“So you’re gay.”
I feel the weight of Rebecca’s expectations, her disappointment about the vibe she must have detected between us.
“Well,” I answer, drawing in a breath, “I was with a guy for a long time.”
Rebecca shakes her head apologetically, the golden hair shimmering. “It was a stupid question.”
“Not stupid,” I whisper, turning toward her. “Actually, he’s the only guy I’ve ever been with. Only thing I can say for sure is that I was in love with him.”

Michael feels bereft without Alex. Alex lived life as if he knew that he would die young, with a boundless self confidence, one that would allow him to pursue a straight man without pause. Michael learns through his love for Rebecca that the question of who he is can be answered by what is in his heart.

But the specter of Michael’s homosexuality hangs over Rebecca and feeds into her insecurity over her body image. It’s easy, she believes, for Michael to be with her because it’s not a true betrayal of Alex. Michael can have both Alex in his life and Rebecca. In the end, Rebecca has to trust in Michael’s love. He tells her, without words, that he’s in it for the long haul, no matter how long it takes her to believe in him.

So maybe I finally have added stalking to my list of failings because for the past seven days I’ve made a point of driving by Rebecca’s place. I just keep thinking that if she’s outside somehow, maybe going for a jog, that I can pull over and lay everything on the line. I could talk to her about Andrea’s party, find out if she plans to come.
In my mind, that party is my last real shot with her. If that moment passes us by, she’ll be like a sundial with me the shadow. Our point of intersection will pass like a lengthening shadow—permanently.
But the drive-bys don’t yield any reward, so I’m forced to do what I’m so very terrible at: be patient. I have to let her come to me on her terms now ….
I sank down in that booth and decided I could man up on her account, become stronger and more resilient than I’d acted since we broke up. I could do the army drill and dig into the trenches for the very long haul.

The relationship between Andie and Michael is beautiful and painful. Rebecca looks at a picture of Andie, Michael and Alex:

What I instantly recall is their family portrait, the one hanging in the hallway. A dreamy photograph of the three of them, sitting together in that sun-drenched backyard, bathed in a diaphanous halo of light. Alex so alive and vital, like he might step out of the picture and talk right to me. Shock of deep auburn hair, broad grin, freckled face. Natural good looks. A good man, obviously. And then the man beside him, too. Strong and handsome, years younger than the one I’ve met in the past few days. Unlike my Michael Warner, that one’s not weary and weathered; the whole world still bows at his feet.
Then precious Andrea curled in front of them on the grass. Still a little girl, though that would soon change, because the Andrea in the portrait is as gone as Alex. And Michael. None of those three live on anymore. There are only ghosts, shades of what might have been.

There were a couple of oddities. Particularly early on, I felt that the prose was given to hyperbole at times because I wasn’t emotionally invested in the first few chapters to buy the extremity of emotion that was attempting to be conveyed.

I also wondered about the fact that Rebecca always refers to her attacker by his first name, Ben, not his last name or something more impersonal.

It’s about chapter three that I am totally swept into the story. I found I couldn’t put it down; that I was choking back tears at nearly every section to the point I felt like I was on some medieval torture rack; and when Andie and Michael find catharsis to glue their little family back together, there are simply too many holes to stop and the dam holding back the emotion breaks down.

I’ve thought a lot about this book since I read the last chapter. I felt like I knew these people who live out in Southern California. They were as real to me as my neighbors and I knew them more intimately than some of my closest friends. My throat even feels a little tight as I write out this review because I keep recycling some of the lines and moments of the story in my head.

This is a story that helps define what romance is. It’s all about the love and to some extent brings up Phèdre’s motto in Jacqueline Carey’s Kushiel series “Love as thou wilt.” It’s the edict of Alex in this story and one that he taught Michael. It is Alex’s greatest legacy.

Let me state the obvious. I’m a fairly traditional romance reader. I’m not adventurous like Jayne. It’s hard for me to move outside my comfort zone . But this is a rare and different gem. It is a story I’ll treasure and remember. I hope that even if it does not net you significant financial rewards that you’ll keep writing these stories. There is an audience for it. I know there is. A-

Best regards,

Jane

- Jane, DearAuthor.com

WRITERS GONE WILD

Sometimes a book falls into my hands that I might not have read had it not been written by a friend or an author I greatly admire. Butterfly Tattoo by Deidre Knight is one of those books. Had I not already been a rabid Deidre fangirl, the blurb for Butterfly Tattoo might not have drawn me in. But I do know this author. I've read enough of her work to know she has the talent and the guts required to write outside the boundaries of current trends. I also knew that Butterfly Tattoo was the story of Ms. Knight's heart, the one that wouldn't allow her to rest until she told it in its entirety, as it demanded to be told. In doing so, she took a lot of risks, the first being the story content itself--a romance between a disfigured heroine and a bisexual widower struggling to raise his belated husband's physically and emotionally traumatized child.

Butterfly Tattoo had me from the first line: "Ben McAllister carried a knife, my name burned into the handle like a cattle brand." I was firmly ensnared in the POV of Rebecca O'Neill, an actress whose career ended when she was attacked and disfigured by a stalker bearing a knife. While enough time has passed for Rebecca to build a new career and begin to come to terms with the attack, she is far from healed. Her sexual confidence is shaken by the network of scars that mar her face and body, and she avoids any relationships that could possibly turn intimate.

Alex, the man Micheal Warner expected to spend the rest of his life with, has died in a horrifying automobile accident that also left their daughter Andrea disfigured. Michael is struggling emotionally as he tries to bridge the widening emotional gap between himself and daughter. The passage of time has done nothing to heal either of their wounds. The guilt that he can't be the one who helps Andrea move beyond the trauma of losing her father is nearly overwhelming. When Andie and Rebecca meet, their scars help them forge an instant emotional connection that prompts Michael to invite Rebecca to his home to spend more time with Andie.

While Michael is surprised by his physical reaction to Rebecca, he is even more surprised that he doesn't feel he is betraying Alex by his growing feelings for Rebecca. If Alex taught him anything, it was that love wasn't defined by something so trivial as gender. It was simply a rare miracle to be savored wherever it grew.

Rebecca's scars run deeper than the ones visible on the surface. She has a difficult time understanding how any man could be sexually attracted to her. She is convinced that Michael feels safe entering a sexual relationship with her because making love to a woman doesn't represent an actual betrayal of Alex's memory. By loving her, she suspects Micheal is avoiding the emotional work necessary to truly put his feelings for Alex to rest and move on.

Butterfly Tattoo is a redemption story that reaffirms the transformative power of love. Knight's characters are lovingly rendered, their voices beautifully flawed. In the end, the literary risks Knight took in telling this very important story provided the alchemy required to redeem three fractured souls with the only kind of love Alex would have accepted as his legacy to Michael and Andrea.

Butterfly Tattoo is women's fiction at its finest. Don't miss this remarkable title.

- Liane Gentry Skye, Writers Gone Wild Blogspot

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