Wanna Do Bad Things With You

Title: Wanna Do Bad Things With You
Author: Shelley Munro
Cover Artist N/A
Publisher: ellora’s cave
Amazon:
Genre: Contemporary M/M, Sports
Length: Novella/119 PDF pages
Rating: 4 stars out of 5

Review Summary: A romance that highlighted some of the difficulties faced by professional athletes in the real world.

THE BLURB

Tyson Hamlin lives and breathes rugby. With loads of natural talent, he’s destined for the big time. But Tyson has a secret—his perfect life, complete with doting girlfriend—is a lie. While he loves the game, he’s not quite as driven as he used to be, and his girlfriend is a beard he hides behind because the truth is—he prefers men.

Darcy Nichols transfers from Dunedin to pursue his dream to make the national team. He’s giving his all this one last season and intends to focus on his goal. Openly gay, he arrives in Auckland to suspicion and hostility.

One look and Ty is smitten. He wants the sexy Darcy to do all sorts of bad things with him. Game on. The sparks fly in private as they burn up the sheets, but they can’t live in seclusion forever. They’re under public scrutiny, and one wrong step could derail their rugby careers and end their dreams forever.

THE REVIEW

Ty Hamlin and Darcy Nichols are professional rugby players who met when Darcy transferred to Ty’s team in Auckland, New Zealand, to pursue his dream of being selected to the All Black national team.  The other players initially wanted nothing to do with Darcy who was the first openly gay rugby player in N.Z., and treated him like a pariah. When he saw Darcy Ty was immediately attracted to him, but he was on the down low because he was concerned about his own future if he were outed as being gay. He had had one night stands with men but used his girlfriend Amanda as a beard so that no one would suspect his sexual orientation, however Amanda was pushing him to get married and this was defnitely not something that Ty was about to do at 23.  His focus was on his career in rugby and when he told Amanda that marriage was not in the cards she was furious, which led to them breaking up. This left Ty free to pursue Darcy but he, too, wanted to make the All Blacks and any scandal would screw up his chances, so a sexual relationship with Darcy would have to be under the radar. But Darcy was out …. and even if he wanted Ty would he want a lover who was in the closet?

Ty was 2 years younger than Darcy but he seemed a lot younger. He lived on his parents’ property and although his apartment was separate it wasn’t private; his father was always in his personal space and didn’t treat him as an adult. Mr. Hamlin appeared to be  re-living his own aborted rugby career through Ty and was the typical male “stage mother” who loved to tell hs son what to do professionally as well as personally. He also wasn’t supportive of Ty’s plans for a  future career in sports medicine after his playing days were over and interfered in his life because Ty didn’t have the balls to stand up to him and tell him to butt out. Darcy on the other hand was his own man and had his life planned. He had a farm which he ran in the off season with his brother, and he used the money from his rugby contract to pay the mortgage while his brother did the day to day management. He intended to be a full time farmer when his playing days were over.

Ty and Darcy had quite a few hurdles to jump over, the main one being their future as professional athletes in a field where the players disdained gays. In addition, on a personal level there was the issue of one partner being out and the other in the closet. On the road for “away” games they had an opportunity to be together without anyone suspecting their relationship as none of the other players wanted to room with Darcy, so Ty did which was very convenient, but eventually they had to come back home and face the music. The day of reckoning came a lot sooner than the lovers anticipated, with all the attendant publicity.

The protagonists cared about each other and the sex was hot but I thought that the relationship was a bit unequal because Darcy clearly was the dominant partner even though this was not a D/s romance. However on the other hand they complemented each other although I felt that at times the relationship reminded me of  many het romances, with the added complication that Ty didn’t have the will to get out from under his father’s thumb by moving into an apartment away from his parents’ home.

I wanted to read this book initially because it was about sports but I became interested in the story because the protagonists were likable and matched each other on the field and in bed. The sports sequences were well done and I enjoyed the games. The players acted like a team once they got over their snit about Darcy being gay and started to treat him like a real person. Also I liked the different settings in New Zealand and South Africa which was a pleasant change from North American, European and British locations. However I have an aversion to the overuse of pet names in M/M romances and Darcy kept calling Ty “babe”  throughout and thinking of him as “the kid” when in his POV. My other niggle is this is the second sports themed book that I read recently where the author chose the easy way out of the dilemma of having two professional athletes on the same team who were lovers. At some point I would like to read a book with a different solution to this issue, without using this plot device or killing off one of the protagonists. My other criticism is I thought that the character of Mr. Hamlin was too intrusive and at times over the top plus he took over too much of the book. I would have much preferred to have the story focus more on Darcy’s and Ty’s romance and the games rather than a controlling parent trying to run the life of his adult son, even though in a way it illustrated Ty’s complex characterization.

On the whole, despite my criticisms, Wanna Do Bad Things With You was enjoyable and funny, and you will definitely enjoy this book and the characters even if you don’t know anything about rugby. 🙂 I also think that Shelley Munro did a good job on the sports aspect of this book and she either did a lot of research or had an excellent beta.

Recommended.