Sea Change by Chris Quinton

Title: Sea Change
Author: Chris Quinton
Publisher: Manifold Press
Length: 432 pages
Buy the Book: Manifold Press

Blurb:

Injured on duty and no longer fit for active service, soon-to-be-ex-Coast Guard Bran Kaulana is drifting, filling his days helping out at the Wai Ola Rescue Center, one of Honolulu’s wildlife charities. He’s working with the new veterinary, Steve, a man drawn to O’ahu by his fascination with dolphins. As their friendship slowly deepens into love, the two men are caught up in the mystery of injured seals and dolphins, a ruthless gang of smugglers and a not-so-dormant undersea lava vent.

Review:

Those of you who have just looked at the number of pages in this book and been put off by the length, may I urge you reconsider. Despite its length the pages turned quickly in this Hawaiian set romance, so much so that even I was surprised at how quickly I got to the last page.

The story involves British vet, Steve, who has found a home amongst the people of Hawaii. He works for a prestigious veterinary practice, but in his spare time volunteers at a rescue centre tending to injured dolphins and seals. It’s here that Steve has got to know Bran, and the two men have become fast friends. Bran has recently recovered from a injury sustained whilst on duty as a coastguard. He’s no longer fit for active duty now, and doesn’t want a desk job. Instead Bran is drifting a little, conscious that he needs to find a new job and get some focus in his life, but also content to help out at the shelter. Bran is gay and Steve is semi-straight – seeing the sexual relationships he had with men as perhaps a phase he was going through at college. Their friends can all but see the sexual sparks that fly when the two are together – no matter how much the two men are denying it.

The beauty of this book is in the characterisation. Not just the heroes, but everyone else in their circle of friends. No matter how small the secondary character, the reader is given enough in terms of personality and background to make them real. The heroes themselves are a delight. Interestingly, both men are strong Alpha types and I liked how this was addressed during the book. I also liked that the cultural differences between Britain and the US were also given some page space. Steve is your typical British guy, a bit emotionally distant with a wicked sarcastic tongue, but also a good all round guy. Bran is suffering more from losing a job he loves and standing on the cusp of a new life, but he too has a strong moral streak and a willingness to go that extra mile for his friends. It’s hard not to like such characters and as a result, I found myself drawn into their life and absorbed in the events of the book.

When I get the time, I really enjoy reading a long book, one which you can get your teeth into. The length of this book meant that there is space and time to explore a number of themes in detail. Therefore the book was able to cover the suspense plot, the romance plot and have room for an overview of life in Hawaii, and of ecological conservation in general. There’s also space for extended character definition, such as Bran’s troubled family background and a sub-plot involving his brother; or for us to get a feel for the day to day running of a shelter, including the importance of publicity and fund-raising. Hawaii itself is given plenty of page space too. From descriptions of the lush setting, to to wildlife, to the attitude of its people, this book was a love story to Hawaii just as much as a love story between two men. Another positive is that the length of book allowed the relationship between the heroes to develop slowly, as they move from being friends to falling in love. Those of you looking for sex, sex, sex are going to be a little disappointed as the pacing and story keeps the heroes apart for quite some time. Instead we get a delightful build up of sexual tension so that when the sex does happen it’s meaningful and explosive.

So after a big thumbs up for the languorous plotting, the attention to detail and the yummy romance, the suspense plot was rather disappointing. Not drastically so, but just enough that it took the shine off what is a great book. Some of my disappointment stemmed from a personal bug-bear – that of the hero/es who take matters into their own hands and don’t report crimes to the police. The suspense plot surrounds a number of injured animals brought to the rescue centre. It seems like these animals were deliberately harmed by illegal divers to drive them away from a local conservation area. After digging further into this both Steve and Bran are threatened and attacked by what looks like local gangsters. At this point a sensible person would involve the police, but no, not these alpha guys who have a plan to take on the bad guys themselves. I personally found this really irritating, as it does every time a character thinks that he can do better than the trained professional. Even once the police were involved, Bran seemed to be the one in control, which again brought a false note to what had been a very realistic book.  Fortunately, the suspense plot is pretty low-key for most of the book, except for the action packed tense conclusion, so I was able to ignore my frustrations with it for most of the book.

Despite my problems with the suspense plot, I really enjoyed this book. The writing was just stellar, with a great mix of drama, romance and bright flashes of humour; The characters believable and incredibly fleshed out. I loved the setting, the community of people, the relationships between the two heroes and with their friends. If you have some time to devote to a really good meaty book, one that will drag you in and not let go until you finish the last page, then you can’t go wrong with Sea Change.