Rating: 5 Stars

Publisher: Hodgkin and Blount 

Tags: LGBT Series. Gay or MM Romance, Murder/Mystery, Dark Themes, Emotional/Psychological. **TW: Religious Themes. Religious Homophobia. Conversion Therapy Mentions. Murder/Death. Drug Use. Dark Themes. It’s Gregory Ashe 

Length: 400 Pages

Reviewer: Kazza

Purchase At: author’s page

Blurb:

Blood will tell.

Life is better for Jem Berger. He’s got a job that he’s good at. He’s got a boyfriend he loves. He’s talking more with his mom, even though he’s not sure if he should call her mom. And there’s been no sign of the murderous pack of psychopaths Jem and Tean ran into a couple of months before.

Sure, it’s not a job he loves. And things with Tean have been…weird lately—therapy, mood swings, a growing sense of distance. And when Jem’s mom calls, it’s not like they have anything to say to each other.

But overall, things are definitely better.

Until, that is, a snowstorm traps Jem and Tean at a resort in the Wasatch Mountains, and they find themselves caught up in another murder—one in which Jem’s mom is the prime suspect. Worse, Jem and Tean discover that the resort isn’t as isolated as they thought. And someone is hunting them.

Review: 

Even after coming out, when he’d been so sure that he’d left all of it behind, it had still been there.
We love you. But.

You know, I would never want the task of writing a blurb for these books of Gregory Ashe’s because I find writing a review for them difficult enough. However, that blurb is interesting because who knows if Jem is good at his current call centre job at BoomTawk. He’s never actually been there. Jem is much happier pulling a con, solving murder/mysteries, than working within the boundaries of a 9-5 job. Mostly because he’s had little education and his upbringing was never, ever stable.  

No responses. Not even rejections. Ten applications every day. Ten minimum. And his inbox was still this big gaping nothing. Because other people didn’t miss out on high school while they were in juvie. Because other people went to college. Or they learned a trade.

Thankfully in this book there’s minimal Ammon. Anyone who reads this series will most likely agree the less Ammon the better. He does creepily come up on Jem late at night in Jem’s workplace parking lot to tell him that Daniel, Ammon’s fifteen-year-old son, appears to be getting stalked. That he’d like Jem to maybe look into that. In light of the last book, review here, it’s highly likely that someone, potentially the wolves, want to get Daniel back. Maybe kill him. It’s certainly intriguing that Ammon approaches Jem. He’s tried multiple times to sabotage him in regards to being in relationship with Tean. Long story. One that actually starts at The Same Breath. So even though this says book #2, it technically isn’t. There is the first series, The Lamb and the Lion, then this one, The Lamb and the Lion: Wolves Among Us, which moves this couple in a direction. It’s a thing that GA does.           

Also, I would say the description of the relationship as ‘definitely better’ is not strictly copacetic because of the relationship Jem has with his mother birther, Brigitte. She is a problem between Jem and Tean because Brig is self-obsessed. She’s the reason for Jem and Tean being stuck in a snowstorm at a ski lodge. Why Tean can’t say anything truthful about Jem’s bio mother because of the conflict it creates within Jem and Tean. Brig says Gerald, her much older husband who is not Jem’s father, wants Jem to come to dinner. He really, truly wants to meet Jem, and he can bring…him as well. 

“Please come. I want to meet your—” You could barely hear it when she choked on the next word. “—partner.”
“Tean,” Jem said.
“Yes, I want to meet him.”

Sure, Jan. What a freaking shemozzle. Gerald wants to cure Jem of the gay. Well, it’s not gay, of course. It’s same-sex attraction. That’s more palatable. Like you’re giving it another name and making the struggle to overcome seem godly. Gay means you’ve given in. The Mormons have a lot of SSA gay mismatched couples and singles at the lodge that Gerald is spiritually guiding. The ones Gerald will ‘cure,’ and Jem can join them. At the dinner, Gerald ignores Tean and talks at Jem. How he can’t expect a free ride, something Jem has never asked for. How he needs to become spiritually devout. A real man. Not gay. Sorry, SSA. I mean, c’mon. Jem isn’t even Mormon.

Because what Gerald really meant—what he apparently thought was so obvious that he didn’t even have to say it—was marry a woman. And that gesture, the one he’d made, was his indication that Tean would eventually be removed by some heavenly waiter, like an inconvenient hors d’oeuvres.

Gerald is rude, argumentative, arrogant. An unintelligent man in power within religion. A particularly nasty combination. All the while, Brigitte is an enabler of the highest order and the perennial victim. Nothing is ever her fault. I was virtually at defcon 1 at the dinner. Also, RIP Brittany Murphy.  (Above gif from the timeless and classic Drop Dead Gorgeous.) 

The real reason Brig and Gerald are at the lodge is so Gerald can continue his brainwashing spiritual advising of a group of twenty-something Mormons about their requirements to be better young men and women within the Mormon church. They, or their parents, all pay good money so Gerald can help them become the straight arrows they should be. Some of the participants want it. Their families definitely want it. Wives want it. The church wants it. The lot of them live in fear of being discovered and disowned by their families if they don’t dedicate themselves to Gerald and this group. Things have been leaked to families before. Then there’s Stephen, Gerald’s PA. He’s supposedly a glowing testimonial of the way being devout + Gerald works to heal SSA. Jem knows that Stephen has never been gay. It’s some sort of con. The group, once they eventually talk to Jem and Tean, also know Stephen’s “conversion” is suspicious as fuck. Oh, and Stephen conveniently runs the financial side of Gerald’s gay conversion spiritual group. Becoming straight? Big business.

Anyhoo…. Gerald is found dead in the middle of a snow storm. At first it appears that he fell. He’s old. It’s a big storm. Tean – a veterinary doctor – does a brief read of the scene and works out that Gerald sustained blunt-force trauma to the head before falling. It’s now a murder investigation. Nobody can come or go from the lodge because of the weather. Initially it’s all ‘Gerald is/was a pillar of the LDS community.’ Or ‘who, Gerald?! Enemies?’ Blah blah blah. But as they dig, because this is obviously a murder/mystery book, plenty of people have reason to want Gerald gone. Anyone from the ‘spiritual’ group. Brig could want him dead. Stephen could. And what about the wolves? The list continues.   

Speaking of the wolves, this book briefly dips it’s toes into the weird and wild latex/acrylic fur mask-wearing, frightening wolves of the last book. There is a small but carnage-y section in the book with them in it and it’s clear there’s more to come. I’ll be honest, I thought this storyline would be about the wolves but it’s about the murders that needed solving in this book. It’s also looking at the triggers both MCs have in regards to their families. Where Tean holds a lot of anger, simmering just below the surface toward his parents, Jem does some licit drugs in illicit ways to numb his fight and flight protectors around his. Where Jem sadly wants to have a family connection, Tean feels like he wants to sever his.

“My mom called. She and my dad are getting a divorce.”
Jem had one sneaker halfway off. He looked up. “Holy shit. What happened?”
Tean gave an unhappy laugh. “I don’t know. I hung up on her.”        

Jem has half siblings, Maeve and Milo, who are much younger than him, they’re ten and eight-years-old compared to Jem who’s in his twenties. And because (not) mother of the year Brig and old Gerald, who was probably not the biological father of Maeve and Milo either, have always believed in letting children free range, code for minimal effort put into actual parenting, Jem’s half siblings are not too unlike him. Blond/e like Jem and Brig, sure, but they’re a handful, resourceful for their ages, eavesdroppers. Thankfully, at the moment, they’re not as street smart as Jem had to be. But who knows what Brig will do. She has more time to fuck them up. By the end of the book, Jem tells her he’ll be watching and he will step in. I wanted to hug him.

Meanwhile, Tean keeps dodging calls from his parents because more and more feelings are surfacing. He finds himself mostly angry. Angry at Jem’s mother, who triggers Tean for the way she’s treated Jem. The debt she racked up in his name. The way she never tried to find him. The damage that was done to Jem in the foster system and then juvie. How she had other children in her life but Jem never had anything remotely parent-like in his. The way she snaps her fingers and Jem jumps. How Jem tries so hard to be loved by her. It’s a cascading affect in regards to Tean’s own family issues – years of being closeted and all the ways in which they and the religion he was raised in have made him feel less-than. A pariah. Wrong. How he had a messed up relationship with Ammon for twenty years, who perpetuated all the stereotypical things that certain church goers perceive gay represents: Seedy. Sordid. Immoral. That he allowed himself to be suckered into it sits heavily inside Tean. It’s all there ticking away. Brigitte ramps that up when Maeve and Milo go missing and Brig just wants to take some pills, lie down, and let someone else look for her two young children.   

What I Liked: 

There’s fun banter between Jem and Tean in this book. I missed that in book #1.

“I told you I should be a coach,” Jem said. “I should teach people how to be gay.”
Tean tried washing his face, but he couldn’t stop laughing.
“Step one,” Jem said. “Cute underwear.”
“Get out of here so I can finish getting ready for bed.”
“Step two, insert cock in mouth.”
Tean very gently—very sweetly—shoved him out of the bathroom and shut the door.

Both MCs do good things but they have some morally grey parts sitting between them. It mostly doesn’t matter because they both accept one another without judgement. Jem believes Tean is the smartest person alive and Tean believes Jem is the most patient.  

Jem makes sure he gets some gloomy zingers out of Tean. Nobody can do morbid like Tean, and Jem appreciates the hell out of it.

The murder/mystery was not as wild as book #1, I’m unsure if that’s possible. It was interesting in its own right. I didn’t know whodunnit until I was meant to. There was a lot going on though. A. Lot. 

It was nice that Jem got to spend some time with Maeve and Milo. He’s good with kids because he’s a big kid himself. Which fits who he is and what he’s been through.

I liked that Daniel is leaning into Tean and Jem after coming out because Tean’s been like family to him and he’s openly gay. His dad, Ammon, and his mother, Lucy, are not handling anything right now. Moving away from any advice from them both is far more beneficial for him. Tean isn’t sure how to handle it but he’s learning. 

I also love how much Scipio, Tean’s Labrador, is a bridge for communication at times. 

That letter…. *Sighs That was such a touching moment. 

I’m so happy that by the end of this book there had been a processing of just how much this relationship means to both the MCs. It ends really well in regards to their relationship. I’m not going to borrow trouble but, urgh, I don’t want anything messing with their hard won, deeper connection.   

The triggers about family of origin, about religion and homophobia, were deep. The backdrop of the cold, intensely snowy conditions made it all the more emotionally piercing and raw. I had Ruelle on high rotation while reading, especially Genesis. Egads, if you want to listen to a song that reflects the mood of this book, yep, that’s the way to go. 

Overall: 

I’m enmeshed with this series. It feels real in terms of emotions and family and how they affect you and your most significant, loving relationship. I can vouch for the immensity of dysfunctional through to toxic families that exist. While there is some humour throughout, The Same Blood is also psychological, sometimes sad, also dark. I’ve read 5 books with Tean and Jem as the MCs. They contain humour but the tone is always emotionally edgy or straight up downbeat. 5 Stars for the well named The Same Blood.