Review of About that kiss by Harper Bliss, Audiobook narrated by Abby Craden
Harper Bliss is an established lesfic author who has an impressive back-catalog over ten years of career. Her novels tend to be on the short side but the level of heat is always high. For her audiobooks, Ms. Bliss normally chooses great narrators like Angela Dawe or Abby Craden. About that Kiss is narrated by the latter so I didn’t want to pass the chance to listen to it.
Ida Burton is a legendary Hollywood actress whose leading roles started to dry up as she hit her forties. When she is offered a leading role in a lesbian rom-com opposite current Hollywood superstar Faye Fleming, she has the opportunity to come back to big leads and come out as a lesbian. It doesn’t hurt that both characters have great chemistry on-screen and off-screen too…
This is a celebrity and coming out romance between two main mature characters. As a matter of fact, this could be considered a coming-out study from two very different perspectives. On one hand Ida, a lesbian who stayed in the closet for her whole career, and on the other one Faye, a straight Hollywood superstar who has never been with a woman before. Ms. Bliss’s take on Ida’s coming out process is compelling as she describes the dire consequences of being closeted not only in her love life but also in her relationships and life enjoyment in general. Ms. Bliss puts it really well when she says “closets are vertical coffins”. Anyone who has been in the closet can relate to that. I thought that Faye’s coming-out process was a bit rushed but I guess the story was more about Ida’s struggle.
As usual with this author, the level of chemistry is explosive from their very first kiss. As you can imagine from the title, kissing on and off camera has a starring role in this story. Ms. Bliss delivers on the anticipation, the hidden sensations, and the characters’ angst in face of their budding feelings. Some of the scenes reminded me of Playing the Role of Herself by KE Lane or Breaking Character by Lee Winter, in the way the authors play with not-so-pretend kissing on a movie set. Great foreplay to the sizzling intimate scenes that follow in this book.
I love that both characters are in their late forties, we need more of these characters in our genre, even if they are hot superstars. Ms. Bliss writes a lot of age gap romances but I’m glad she didn’t in this case. This story needed to be told from the perspective of two mature women who could reflect on their experiences and enjoy a rebirth to a new life.
The audiobook version was narrated by Abby Craden who does a great job as usual. Her sultry mature voice is perfect for the tone of this book and so is her overall performance. Ms. Craden has become a celebrity for lesbian audiobook fans and once again, she shows why.
If you are already a fan of Harper Bliss, you won’t be disappointed with this one. If not, this could be a good one to start. 4.5 stars.
Length 5 hours, 52 minutes
