Rating: 4 stars
Buy Link:
Amazon | iBooks | Amazon UK
Length: Novel

 

When Jack Mann lets Perrin Thayer into his family hotel during the middle of a storm, he doesn’t realize his entire life is about to change. The Manns basically own Bear Valley and are an exceptionally tight knit family who have worked hard to build a future for themselves and the residents of the town. Perrin has spent several years hopping from job to job and skiing during his off hours. Bear Valley could finally be his chance to settle down.

Jack and Perrin are immediately attracted to one another and share a mutual love of skiing. Their connection is natural and vibrant, but both men have darkness in their pasts. That darkness could destroy them both before they can achieve any kind of happiness.

Forever Mann is the start of a new series following the adopted Mann brothers of Bear Valley and in this first installment, Jack takes center stage, though the entire family is introduced.

Jack and Perrin are a well suited pair, each fully developed enough to feel complete and independent of one another. They definitely enjoy a period of insta-lust, but this progresses to a believable relationship and they are well balanced. Jack’s family is a bit overwhelming, but they never stole the show and I appreciated the grounding effect they had on Jack and on those they considered friends. The character development is really the highlight of the book and I enjoyed watched the evolution of Jack and Perrin into a loving couple.

There were a couple of irksome bits about Forever Mann, the worst of which was its tendency towards some soap opera style dramatics. While a bit of that is fine, it sometimes tips over to the excessive with this book. It doesn’t go so far as to become ridiculous and I was thankful for that. There were just a few moments that had my eyes rolling. My other issue is really more of a pet peeve: the characters tended to shorten names to just the first letter, so Perrin was often called P, as example. Why bother giving your character a name if you aren’t going to actually use it? For whatever reason, that particular habit on the part of the author I found annoying and it tended to take me out of the moment every time it happened. And it happened a lot. It’s probably the sort of thing that won’t bother most readers so I’m willing to concede it’s just me.

Forever Mann is, on the whole, an interesting start to a new series. I enjoyed the interplay between Jack and Perrin and Jack’s family added a secondary layer of character development, which I felt really added to the overall depth of the novel. There were a few problematic areas, but nothing that will prevent most readers from enjoying this one.