Best Bisexual/Transgender Debut Novel/Book: Atom Heart John Beloved by Luke Hartwell

After the very long ride to read this book, I feel like worn out, an hole was forming in my heart and the author suddenly filled it in a rush, so strongly that it let me hurting. This novel is good… disturbingly good. John Parker is an eighteen years old straight teenager who decides to give himself up for sex to his best friend Nathan; Nathan is gay and in love with John, and John is thinking he can be Nathan’s sex toy, while at the same time having a girlfriend and some other heterosexual adventures on the side. While with all the women he is the dominant lover, with Nathan he is always the submissive; strange as it’s, John is able to have sex with a man only if that man is Nathan, and only if Nathan is in command.

At first the author, through John’s own words, let you have an imagine of John that is not exactly good; he seemed quite conceited, convinced he is like a God gift for girls and guys, sex on legs like he said of himself. I didn’t like much John, especially since, even if he is always very nice with Nathan, he was also cheating on him with his girlfriend Mary, and cheating Mary with Nathan, but above all he was cheating both of them with other non-important flings. And while at the beginning John was only having sex with women other than with Nathan, then he starts also with other boys, and then he starts doing “dirty” things with these boys once he understands Nathan is not up to the same game he is. Again I approached this side of John in a negative way, I was thinking how unfair he was with Nathan, how stupid and selfish he was… but then I started to see something different, John was trying to degrade himself, he was trying to find a way to prove he was no good, that he wasn’t indeed that God gift everyone was thinking, Nathan first in line. He had to prove to Nathan he was not worthy of his love, not for him but for Nathan’s good. He was so in love with Nathan, that he was ready to destroy himself for him.

There is "consensual" rape on the page and non consensual sex behind the page; this novel is not pretty and cute as it could seem at first, it’s dark and disturbing, and as I said, I was addicted to it like Nathan was addicted to John, but a hole was in my heart, a scaring hole from the fear I was having these two guys weren’t destined to an happily ever after. But don’t worry, the author managed also to scare away that thought like he managed to put it there. It will not be easy for Nathan and John, and I don’t think the end of the novel is the end of their trouble, but at least they have a beginning. We will see where it will lead them, and I hope the author will share with us that.

Amazon: Atom Heart John Beloved
Amazon Kindle: Atom Heart John Beloved
Paperback: 236 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace (June 30, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1478142928
ISBN-13: 978-1478142928



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