Lewis's misogyny where?? lol One minor plot point I want to talk about: Aslan says Frank the cabbie and Helen his wife have not yet encountered grief, but they're totally OK with being yanked out of their world and never seeing anyone in it again? Don't they have families? If they don't have families, then haven't they known grief? Didn't they have friends they'd miss? If you don't have family or friends you know grief, in my opinion. 4.5 stars, permanent collection. Trigger warnings for this book: children used/forced to participate in magical/scientific experiments without their consent by adult, physical violence, an adult physically hurts/harms children repeatedly, threats of violence and death, animal abuse and cruelty (to a horse), sick/dying parent, verbal manipulation of children, off-page magical genocide, off-page magical immediate extinction of all living species, sexism, theft

 

A True Wonder: The Comic Book Hero Who Changed Everything (read in November) is a picture book biography about Wonder Woman and how her comics came to be, with an especial focus on the women who made her possible. It was written by Kirsten W. Larsen and illustrated by Katy Wu. I loved this book and learned a lot from it. A must-have for fans of Wonder Woman and comics! GIRL POWER! 5 stars, keeping.  Trigger warnings (that I remember): sexism towards real women and Wonder Woman, sexualization of Wonder Woman's outfit (wanting her to be more/less covered up)

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle (read in December) is indeed the last book of the series. I like it but at the same time it's depressing. Eustace and Jill are called back to Narnia to help its last king attempt to save his country's creatures and soul from forces outside and within. I found Shift's truth-bending and manipulation of religious belief for power to be prescient when I last re-read this series during the Bush administration, and I continue to find it prescient during this current era of fake news and Christofascism. My heart hurts for Tirian, the Narnians, and all the sad stuff that happens. Important to note that racism rears its head again, due to the part Calormenes play in this story. To go about undetected, Tirian and the kids put on brownface to impersonate Calormene soldiers. Tirian and other Narnians say racist things about Calormenes and their skin colors. This book's One Good Brown Person is Emeth; I can't go into his whole thing in the short paragraph I want this review to be (a good article; 'ware spoilers). Not to mention, the problem of Susan (ditto. all of his Narnia articles are so good)! There's a lot packed into this little book; you could say it's bigger on the inside, like the stable. 4.5 stars, permanent collection. Trigger warnings: war, battles, murder, death, physical violence, animal cruelty, cruelty to sentient creatures, slavery mentions, brownface, racism/colorism, child soldiers, hunger and thirst mentions, fantasy horror, sexism, heavy-handed Christian symbolism