Sigh of Relief (A Table for Two #6)
by Layla Reyne
My Rating: 3 stars
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: m/m
Blurb:
A vintage love worth savoring…Ingredients:
One openly bisexual winemaker with a gruff exterior, a generous heart, and a quiet ache for forever love.
One closeted FBI director who buried pieces of himself to climb the ladder, only to realize success is fleeting when the world’s on fire.
A growing season overflowing with buried desires, second chances, and chemistry too intoxicating to resist.Directions:
Blend together stolen days in the vineyard and a slow-burning attraction that refuses to stay bottled up.
Add years of regret, the yearning for more, and the bravery to live honestly.
Let age to perfection until passion deepens into something rich and built to last.
Best served under stormy skies, with full-bodied courage and the kind of love that feels like coming home.Take a sip of this sexy, emotional later-in-life M/M romance novella where true relief comes from surrendering to exactly who—and what—you desire.
My Review
I really like this series with the sweet and steamy romances and the food theme. So I bought this one on release day and read it shortly after that. While I did struggle a bit with this one at points, I did enjoy reading it and seeing Elton and Archer fall in love. There is some food and wine focus as a lot takes place at a winery, but it’s not as strong as in other books in the series. I had hoped for a bit more of the food and drink focus, but there are some fun scenes involving food and wine. I liked the later in life romance vibes and how these two met years ago and now finally find their way to each other and forge a future.
I liked both characters Archer and Elton both felt like interesting characters and I liked how they each had their hopes and dreams as well as struggles. I liked seeing Archer be confident in what he wanted and steady about where he is and what he wants. And seeing Elton finally find the courage to be out and open about who he is and what he desires was great. There is a bit of kink and steam later on. I also liked how the two sent text messages getting to know each other while they were apart. There are some great scenes as these two connect and get to know each other. I also liked seeing them figure out how to make a future work and the ending was very sweet and hopeful.
This book is very strongly tied to previous books by the author, I haven’t read the romantic suspense books and felt I missed some of Elton’s background and connections because of that. There are a bunch of side characters and the way Elton interacts with them that didn’t have as much meaning for me. And that made me feel a bit like I was missing something at times. I think this book can be read as a standalone, but it probably is even better when you have read some of the other books were these characters first get introduced. I did a bit better with remembering Archer’s friends and family as a lot of those are from this series, but some of those I’ve read years ago and didn’t always fully remember all the details and only vaguely remembered that Archer was a character in one of the earlier books.
This book is set in the current political climate in the USA and that heavily influences the plot. I don’t live in the USA and don’t know all the details and at times felt like I was missing things as the author sometimes hints more subtly to current events and other times more explicitly, but without the full knowledge and understanding of the situation it could be a bit harder for me to fully grasp what was going on and why. I do think it’s nice the author decided to tackle this topic and how it impacts these characters lives and it does have a very real and current vibe to the story because of it. It does have a more heavy feel to it than some of the earlier books and with my current mood that wasn’t quite what I wanted.
To summarize: This was another good installment in this series featuring queer romances and a food/drink theme. I thought the food/ drink theme was a bit subtler here, but there are some fun food and wine scenes in here. I liked the later in life romance between Elton and Archer. I liked seeing them find their way together and figure out what their future looks like. They were sweet together and I liked seeing how they connected both in real life and through text messages when they were apart. There is some spice and kink later on in the book. I did struggle a bit with this book as I haven’t read the series in which Elton is a side character and felt like I missed some depth and connections of this character due to that. I also struggled a bit with the heavier tone this one has as it deals with the current USA political climate. I don’t live there and don’t know all the details, so this could make it hard for me to fully understand everything that was going on and the heavier tone didn’t quite work for my current reading mood. All in all a good addition to this series, even though there were parts I struggled with a bit.
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