Series: County Durham Quad
Volume: 3/?Publisher: Rowanvale Books
Genre/s: contemporary M/M/M/M, crime/mystery
Length: 63 000 words
Read in: English
Review copy format: epub
Rate:✮✮✮✮✮✬
On the art market appears a painting which experts believe to be a fake. Because the style in which it was created resembles that used by Raith, London Fraud Squad led by Nick Seabrooke makes him their first suspect. Unfortunately, it quickly turns out that even some vague circumstantial evidence may have fatal consequences and put an innocent, falsely accused man in real danger.
Reading "Ace in the Picture" we immerse ourselves in the world of the "County Durham Quad" series created by Jude Tresswell for the third time. However, as the title of this volume indicates, this time the polyamory of our four main characters shares its honorable place at the very top of the series's problems with the subject of asexuality. I admit that I consider this a great advantage of this volume. The more so, because I like the way the author approached this topic. First of all, she introduced to the novel an adult character, who, although aware of his asexuality, still discovers it and hesitates as to certain aspects of it, analyzes his feelings and asks himself some questions about being aromantic/romantic ace. I think it makes Nick an extremely believable character, with whom I can easily identify, as I'm constantly trying to find myself within the limits of my asexuality. So Nick is really close to me and it would be my greatest pleasure to get to know him better in the future.
In terms of the plot, "Ace in the Picture" looks even better than the previous volume of the series, which was after all really good. What I think is truly important in this installment is the fact that the main characters get much more involved in the criminal aspect of the plot, because it relates directly to their lives and to them. In this case a person at risk is not a stranger, but one of our boys, and thus, the action of the novel keeps us in suspense even stronger. Let's add that the events described in "Ace in the Picture" don't stretch to infinity, but rather quickly follow one another, so we hold our breath while reading about the situation development and the course of the investigation. What's more, we remind ourselves of the events from the end of the first volume, which undoubtedly strongly stirs up our emotions. Especially because when we read this novel the characters are already very close to us and we really care about them. To a large extent, we are not just some passive witnesses, but we really live through the events of this installment of the series.
I think that the great advantage of "Ace in the Picture" is also the fact that the novel evolves from volume to volume. First of all, the relationship between the characters changes over time, and it's not just about the relationship between the members of our love quad. I admit that I didn't expect to see the renewed friendship between Mike and Flaxby, and this is exactly what happens in this part of the series. What's more, changes also occur in the characters themselves, which is most clearly seen in the case of Mike. Although the man still tries to deal with the consequences of his choices from the first volume of the series, we can see that he clearly feels better living his current life. He no longer obsessively thinks about the things he has lost and he easier accepts that there are the means available to him as a civilian and those available only to the police. The fact that the mentioned evolution is noticeable in the novel really says a lot about the level of this book, as well as about the author herself, who makes her characters and their relations with others grow stronger as the story moves forward. I think it really should be appreciated.
Reviewing "Ace in the Picture" I would also like to mention the autoanalysis, which clearly plays an extremely important role here, just as in the previous volumes of the series. I really like the fact that some characters not only act, but also analyze their actions and their feelings, they try to sort out what's happening inside their minds and how they react to certain events and people around them. This is important because it shows how real and believable the characters in this series are. Especially if we take into consideration the fact that they don't keep their thoughts only to themselves or hide them from others, but they talk about them with each other, try to understand the motives that guide them, and seek answers to the questions that bother them. In short, they participate very actively in constant creation of themselves. This is extremely interesting, because it helps us to get to know the characters from this more emotional and fragile side.
To sum up, I can wholeheartedly recommend "Ace in the Picture" to every reader who likes novels with a hint of a crime story, in which the characters don't focus only on their tasks, but find some time to discover themselves, interpersonal relations and attach great importance to feelings and emotions. It's a really good book that you read with interest and pleasure.
Headcanon: Mike thinks about buying a defensive dog that would look after his lovers when they are alone.
Fanfiction idea: Nick spends a week with the County Durham quad. During this time, he gets to know more about all four guys, and they learn more about him. In order to spice up Nick's holiday, the quad decides that each of them will ask Nick on a date.
AU idea: Nick is an employee of a coffee shop who, one winter day, helps a "homeless" who's about to freeze to death at the back of the café. However, it turns out that the "homeless" - Mike - is actually a fallen angel.
MOODBOARD IN PROGRESS
Here's some more about:
An art fraud, a polyamorous suspect, an asexual detective…
Blurb
Book Title: Ace in the Picture
Author: Jude Tresswell
Cover Artist: Billie Hastie
Heat Rating: 2 flames
Release Date: March 31, 2019
It can be read as a standalone, but is also the third book featuring the County Durham quad
Blurb
Polyamory and asexuality meet in this third tale about a north-east England quad.
The police suspect Raith Balan of faking a painting. So do money-launderers who sink profits into art. Mike, Ross and Phil, the three men in Raith’s life, must prove his innocence. They’re hampered by their certainty that a member of the Fraud Squad is corrupt.
The senior investigating officer is Detective Sergeant Nick Seabrooke. He knows he is asexual, but is he aromantic too? As Raith’s lovers struggle to keep Raith safe and find the fraudster, the sergeant struggles to understand why the quad is often in his thoughts.
The police suspect Raith Balan of faking a painting. So do money-launderers who sink profits into art. Mike, Ross and Phil, the three men in Raith’s life, must prove his innocence. They’re hampered by their certainty that a member of the Fraud Squad is corrupt.
The senior investigating officer is Detective Sergeant Nick Seabrooke. He knows he is asexual, but is he aromantic too? As Raith’s lovers struggle to keep Raith safe and find the fraudster, the sergeant struggles to understand why the quad is often in his thoughts.
Excerpt
Chapter 1
Raith stood in the kitchen in front of the calendar. His gaze shifted from the naked figure depicted on ‘October’ to the highlighted ‘Thursday 12th’ and back again. He pressed a fingertip to his lips, transferred a kiss to the mid-point of the figure’s shoulder blades and ran his finger down the spine—Mike Angells’ spine.
The real-life Mike walked into the room and filled the kettle.
“What are you admirin’?” he asked. “The model or the artist?”
Raith was the artist. “The artist,” he replied. “He’s classy. The model’s okay, I suppose.”
“Cheeky!” Mike admonished.
Changing the subject, Raith asked, “You know what day it is in two days’ time, don’t you?”
“In two days? Well, let’s see… difficult one… It must be Thursday. Aye, that’s right. It was Monday yesterday, so—”
“Stop teasing me! Do you think he’s forgotten?”
‘He’ was Phil Roberts, the man Raith had married 364days earlier.
“Don’t be daft. Of course not. You know Phil. His middle name’s ‘No fuss’.”
“That’s two names.”
“And that’s two cups of coffee. One for you. One for me,” said Mike, handing over a mug.
“None for me?” asked a third man who, yawning, had entered the kitchen. He hugged the two men already there.
“Sorry, Ross,” Mike apologised. “I didn’t make you one. I thought you were still asleep.”
“No. Just dozy,” said Ross sleepily. “I heard Phil’s car. Is it an emergency, Raith?”
“Not exactly,” Raith replied. “He went in early to cover for a colleague.”
Phil had helped to pioneer a form of rectal surgery that used nanocarbon patches to reconstruct torn tissue. He was a respected consultant at the hospital an hour’s drive away in Warbridge, County Durham.
“I’d better get sorted and get out myself,” said Ross. He was, amongst other things, a gallery proprietor in Gateshead, and his journey to work took longer than Phil’s. He yawned again.
“Are you feelin’ okay?” asked Mike, alert to Ross’s tone of voice. “It’s not like you to sound so unenthusiastic about work.” In fact, it wasn’t like Ross to sound unenthusiastic about anything. He was always lively—he personified keenness.
“I’m dead tired cos I didn’t sleep well. I had a strange text late on. You were already asleep. I don’t think you heard the phone buzz. Strange. Unsettling.”
“Oh?”
“How do you mean?” asked Raith. “We’re not going to get involved with more criminal activities, are we? I had enough of crime fighting last time!”
Even though Mike was no longer a detective with the Tees, Tyne and Wear Constabulary, the four of them were involved in a surprising amount of crime fighting. ‘Last time’ had involved an illegal immigrant, and the tensions that had arisen had threatened the survival of the quad.
That’s what they were: a gay, polyamorous quad. They lived in Tunhead, a hamlet in Weardale in the Durham hills. Once, Tunhead had rung to the sound of workers’ hammers hitting stone. In a way it still did: Ross had turned it into an arts centre full of smiths, sculptors and potters who wanted to escape the North East’s towns.
“Well, we’re not, are we?” Raith repeated.
“No.”
“Good. Well, my creations won’t create themselves. I’d better get off, too.”
In Raith’s case, ‘getting off’ simply meant walking twenty yards to his studio, a converted storehouse.
“You sure he hasn’t forgotten?” he asked Mike again before he left.
“I’m sure.”
“Okay then.”
“What’s that about?” asked Ross after Raith was gone.
“He’s bothered that Phil’s forgotten their anniversary.”
“He hasn’t.”
“I know he hasn’t. He’s takin’ him off on a trip sumwhere—but you know Raith. He needs everythin’ crystal clear and written in capital letters. And sumtimes, so do I. What was this message about?”
Ross pulled a face and explained. When he’d done so, Mike could understand his concern.
“He wouldn’t be so stupid, Ross… Would he?”
“Not stupid, Mike, but he’s gullible. He doesn’t always think. I just don’t know.”
***
The message stayed in Ross’s mind during the forty-mile drive to the gallery and he couldn’t forget about it once he was there. Some of Raith’s paintings hung on the gallery walls. They were mainly of Weardale’s waterfalls. After heavy rain, the falls transformed from gentle trickles into rushing, gushing powerful forces of nature that the four men knew could kill. They’d seen them kill.
Raith loved to paint the waterfalls. From a distance, his torrents looked alive. The effect was linked to his use of colour. Raith was a tetrachromat; he could see a host of hues in what, to most people, was a single shade. He painted for himself, though, not for fame or money—he had plenty of both, due to his skill with clay not brushes. Several of his wares were on show at the gallery, most tagged ‘sold’ with a price that would feed and clothe all four men for a long, long time. His sensually erotic sculptures, modelled on Mike and Phil, were always in demand and beautifully, lovingly executed. But today, Ross gave Raith’s erotica a miss. He stared, instead, at the waterfalls.
What might induce Raith to produce a piece of work “with intent to deceive”, as the legal phrase was?
That was what the worrying message had suggested. That Raith’s were the hands and eyes behind a painting that the police were interested in. They thought it was a fake. For the umpteenth time, Ross asked himself why?
Raith didn’t need fame and he didn’t need fortune, but did he need the challenge of outwitting the experts? Of copying another artist’s work so accurately that no one would notice the difference?
Surely not. Momentarily, Ross’s dark mood lifted. The only challenge Raith was likely to rise to was the one of finding ways to spice up the quad’s evening meals. Two nights ago, he’d ‘accidentally’ stumbled near the saucepan with a teaspoon of chilli flakes in his hand.
“Oh, look! They’ve fallen in,”he’d said apologetically.
Ross smiled when he thought about it, but anxiety soon returned. Could Raith be feeling resentment? Sometimes, that was the driving force behind a fraud. Failed artists whose work had been refused once too often. Failed artists who took I’ll show them!literally.
No. All Raith’s resentments were little ones that quickly blew over—feeling nagged for not doing his turn on the house-keeping rota, being yelled at for leaving clay-covered dirty washing on top of the pile of clean laundry. Raith took umbrage easily, but he’d be smiling again within the hour. And anyway, he wasn’t a failed artist. He was a very successful one.
He was a strange mixture though. That complexity was part of his attraction. It was part of what made him Raith. His skill was undeniable, but his mental health was fragile— ‘bloody unhinged’ was how Mike would describe Raith in less charitable moments. He could be unpredictable. He could be very violent. He had another side, though, and it was what Mike and Phil and Ross adored about him. Canny, clued up, an ex-con hard as nails… but at the toss of a coin, as loving, as sweet and as trusting as anyone they had ever met. Mike was as loving, and often as sweet, but trusting? No. Mike was ex-CID. It wasn’t in his nature to be trusting.
Which was why Mike was already making phone calls.
About the Author
I’m not Nick Seabrooke, the ace in the picture, but there are some firsthand truths peeping through the fiction. Like Nick, I’m ace and happy with it, but also, like Nick, I’m wavery on that ro/aro line–and that can cause some soul-searching. If the picture painted in the story is a very narrow one, it’s because I didn’t want to stray too far from what I know. The quad, however, are totally imaginary.
I blog at https://polyallsorts.wordpress.com. There are posts about asexuality, polyamory, beer, tattoos, book covers, and many other story-related items. There are photos of the Durham countryside, the setting of the stories, too. I’m always happy to receive and respond to comments. Well, if they’re friendly ones!
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