Marry me for 1 year. Payment: $1.2 million.Hayden Somerset is convinced the ad is a joke, but he responds anyway because, hello, $1.2 million. He’s broke, living in a tiny apartment with two roommates, and exhausted from praying his ancient car survives just one more week. His skyrocketing rent and crushing student loans aren’t helping either. At this point, there isn’t much Hayden wouldn’t do … Hayden wouldn’t do for that kind of cash.
The ad isn’t a joke. Jesse Ambrose is absolutely serious. His father, the charismatic patriarch of a powerful Hollywood dynasty, has his eye on politics, and he’s counting on California’s liberals and progressives to elect him. But Jesse knows what his father believes when cameras and voters aren’t around. As the election looms, he’ll do anything to force the man’s hand and show the public who Isaac Ambrose really is.
Anything, including marrying a stranger so his father will make good on his promise to disown Jesse if he ever takes a husband.
Now he just has to wait for his father to take the bait… and try not to accidentally fall in love with his fake husband.
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L. A. Witt has me doing a double-take with contemporary M/M romance. I admit I’ve always been partial to fantasy and paranormal titles with mysteries and thrillers thrown in for a more versatile reading experience. But I’ve been keeping my eyes and ears open for opportunities to enjoy the ‘normal’ M/M romance experience. Seems the joke is on me! Writers are selling books because of the ‘hook’ and the hook in the book isn’t all that ‘normal’ at all. Take our writer’s novel titled ‘The Husband Gambit’, for example.
We have a tyrannical patriarch of a powerful Hollywood dynasty who has his heart set on politics and plans to cruise into a position on a liberal platform in spite of racism and homophobia. He bends to his wife’s insistence on not throwing out his gay fifteen-year-old son but makes him one solemn promise–to disown him if he ever decides to marry a man! That son, Jesse Ambrose is determined to stop his father from gaining a political position that may reverse laws for the LGBTQ+ citizenry. He wants an audio-visual recording of his father disowning him. Now, to contract a husband to get things started.
Jesse runs an ad: “Marry me for 1 year. Payment: $1.2 million.” A cool hundred grand for every month of marriage. Hayden Somerset is desperate enough to answer the ad given his ancient car, huge student loan payments, and the dismal apartment he’s sharing with two friends who are just as broke. He is delighted that the offer is legitimate but disturbed by how handsome Jesse is. He goes on to discover that Jesse has many other wonderful attributes including the willingness to work as a makeup artist in spite of all of his inherited wealth. Jesse’s goal to show the world who his father really is becomes one Hayden embrace completely and they do just what they set out to do and find love and a genuine marital relationship along the way!
All in all, the narrative is incredible as it is replete with all the necessities of an EXCELLENT novel, regardless of genre: Impeccable world-building, awesome character development, distinctly defined conflict, and clearly delineated conclusion. Also, the additional components of exemplary pacing (the rate at which the writer introduces key elements in the story) and methodical balance (the distribution of varying types of elements in the narrative), giving the audience an exceptional reading experience. It has been a pleasure and privilege to review this writer’s work.
I’m reviewing the audio edition. I was referred this audio book by a friend and I am so glad I took the time to listen. This is such a fun story. Sure there are plenty of fake husband stories but I really enjoy if the characters have some personality. Hayden does. His comeback lines kept me laughing and wishing I had this talent. The romance is really good and Jesse is someone I wanted to hug. It helped that Greg Boudreaux and Michael Ferraiuolo did great jobs at the narration. It was easy to picture what was happening. This is one of the stories that gave me an escape from everyday and just enjoy it.
A fine example of the genre and of this author’s writing chops. Happy to have spent the money on it.
Toxic and dysfunctional family : can love always wins? Hayden and Jesse fight for what’s right.
I really expected a fluffy love story. I rarely read love stories-don’t like them. And while there is definitely a love story, there is so much more. I was suctioned in and could hardly put it down. Several stories rolled into one. It’s not a total happy ever after but it is a satisfying ending.
It was a fun easy quick read
I loved the fact that I could identify with Hayden’s amusing way of looking at his own pathetic circumstances. A lot of us have been that broke – where you can’t afford to put petrol in the car, but if you don’t, you can’t earn money to buy petrol, and other such vicious cycles. His reaction to the riches in Jesse’s life were so funny too. “Fuck subtlety” and other such quips. I really enjoyed this book.
Witt takes the often used trope and gives it real depth with the stakes being higher than normal. Jesse Ambrose is the son of a powerful Hollywood mogul making a move into politics. Jesse knows firsthand that his father is homophobic and concocts a scheme to expose him before his political career can get off the ground that involves paying someone to be his husband for a year for the plan to work. Of course, the pretend husbands fall in love, this being a romance and all, but the spin on the fake wedding trope gives the romance an added dimension. The book is also long enough to give the characters room to breathe – very refreshing when many books are little more than glorified story outlines.
The storyline for The Husband Gambit is a little over the top with the way things come together, so it does require some suspension of disbelief. It’s also one of the best uses of the fake romance trope that I’ve come across in some time. Jesse’s reason for needing a husband is far from the norm and certainly made for an interesting tale. The story is also a bit drawn out, but these guys are just so darn lovable that you want more of them. Jesse and Hayden are total opposites in their upbringing, financial status, and social circles, but somehow, they just work together. Even before feelings come into play, they have an easy rapport full of wit and banter. There is some angst and a building tension as Jesse’s family starts to show their true colors, but relationship angst is pretty low. All in all, this is another great read from LA Witt. The story is interesting, the characters are engaging, and the romance is a good combination of sweet and sexy.
I’m not ashamed to say that I usually enjoy the fake boyfriend/fake marriage stories and this one delivers much more pure enjoyment.
The story itself is at times, rather dark although somewhat realistic with a ‘ripped from the headlines’ vibe. It isn’t so farfetched that someone, even someone from Hollywood, would have political aspirations and hide their true nature and beliefs in the hopes of being elected and make change other than their campaign promises. We’ve seen it. What is different about this story is the presentation with gallows humor, and incredibly detailed characters and situations.
The main characters are so different. Both are entirely likable and have the best intentions.
When Hayden sees the advertisement on his laptop, it is almost ridiculous yet sparks a glimmer of hope. He gets along great with his roommate friends but destitute isn’t a good look on them. Even though it seems unlikely that someone is really willing to pay 1.2 million dollars to marry him for one year, 100 k per month for twelve months, the possibility that it is real is too good to pass up.
Jesse knows that he lives a life of privilege. It’s not that he wants it to throw it away exactly. He can’t stand the fact that his father is going to run for political office as a liberal, pride-flag waving candidate when Jesse knows what a bigoted racist his father is. His own queer son will be disowned if he comes out of the closet any further than he already has. Jesse hates the lies and he feels that his father is dangerous. He has a plan.
Jesse is a sweet and naïve young man with the best intentions. His goal is to be publicly disowned by his father in a manner so public that his father won’t be able to hide his true nature any longer. Jesse is going for the long game. He has a job and believes that he can support himself. He owns a luxury car and a condo with a trust fund coming. He isn’t really considering that everything is in his father’s name. Such is the devious nature of his father.
Hayden’s family life isn’t all peaches and cream but not anywhere near as toxic as Jesse’s.
For me, the best part of this story is the real, detailed descriptions of the people and their motivations. Example, Jesse’s father’s mansion has a huge front door because he and a neighbor were in a sort of a dick-measuring competition to have bigger. Bigger door, bigger pool, bigger/better everything.
Some things that we experience every day are presented with such humor and clarity that we buy in, emotionally with the characters, these two young men and their friends as well as their story.
When Hayden first meets Jesse, he is a bit panicked – not at the what of his meeting but more at the where – “Did I look remotely suitable to be in anything marked VIP? Should I have worn something else? Did I look like a million dollars…”Oh sweetie, some voice inside my head tsked. You look like twelve bucks in wrinkled bills”….and the self-defeating self-talk took over.
When Hayden realizes who is offering the 1.2 million dollar marriage, he quickly understands the motivation. “Jesse’s father’s movies weren’t on-the-nose overtly racist..but in the more subtle, insidious ways that made Luis’s skin crawl. Lily white heroes and brown-skinned villains. Ensemble casts dying in order from darkest to lightest with the pristine Caucasian leads surviving to the end. So many white saviors.”
Hayden believes in Jesse’s goals. For both men, this is definitely a win/win situation. The author sets the scene with such emotion that I had goosebumps. “Answering Jesse’s ad changed my life in a matter of days. My two best friends could finally breathe. I was going to be okay. They were going to be okay. And…I’m not ashamed to admit it. I cried.”
The author describes the feelings of being poor so descriptively that many of us can identify as with the feeling when entering a high-end store, specifically a jewelry store, that somehow they will know that there is no way your credit card or debit card would support buying anything in such a place. Even more than that, that security guards and salespeople can tell that you don’t belong there.
The most hysterical part was when they were planning the fake wedding. “do you think your parents would take it well if I said I wanted to use paper streamers from the dollar store and print the invitations on an old dot matrix?” “You rich people live in a different world…if it was left to me (Hayden) … everyone would just get emails, or Facebook invites. Wouldn’t it be awesome if we could do this whole thing via a Facebook event.”
I hope that you can visualize how truly funny, and entertaining this story is. I alternately smiled, laughed out loud, frowned and became just plain angry until the warm and fuzzies took over again.
Hayden and Jesse are hot together!
While this isn’t my favorite L.A. Witt book, I enjoyed The Husband Gambit a lot. It’s a good fake spouse/spouse for hire story and Hayden and Jesse had a lot of chemistry right off the bat.
There were a few places where I thought the story could maybe have been tightened up a bit but I never wanted to skip any pages. This is a romance trope that I really like and I enjoyed L.A. Witt’s take on it.
Jesse Ambrose has a seriously messed up family. Read the blurb for more details. Hayden has reservations about responding to Jesse’s ad for a husband for hire but he’s in a bad financial situation.
I like how Hayden, while agreeing to the husband for hire scheme because he’s desperate financially, doesn’t throw away all of his principles and draws the line at letting Jesse be too extravagant when giving him things.
While both Hayden and Jesse have complicated relationships with their siblings, Hayden has a great relationship with his parents; unfortunately, Jesse doesn’t. It was both painful and hard for me to understand how anyone’s family could be like Jesse’s but I’m sure it does happen in real life.
The Husband Gambit is a story that made me laugh (there are lots of lighter moments) and cry; just the way I like most of my books to be.
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***