Book Review: Fire and Snow by Andrew Grey

Reviewed by Morgan 

Title: Fire and Snow
Author: Andrew Grey
Series: Carlisle Cops #4
Heroes: Fisher Moreland/JD Burnside
Genre: MM Contemporary
Length: 200 Pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: May 20, 2016
Available at:  Amazon and Barnes & Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads

Blurb:  Fisher Moreland has been cast out of his family because they can no longer deal with his issues. Fisher is bipolar and living day to day, trying to manage his condition, but he hasn’t always had much control over his life and has self-medicated with whatever he could find.

JD Burnside has been cut off from his family because of a scandal back home. He moved to Carlisle but brought his Southern charm and warmth along with him. When he sees Fisher on a park bench on a winter’s night, he invites Fisher to join him and his friends for a late-night meal.

At first Fisher doesn’t know what to make of JD, but he slowly comes out of his shell. And when Fisher’s job is threatened because of a fire, JD’s support and care is more than Fisher ever thought he could expect. But when people from Fisher’s past turn up in town at the center of a resurgent drug epidemic, Fisher knows they could very well sabotage his budding relationship with JD.

Review: This is book 4 in the Carlisle Cops series, and as such, we meet another police officer, JD, new to the force from North Carolina. He was forced to leave home by his parents’ old fashioned sense of propriety (gay is apparently not proper) after being outed by the town’s mayor’s son. He likes his job and is adjusting to the weather. On a snowy night in December, he finds a man sitting on a bench acting strangely, when he rules out intoxication, he befriends him and asks him to join him and some friends for dinner.

Fisher is the man on the bench and he has some peculiar traits after receiving a traumatic brain injury a few years ago that have left him with a condition like bi-polar disorder. While on his meds, he’s mostly in control, but he’s subject to mood swings under times of emotional stress.

For some reason, JD is immediately attracted to Fisher (though Fisher can’t see why) and the two begin a friendship that slowly develops into something more.

**

While I’m a big fan of Andrew Grey – there are some of his series that resonate more with me than others. This is one of the series that I only like, not love. Because it’s Andrew, you know you’ll get quality writing and perfect editing and a solid story line filled with emotion and hot smexy times – and this is true here as well.

I didn’t care for the relationship between JD and Fisher as well as some of his other pairings because I didn’t quite see the instant attraction on JD’s part. Fisher doesn’t represent well until almost 70% through the book – his self-esteem is low, he has several stress-induced episodes, and he tends to be abrasive and defensive. So I was hard pressed to see the appeal.

Once the couple got together and began working through their stuff a bit, Fisher calmed down and began to be more appealing, but in the beginning I was wondering why JD even tried.

So… for fans of the series and the author, you’ll want to check this out to see where previous MCs are at and because you know the author always delivers a good story. If you’re new to the series or the author (really? He’s written like a million books – read them – they’re awesome!) then you might not start with this one. I’d recommend his Farm series or his paranormal series, Yellowstone Wolves (written as Dirk Greyson), as those are really heartbreaking and excellent at the same time.

Overall Impression: I liked it

*I received a copy of this book from the publisher in return for a fair and honest review.*