Title: Wasted
Author: Aiden Shaw
Publisher: Running Press
Genre: Contemporary M/M
Length: 320 pages (print); ebook
Rating: 1 star out of 5
A guest review by Leslie
BLURB
Adult film superstar Aiden Shaw follows up his bestselling memoir, My Undoing, with the third novel in a gritty and stimulating trilogy of sexual excess (following Boundaries and Brutal: Uncut). Set in the hedonistic London clubs so vividly characterized in his previous novels, and reintroducing David, Joe, Ryan and the disturbed Flora, Wasted brings the trilogy to a rousing and unexpected climax.
REVIEW
NB: This review is based only on a sample of the book. I haven’t read the whole thing. But even so, I think it is accurate. If someone—anyone—out there disagrees, please let me know.
I can give you a three word review: Oh. My. God. Do you want me to elaborate? Okay, I shall.
The story opens with David and Ryan having an interaction in a living room. Since it takes awhile to figure out who is who, it also takes awhile to figure out whose living room we are in—but eventually, I think, it is David’s (not entirely sure on that, though). Anyway, David and Ryan seem to have the hots for each other but there are some obstacles in their way, namely 1) David has a boyfriend named Joe; 2) Ryan is only 16; and 3) Ryan is David’s nephew. But, hey, obstacles are meant to be overcome and off we go and after a few descriptions of Ryan’s “slim waist,” “smooth hairless suntanned skin,” and “striking hazel eyes,” we are off and running.
David wants to seduce Ryan and does this by doing very sexy things like gulping beer and burping. But no matter, Ryan obviously thinks this is hot and responds by massaging David’s feet.
Before things can get really going, we need to have an interior decorating interlude, in which all furnishings are carefully described, including the “faecal-brown” walls (fecal for those of us in the US). Walls the color of excrement are sexy? Um, okay.
The action moves back to the couch where David and Ryan’s inane conversation continues, with some dalliance about age. While it has been established that Ryan is 16, David may be any age ranging from 30 to 50. This is when my squick factor kicked into high gear….a 50 year old man seducing his 16 year old nephew? Ew.
Ryan clearly has none of the issues I have. He plonks onto his uncle’s body and then another inane conversation begins with a lengthy discussion about the London tube. But even with the not-so-sexy conversation, they manage to wrestle and maneuver and declare love to each other and cuddle and kiss when suddenly, Ryan announces he has this really hot sexy girlfriend named Leila who is a model!
Leila is described as being six feet tall, kooky, a model, she’s gorgeous, compelling, even though her face is average. She has a manner that sets her apart from her ‘pears.’ (Yes, that is what is printed in the book. As Dave Barry says, I am not making this up!). She can walk down the runway drinking whiskey from a bottle and lifting her skirt to show her ho-ho, but because she is such a fabulous model (never mind the average face) she is invited back year after year.
And she dates a 16 year old kid.
Whose uncle wants to have sex with him.
Is anyone here shaking their head yet? If not, let me continue.
We learn more about the fabulous Leila. In addition to pulling up her skirt in any random place, she loves to go into restaurants, sit down at a table with strangers and eye their food until they feel compelled to offer her some. Or, she’ll wait until they finish eating and then take their plates and using their dirty utensils, eat all their leftovers. And she gets away with this.
Leila and Ryan have such a close bond that they do things like shave their heads together and then dye their hair green (excuse me, I thought they were bald?). Leila needs to escape from ‘Manfester’ (again, not making this up!) and Ryan, David, and Joe are going to help her….wait, isn’t she a great success as a runway model in London? I thought she had escaped from Manfester already?
Just about when I thought my head would explode from trying to keep track of what is going on and who’s who, THANK GOD my Kindle sample ended and I could stop reading.
All this, in just a sample of the book. My heart aches for people who actually paid money for this crap and tried to read the whole thing.
The sample was riddled with typos, punctuation errors, misspellings and so on. It is unbelievable that this is an offering from a mainstream press. When I buy a book for $9.99—actually for any price—I expect a quality presentation and decent writing, not a steaming pile of crud.
My overall recommendation: stay away. Stay very far away. Do not get sucked in by the slightly sexy cover. There is nothing—nothing!—in this book that you want to read. Trust me. And I didn’t even read the whole thing.
Now I just need to go and sanitize my Kindle and find something good to read.
Okay, my head is spinning. Hope your kindle survived the experience. So I’m thinking you’re recommending Aiden stick with screwing other men for money on film and forget the publishing biz? LOL Sometimes you just should do what you do best and leave it at that. 🙂
Yes, Gabriel (that’s my Kindle) was a little shaken up but I promised him I’d only read 5 star books for the next few days and he seemed relieved.
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L
Oh dear.
I don’t even think I need to elaborate on that.
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I do hope there are as few people as possible who read this story or it might put them off Running Press entirely, which would be a pity for the new line of M/M romance. 🙁
O dear O dear
Oi. Thanks for the warning. I, too, am appalled and disappointed that RP would pick this one up in the first place, much less let it go out the door with so many errors. With so many really great books being published, this is what they choose in their slim line of m/m?
Actually, looking at the RP website, this seems to be an offering from their erotica/sexuality division, which appears to be completely separate from the M/M romance division — thankfully.
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They have another book for sale from another porn star-turned-author. Maybe this is a special niche market for them?
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For a chuckle, go to Amazon and use the “look inside the book” feature to read the back cover. There is a promotional blurb from Boy George that is…well, if I had read that first, I might not have bothered to download the sample. LOL.
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L
Thanks for the warning. I’m glad Gabriel made it through without permanent damage. Might I recommend an old, familiar comfort read to put him back to rights? I know nothing puts Dresden (my ereader) right like The Tin Star or anything by Josh Lanyon.
If you can believe it, I haven’t read The Tin Star! It’s on my list but I just haven’t gotten to it yet. This might be the motivation I need to read it now.
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I am reading Charlie Cochrane’s newest, Lessons in Power and Jonty and Orlando’s dulcet voices seem to be having a soothing effect on Gabriel’s frazzled circuitry, thank heavens.
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I also have Josh’s Don’t Look Back lined up so I think I have lots of good healing reading in store for me. 🙂
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L
I can actually see “Manfester” working as an expression of disgust for Manchester. That’s the only half-way clever thing in there.
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“Leila and Ryan have such a close bond that they do things like shave their heads together and then dye their hair green”
Is that like stripping naked, swimming out to the ship and filling your pockets with ship’s biscuit?
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So far, they ALL need therapy.
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And why can’t I write about a pair of 17 year olds if these guys are writing 16 year olds getting it on with their uncles?
Hi Angelia,
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I actually thought about the Manfester thing, but since the city was mentioned once as Manchester and twice as Manfester, I decided it was a typo. By the time I got to that point in my reading, I wasn’t expecting anything clever or unique and wasn’t giving the author any points for this. LOL.
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As for the age issues–good question. This sure doesn’t fall under the rubric of great literature, so they can’t be using that excuse.
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L
Good for you Leslie 🙂
Thanks, Ingrid. I feel better already, after some intensive lunchtime reading which extended into…oh my goodness, look at the clock! It’s 3:37 and I’m still reading. 😉
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L
I bought the hardcover version of My Undoing only because I got it for $1 when I joined gay book club. I like(d) Aiden Shaw for the great porn he acted in. Hot body, big uncut cock, nice face. So I wanted to read something about him, kind of what made him tick. My Undoing was depressing. If he wasn’t shooting a porn video, he was depressed about his porn boyfriend in America. If he wasn’t escorting, then he was doing drugs with his buddies in London’s clubs. He described David as a lifelong friend. And I think the guy has been in some gay porn I’ve watched, and enjoyed. He talks about his band of alternate, punk rockers, quotes some of the depressing lyrics. He describes his near fatal accident in another european country. He doesn’t say it in so many words, but he was high on drugs and laying in the middle of a road looking at the stars and got his stupid ASS run over by a car!
I know I’m responding to a review for a different Aiden Shaw book, but I figured y’all might be interested in the one I read. My Undoing was well written, no glaring typos and editing snafu’s. So, if you want to read about the endless self doubt, depressing, self destructive behaviour of a gay porn icon, My Undoing is the book for you.
I am quite surprised that Mr. Shaw even survived to write another book. Maybe he wrote Wasted from a padded cell in a mental institution. I wouldn’t be surprised.
Thanks for the painful read and review, Leslie. I know you feel for the people that might buy the book. But I feel sad for the author and the people he described in the book and their wasted lives.
Thanks for that mini-review, John. I think that many people who aren’t authors or writers can still manage to put out a halfway decent memoir because after all, all they are doing is writing their story. The story and words are there–all the author needs to do is write them down. S/he is a scribe. But fiction writing, as we all know, is a completely different kettle of fish and requires that the writer know something about things like plot, interesting and likeable (or at least sympathetic) characters, and readable dialog, all of which were missing in this sample.
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What I am most surprised at, however, is how this book got into print in this condition. It almost feels like the publisher was handed a manuscript which was sent immediately into production without anyone ever laying an eye on it. How can that be? And, this isn’t a quirk of the Kindle sample. I read a few other reviews and they all comment on the errors. One reviewer, in particular, said he read the paperback version and there was at least one error, and usually more, on every single page.
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L
Holy cow. Your poor kindle.
Is there the slightest bit of a chance that this opus could be meant as… kinda sorta parody of the genre?
It’s not clever enough to be a parody, imho. It’s just a bad book.
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Gabriel K. is recovering…thanks for your kind words.
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L
Leslie, read The Tin Star, stat! It will heal both you and Gabriel. Followed immediately by Don’t Look Back (it was pretty good, although my fave Lanyon is Snowball In Hell).
If we’re doing Josh recs…I liked Snowball in Hell, too. So much so that after I read it, I sent him a four page precis of a sequel (which would come after the sequel he supposedly has in mind). I said if I wrote it, it would be fanfic, so I gave it to him for inspiration. Josh wrote back, very gracious, and said he was flattered. He said that while many fans had given him suggestions for stories/sequels, they were usually a sentence or two, not four pages! Who knows if Matt and Nathan will ever show up in the scenario I sketched out for them.
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I also really enjoyed I Spy Something Bloody, one of his books that doesn’t get mentioned too often.
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L
I’ve had quite a bad week. But you made me laugh a lot with this review. Thanks for that!
You’re welcome. I chuckled a bit writing this review. There is something fun about writing a review of a really, really bad book. I think really bad books are somewhat rare. There are tons of mediocre ones, but disasters like this don’t come along everyday.
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L
well at least the title is appropriate!
:0)
It sure is!
Leslie, I too loved I Spy Something Bloody. I can’t wait for I Spy Something Wicked. Now, if we could just get a confirmed release date… Le Sigh.
I’m also waiting for/dreading December… The final (for now, at least) Adrien English.
Four pages? Did you say FOUR PAGES? I don’t think I’ve ever heard of that before. Did you have to put a lot of thought into it, or did it just come to you?
So as to avoid a /threadjack, West, I sent you a PM over on your LJ. Let me know if you get it.
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L