Review: Taboo For You by Anyta Sunday

Posted July 2, 2019 by Lola in Contemporary, Review, Romance / 6 Comments

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Taboo For YouTaboo For You (Love and Family #1)
by Anyta Sunday

My Rating: 4 stars

Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: MM

Blurb:
Sam’s freaking out. He’s 30 in three weeks. And what has he done in his twenties? It’s pretty simple math: nothing exciting at all. But hey, he has three weeks right? Maybe that’s just enough time to tick his way through a 20s Must Do List . . .

Luke’s freaking screwed. He’s come out to his family, and his friends. Except there’s a certain someone who doesn’t know yet: his neighbor of 7 years. Who also happens to be his best friend. Who Luke needs to tell the truth, but he just . . . can’t . . . seem to . . .

Jeremy’s freaking over-the-moon. It’s the countdown to his 15th birthday, and his goal is simple. No matter what, he’s going to spend heaps of time with saucy Suzy. But first he needs to get his over-protective, no-girlfriend-’cause-you’ll-get-her-pregnant parents off his back. And what better way than pretending he’s gay?

Sam, Luke, and Jeremy. Three guys who have a lot of history together, and a lot of future too—

—well, if they can sort out their issues, that is.

My Review

I’ve enjoyed this author’s Signs of Love series so far and while I grabbed some of her other books, I hadn’t gotten around to reading any of them yet. Then when Made For You, book 2 in this series released, I decided it was finally time to pick this one up.

Taboo For You is a friend to lovers romance featuring best friends and neighbors Luke and Sam. Luke just has been away for months to take care of his mother. During his vacation he has realized he’s in love with his best friend and neighbor and he has come out to his family as gay. Now he’s back and the only person he still has to come out to is his best friend, but he can’t seem to do it.

Sam is turning 30 in a few a weeks and freaking out over it. He became a dad at 15 and has spend a lot of time taking care of his son. He works a boring job and now that he is almost 30 he decides to take some time off and make the most out of what he has left in his 20’s. So he makes a list of wild things to do and who better to help him with that list than his best friend?

This book is told in dual point of views of both Sam and Luke and a few chapters from Jeremy’s (Sam’s son) point of view as well. I found it pretty hard over the course of the story to keep track of whose pov it was at times as both Luke and Sam’s voices are very alike. Jeremy being a teenager and in different situations, was easy to keep separate. But multiple times I had to remind myself or think about whose pov it was, which was a little jarring.

I liked Sam and Luke together. I like friends to lovers romances and it was fun to see them change from friends to more. And Sam is so oblivious for a long time that he feels more and keep rationalizing it away. Although I wouldn’t have minded even more build-up and to read about them being friends before Luke realized he was in love with Sam. Now most of the book felt a bit one sided with Luke already being in love with Sam and Sam not yet realizing he is in love with Sam. I do like the clueless guy theme, but I would’ve liked to see a bit more of Sam being in love with Luke as well as now that didn’t happen till late in the book. And maybe a bit before Luke realized he was in love with Sam.

I especially liked the sweet scenes these two had. It’s clear they care about each other a lot from the start and there are all these little signs and things from which it’s obvious how much they care. Like how Luke would pay for things and take care of Jeremy and Sam. I liked the sex part less actually, especially with how it starts out. One things that bothered me was how they start experimenting as something to tick of Sam’s list, which felt a bit off. And what really bothered me was how Luke doesn’t tell Sam he is actually gay. I understand that he would keep the in love secret, but it bothered me that he didn’t admit to being gay. And then Sam thought it was all new for Luke too and it just cast a shadow for me on their experimenting scenes. I was has happy when the truth finally came to light and their relationship could begin for real. The ending was sweet and happy.

Taboo For You is not a taboo story and I have to admit I find the title not completely fitting, but at the same time that’s the term they use in the book so it kinda works. Anyway the taboo they refer to is just gay sex. And by the end they cleared it up that it wasn’t really taboo. But Sam thinks of it as a bit forbidden and taboo at first, and doing something taboo is on his list.

I really liked the family dynamics in this book. It might’ve been one of my favorite parts as it was so well done and felt spot on. The relationship between Sam and Luke, but also between Sam and his son Jeremy. How Jeremy interacted with his dad, but also with his mother and even with Luke was great to see. In my opinion the author captured Jeremy’s teenage behavior quite well. With how upset he was at things and how he could act quite immature at times. And then there is his little stunt of letting everyone believe he was gay so he could get his parent off his back and spend time with Suzy, but also the nudge of guilt he felt over it.

Besides the main characters there are some fun side characters as well. I liked Luke’s friend Jack and he is the main character of book 2. I am curious for his story as I felt bad for him here and it will be great to see him fall in love. Then there are some friends of Jeremy as well, like Suzy his love interest and his friends Simon and Steven. And Jeremy’s mother Carole also plays a role. I had expected to get to see Luke’s mom in this book, but that didn’t happen.

This story takes place in New Zealand and I had hoped to get a bit of an impression of the country, but that was very limited. There is a short vacation they take that made me remember where they were. But most of the time the location just didn’t matter. I wouldn’t have minded to see a bit more of the location shine through in the story.

To summarize: Taboo For You is a fun friends to lovers romance featuring two best friends and neighbors who are in love with each other. At the start only one of them realizes that tough and it takes the other a while to realize that truth. I liked Luke and Sam together, it was obvious they cared about each other a lot and it was fun to see how close they were and how they grew even closer. I especially liked the sweet scenes between them. It did bother me that Luke kept it a secret from Sam that he was gay, especially when they start experimenting together. I would’ve liked to get to know the characters a bit more as there were multiple hints, but there were some things I would’ve liked to see explored more. I like the author’s writing style and the story flowed well. I had some trouble keeping Sam and Luke’s point of view apart at times as their voices sounded similar. Jeremy, Sam’s son, also had a few chapters from his own point of view and he was easy to recognize. I think the author captured his teenage voice well. I liked the romance between Sam and Luke and the ending was great. I am curious about Jack’s story in book 2. The story takes place in New Zealand, but there weren’t many details to notice the location sadly.

4 Stars

Links:
Goodreads
Bookbub
Amazon

You can also read my review on Goodreads, Bookbub and Amazon.

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6 responses to “Review: Taboo For You by Anyta Sunday

    • I enjoyed Made for You even more than this one, but I am glad I started with this one and got Sam and Luke’s story. I hope you’ll enjoy it if you get around to reading it.

    • The little things kept me form enjoying it as thoroughly as I would’ve liked, but overall it still was a very solid read. And I am glad I picked up this series as book 2 was even better. The family dynamics were great to read about.

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