Cross-posted at Shelf Inflicted and at Outlaw Reviews I was debating on whether I wanted to continue with this series or not, as my feelings about After Ben were rather lukewarm.Though the first story was mainly about Theo recovering from the death of his partner, Ben, and finding love again, there were interesting secondary characters, such as Peter Morse, a paramedic who fell for Theo at the wrong time, and Maggie, Theo’s personal assistant and friend, who was instrumental in supporting him [...]

Full review now posted3.5 stars. Saving Sean is the sequel to After Ben. After loving and actually devouring After Ben I've had very high expectations and it saddens me to say that I'm not overly happy with Saving Sean. To be honest, the book could never live up to my high expectations. The final 30 % of Saving Sean contained too much sex and fell totally flat for me. And then there was Sean…and Maggie. Frankly, Sean is not my kind of hero and Maggie who was a wonderful character in After Ben [...]

sophomore slump—or superior sequel?the answer is: yesis book is ambitious as hell. while not entirely successful in its every gambit, it is still a damned fine piece of work, all the same demands you sit back and be told the story—to stop pushing, and be guided instead.over and over, you'll find yourself reading something and wondering, 'why is this here? why am i seeing this now? what about that other thing?'the narrative loops over and around itself again and again, layered with surprising [...]

3.5 starsI had some likes and some dislikes -- issues with characters' personalities (that seemed different from the beginning OR that I knew from book #1), quick conflict resolution, and weird sentences. It has been two months since I read book #1 and I am probably in a less good mood now, especially since I still have the m/m romance slump. The result is, things that I was able to dismiss in After Ben were now glaring at me like neon lights. However, I also had parts that I adored or some humo [...]

4.5 stars. Another seriously good m/m romance from relatively new author Con Riley who is now on my auto-buy list. In Saving Sean, unlucky-in-love paramedic Peter is sent on a mercy mission to save the younger brother of Maggie (a friend of Peter's 'ex' Theo, with whom he is still infatuated). Peter can't refuse and spends his vacation helping idealistic young conservationist Sean go through his deceased father's cabin. A lot of pressure is on Sean to finalise the estate and sell the cabin and l [...]

In summary: it was tedious and poorly written.In detail:I could see the bones in this story. This story read like a sketch, an outline that was hastily and shabbily clothed in response to demand. There is a difference when an author writes with her soul and for herself and in her own timing as opposed to when an author is writing in fulfillment of external exertions being placed upon her, whether they be from the publishing house, editors, her audience et al. Because the bones/the structure were [...]

Well, I finished it - that's about the most positive I have to say about it right now. Up to about 60% it was a nice, compelling read, but then it got tedious. With a title like 'Saving Sean' what do you expect? Saving this Sean from either some emotional turmoil or something like 'The Fugitive' :) What you don't expect is saving Sean from the tons of paper his hoarding deceased dad has left behind. Yes, I totally loved 'After Ben' and I hoped/expected another fascinating and gripping tale, but [...]

3.25 starsSadly, another sequel which crashed and burned. So disappointing, not even close to matching the wonderful and loved first story in the series of After Ben.

So here is a thing/rule about me. I don’t traditionally read a series in order nor do I read an author back to back. Maybe it’s the OCD in me or some anxiety about getting burned out on characters or an author’s style to not like the other books as much as the first. Well, Con Riley broke that rule for me and threw it right out the window. She threw it out and ran it over with an remodeled RV driven by the cutest couple whose story I really need to read. Ugh. Sorry, got off on a tangent th [...]

I honestly cannot believe it took me one month to read this book. I had 4 tries but finally I finished it. It was really frustrating, but because I loved After Ben I wanted very much to give this a chance. Sadly this it doesn’t compare to it. I don’t know what went wrong but I couldn’t get into it at all. I loved Peter, he was really sweet but the whole plot was tiring. Too much hording, it got annoying, I actually got to one point where I thought that Sean had inherited his father’s hor [...]

This book gives you all the feelings. As you know, I don’t go through the plot in my reviews, I concentrate on my findings in the book itself, and what made this one work for me was the truly believable male voices in the story. Both Sean and Peter ring true, and really connect.Broken, but trying to save himself, Sean is a young man who is overwhelmed. By fate, life, and death. Enter Peter. This Peter, who gained both Sean’s and my trust as the narration developed. This Peter (that I had onl [...]

There are several other reviews that cover the good and bad. So I'm just going to give my immediate thoughts:(view spoiler)[I read After Ben not more than a week ago and I was so confused with who was who in Saving Sean. And who I thought someone was didn't match their personality in this book. Except for Marco, Italian or not, nice or not, someone (Theo)should tell him he's an adult and its unacceptable to crawl into other peoples beds, unless invited.Maggie was a great friend in After Ben howe [...]

I had a hard time connecting to the characters in this one and I enjoyed it but the story didn't resonant with me like After Ben. I was happy to see a story focusing on Peter but he seemed pretty lost for a large chunk of this and not as strong as I remember him from the first book. I did enjoy how Peter was able to solve Morgan's issue with Marco. This was a good read and good story but suffers in comparison to the first of the series.

Review Summary: A decent book that fell far short of the standard set by the first.Review: Though I got engrossed in this one faster than After Ben, my enthusiasm waned around the middle and by the end I was frustrated. Insta-love, a main couple planning HEA for reasons that weren't clear to me, gratuitous sex once the heroes got together, and formerly likeable characters who were now obnoxious did not result in a sequel that lived up to the standard set by the first book.Given my pet peeve abou [...]

3.5Book one in this series had some emotional depth that makes it a hard to follow up with in book two.The slow burn and emotional progession and growth that made me love book one are not present in this book.However, this is still a good read, just not what I was waiting for.Sean and Peter work great together, I wish there wasn't so much sex like they used that to build their relationship.This review is a bit fragmented, but that is how the story was for me.My absolute favorite thing about this [...]

Audiobook narrated by JP HandlerI was excited to read this story because of how much I enjoyed After Ben, the first book in this series, however, this story fell far short. I’m not sure if that is entirely the result of the story content, or if my disappointment is influenced by the narration as I found the narrator’s exaggerated pronunciation of every syllable of every word to be quite distracting. However, the fact that I wanted to smack Peter, and that I frequently found myself shouting � [...]

A Hearts On Fire ReviewTHREE & A HALF STARS--Con Riley's "Saving Sean" is the second book from theSeattle Stories series. Both books can be read as stand alone books but I didn't follow thatd I am so happy I did!Here's why: though technically yes, you don't need to read "After Ben" firstyou're better off just starting with book one because you can fully understand the secondary characters complexities and flaws. If I didn't read Morgan (my love) or Theo (my other love) or Maggie (my s-hero f [...]

Broke down the review to parts:On the writing:Saving Sean highlights some problems with the writing. These problems existed in After Ben too, but are even worse here in SS.The story tends to jump ahead, then rewind and explain something that happened earlier. While I've got nothing against that per se, it gets really annoying when pretty much every chapter starts like that - to the point where I don't even know if something is happening now or earlier sometimes.On the characters:Then there's the [...]

1.5 StarsI'm a bit at a loss here. This is, I think, my first book by this author. I've read lots of amazing reviews on her works and was eagerly anticipating digging into this one for a challenge. This has some moments, but ultimately they cannot save the book for me. I would have loved to do 2 stars because I nearly never do 1 star if I finish a book but the audio telling of this was, at times, so terribly dreadful I simply cannot make myself add that extra star. I literally was gritting my te [...]

In this series of stories about loss and moving on, ‘Saving Sean’ deals with a different kind of loss than ‘After Ben’, but it involves some of the same characters, which I found fascinating. In book one, Theo lost his long-term partner, Ben, and had a very hard time moving on. Theo ended up falling in love with Morgan, but the other man he’d gotten close to, Peter, is now devastated that he lost the opportunity to be with Theo. So this is Peter’s story – the tale of how he finds S [...]

3.5This is the second book in the Seattle Stories series. Like with After Ben, there are so many things to love about this book.These are the things I thought worked well:1) Once again, the author delivers clever, well-written sentences, that bring imagery and emotion to the forefront. It helped my to “feel” or be “in” the characters. 2) The beginning of the story—in fact, up to the 50% mark, I was captivated in the story and curious about how the characters—and plot—would develop. [...]

1.75*Every review I read seems to say that this book wasn't as great as After Ben, which is neither here nor there to me since I had major issues with After Ben as well. I think this author's writing style just doesn't work for me. I need a cogent, concise story, with a sequence that I can follow and minimal distractions. The author's characters are awesome, dialogue is wonderful. It's everything else that I can't deal with. Incessant rambling, paragraphs and paragraphs of backstory that I could [...]

'Saving Sean' tells Pete's story (from 'After Ben'), but it also gives us more Joel & Evan, and even some Morgan and Aiden. Theo, rightly so, remains in the background, but still there is a change in his life so I hope we get to see more of that in future books.New secondary characters introduced like Peter's Dad and Jack the librarian add backstory and humour respectively, but of course, this is really the story of Sean and Peter.Riley does this thing to show the way Pete is totally unfilte [...]

I am so pleased to have found this author. Con Riley writes beautifully. "Saving Sean" is the second novel in the Seattle Stories publications. Judging by the way secondary characters are developing, there should be many more to come in this series.Although this book is called "Saving Sean" it is actually Peter the paramedic's story, Peter was introduced in the first novel "After Ben." It's great to see characters return in this story, they become more like family or close friends rather than ch [...]

4.5 starsUnlike most people, it seems, I liked this book better than the After Ben. I connected with Sean and Peter and I liked the way their feelings and their relationship developed. I found Peter's way of handling Sean and protecting and helping him very tender and real. I also appreciated very much that the book conveyed to me not just strong feelings of romantic love, but also of friendship and family ties. It was interesting to see Peter and his father find each other again and in contrast [...]

This is the second in the Seattle series, and though not as compelling and heart-breaking as After Ben this is still a good read. The story starts when our hero Peter Morse, the unrequited love interest of Theo Anderson receives an urgent call from Theo (who Peter is still crushing on). Peter has been on the road teaching paramedic training for months on end and just wants to go home to a cool beer, a hot tub, a 42 inch tv and a comfy couch. He decides whatever Theo is asking him to do he will s [...]

I was really pleased that this came out not long after reading 'After Ben' which I adored. This was a great book and carries on the Seattle series with Peters story - who is still hung up on losing his chance with Theo - until he is asked by Theo to find Sean, Maggies brother, a complex multi layered character, who knocks him for six from the word go! Their attraction is instant but Sean is 'skittish' and tends to run ( literally as well as figuratively ) when he feels pushed so they have quite [...]

It was an overall good read, but I was a bit disappointed. (view spoiler)[ Peter, a secondary character from "After Ben" is a paramedic who trains other staff for crisis situations. He is the poster boy for good guy, and in this book he becomes too good to be true and to be honest a bit boring. As a favor to his former flirt (Theo, MC from "After Ben") he checks on a young men, Sean. And then the title says it all. Peter tries to save Sean, who obviously needs saving. Very much. Sean comes acros [...]

My rating is 4.5 stars But read After Ben first.I think this book has been reviewed a little unfairly by some, because the first book in the series was just so damn good!Saving Sean continues the story of Peter (One of Ben's love-interests in book 1) and introduces Sean, Maggie's brother. the story compares favourably to other m/m lit, but doesn't quite meet the standard of After Ben in terms of character development, or complexity of story arc. Where it IS successful is in "world building" - Al [...]

I loved the first book. I was so ready to read about Peter. He was a character who I almost wanted to get with Theo. now in book two he gets with Maggie's brother Sean.I enjoyed the book, but there seemed to be a lot of triangles and angst that I was not sure was needed.But the main reason that I gave this a 3 star instead of 4?[after re-read I have made it a 4] Maggie. Apparently, between books she was captured by aliens and given some sort of personality transplant. I was left with NO respect [...]