Love in the Clouds

Sarah Hadley Brook

Sept 2018 · JMS Books LLC

About this eBook

Rafael Patino has a great life in Rain Valley. He’s a teacher at the high school, has a great group of friends, and enjoys the occasional baseball game. Other than the sporadic call from his drunken mother, he’s pretty content.

He’s also been in love with his best friend Dustin for nearly a decade. Years of keeping those feelings under control are put to the test when they begin a summer project together.

Dustin Vance builds furniture for a living, has just earned his pilot’s license, and has an amazing best friend. When he buys a 1976 Cessna Skyhawk, he asks Rafael to help restore it, then travel with him to Wisconsin for the largest aviation convention in the world.

As they spend their days working on the plane, they begin to spend their nights together. Will they find love in the clouds, or will they stall out before they even take off?

Ratings and reviews

Friends to lovers; a favorite trope of mine. Love in the Clouds is a good friends-to-lovers story; one of my favorite romance tropes. Rafael has been in love with his best friend, Dustin, for a long time but doesn't want to risk their friendship by telling him. When Dustin finds out that all of their friends consider them to be a couple he starts looking at Rafael in a new way and soon realizes that he feels something more than just friendship. So here we have two great guys, who are best friends, both hiding their feelings from each other. Once they finally get together the sexual chemistry is hot and I really liked how their friendship turned to romance. Working on Dustin's plane all summer provided lot of interesting information about planes. While I didn't check any of the facts about the plane specifications talked about in the book, it seemed obvious to me that the author did a lot of research for this story. There was a bit of a side story about a young girl in Rafael's class (he's a teacher) and how he helped her. While it didn't really add anything to this particular book it seemed like it might be a set-up for a story for her uncle. My one issue with this book is that I kept waiting and waiting for some momentous thing to happen between Rafael and Dustin and then when it finally happened it was really nothing. I think most great romance stories have at least one major conflict happening so that the couple can overcome it and get their HEA. Love in the Clouds lacked that and, in my opinion, it would have been a better story if there had been one. Still all-in-all it was a good book and I enjoyed reading it. An advanced copy of this book was provided to me but my review was voluntary and not influenced by the author. ***Reviewed for Xtreme-Delusions dot com*** (posting 9/7/18)

I really enjoyed this sweet and charming story about two best friends falling in love. Or it might be better to say they already love each other, but they are blind to see what is in front of them. Rafael and Dustin have been friends forever and do everything together. Then one day, they see each other in a different light, that they feel more for each other than just friends. It is a slow-burn love story with the men dancing around each other. Everyone else around them sees it, but they are oblivious and maybe a little bit scared of losing their friendship. The author did a good job building up the tension. I was just waiting and waiting for their first kiss. And when it finally came, it was all systems go. What was, understandably, absent in a good part at the beginning of the story, it sure made up in the remainder of the book. The sex was hot. As Dustin just got his pilot’s license and bought a Cessna, we learn much about the mechanics of an airplane and flying. Although it is not something I am particularly interested in, it was fun reading it as I haven’t come across it very often in books. I liked the characters and the idea of working together on an airplane and thus letting them open their eyes to what is in front of them the whole time. There were a few things I am not sure about. There is Daisy, one of Raf’s students, who comes from a troubled home. It could have been an interesting plotline, but the author chose not to build on it further. That is her choice, of course, but as such, it didn’t add much to the story. Then there is suddenly talk of Dustin’s brother who could help him with his carpentry, but we haven’t heard from him before or after. That aside, this book is a sweet friends-to-lovers romance.

About the author

Sarah Hadley Brook reserves her evenings for her hobby-turned-passion of writing, letting the characters she conjures up in her mind take the lead and show her where the story will go. She dreams of traveling to Scotland some day and visiting the places her ancestors lived. Sarah believes in “happily ever after” and strives to ensure her characters find their own happiness in love and life. For more information, visit sarahhadleybrookwrites.com.