Love After Atlanta by Samantha Underwood

Publisher/Date:  Lulu.com, Apr. 2012
Genre:  Romance
Pages:  204
Website:  http://loveafterseries.com

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 

The Plot: Sometimes a bullet can give you clarity, make you view the whole world differently. That’s Leah Fiento’s opinion after a being shot in action in LOVE AFTER ATLANTA, author Samantha Underwood’s debut novel. Leah, a 31-year year old Georgia Bureau of Investigation officer, leaves Atlanta for FBI in Washington, D.C., where she’s paired with a top-notch team that includes the lovely Dr. Carla Ward. The sparks fly as soon as they are introduced.

The Good: Leah and Carla’s attraction is searing – and forbidden, if anyone were to discover the colleagues’ affair. Carla’s feminine charm and Leah’s bravado captivate this fast-paced tale with crime and intrigue thrown in the mix.

The Not-So-Good: Some of the situations the agents find themselves in didn’t seem totally realistic. And the writing could have been tighter.

The Bottom Line:Love After Atlanta is a page-turner worth the sex and romance. Who can resist an FBI agent?

Reviewed December 2012

Strapped by Sharon D. Smith

Publisher/Date:  Lulu.com, June 2010
Genre:  Romance
Pages:  126
Website(s):  http://www.strapped2009.ning.com, http://7stagespublishing.com/

Rating: ★★★½☆ 

If you’re a stud, you’re not supposed to fall in love with another stud – right?

Who says? This is the premise of Sharon D. Smith’s STRAPPED, a fast-paced novel following the attraction between masculine-appearing women, Silk and Taz. The pair have well-worn identities as dominant females, and typically date feminine women accordingly. This stud-femme dynamic is turned on its head when Silk – rocking baggy jeans and a Black and Mild between her lips – moves into Taz’s neighborhood.

Taz notices her next-door neighbor’s swagger, and they quickly become hanging buddies. While they watch sports and hit the clubs, their friendship grows despite not knowing that much about each other’s pasts. It all comes out in a game of basketball when Silk reveals her true feelings. Taz is taken aback by this admission of affection. She can’t believe her homeboy is attracted to her. Silk knows she has a girlfriend — a curvaceous beauty at that — and that their friendship is simply platonic.

Silk feels differently, though. She has always had a thing for butch women. And while Taz tries to understand her friend’s seemingly-odd attraction, she eventually succumbs to it when the pair is thrown into a crisis situation.

Taz and Silk find themselves in love and in trouble. Taz believes she’s losing her edge and doesn’t  know if she can handle the type of love that dare not speak its name in the lesbian community, while Silk’s past comes back to haunt her new relationship with Taz.

Smith’s Strapped shows the conflict some black lesbians experience with labels. Femme, stud, stem, bisexual – it all means nothing when it comes to how one feels inside.  Taz and Silk had to leave the pressures of sexual roles behind to discover a comfortable home in each other. Their affair is unpeeled layer by layer, realistically so. With that being said, while Strapped does a good job getting in Taz’s head, but doesn’t delve enough into why Silk loves studs. I guess that will be explained further in Smith’s next novel.

So get ready because Strapped will challenge all your perceptions of what love and labels really mean.

Reviewed August 2010