Calling the Show by J. A. Rock 
ASIN B008MH30ZU
Story Rating: 3 out of 5 paddles
Sting Factor (kink): 3 out of 5
Synopsis:
Senior stage manager Jesse Ferelit and sophomore lightboard operator Simeck Whedon meet while crewing a college theater production. Jesse hates everything about Sim — his lack of theater experience, his obsession with LGBTQ politics, his infatuation with, of all things, hula hoops. Well, he doesn’t hate everything. He doesn’t mind Sim’s eyes, or hair, or his surprising ability to be cool in a crisis. But Jesse is graduating in just a few months, and if there’s one thing he does not have time for, it’s a relationship.
Sim knows exactly what he likes: civil rights, the circus, and sex. And he knows what he likes about Jesse. In the control booth,Jesse is exactly Sim’s type — a natural leader, collected and confident. But outside the booth, he seems reclusive, acerbic and uptight — hardly Sim’s type at all. Is a relationship with Jesse a real possibility, just a fantasy, or a hopelessly lost cause?
When Sim offers to teach Jesse how to hula hoop as away to relax and loosen up, the lessons ease the two men out of their individual circles and into an unexpected shared world of sex, kink, friendship, and eventually love.
Review:
This book was hard to get into and slow to develop. It’s written in third person alternating between Sim and Jesse. And while the “voices”of each character were different, the change between characters was rough. The first quarter of the book I was not even sure that Sim, and Jesse even liked each other much less were attracted to each other. As the book went one the feeling that Sim and Jesse did not even like each other continued.
The author did a great job with the characters though. They were life-like having faults that all people have, and trying to deal with challenges of life. Sim and Jesse gradually work up to BDSM elements in their sex life. This story was more of fictional take real life relationships ups and down.
Reviewed by Melissa
