Exciting

Oct. 18, 2014 by Sandra Shrewsbury on Amazon | 5 out of 5 stars

This is truly a story about life- the choices we make, the regrets, the plans, the hopes and dreams. he & She is a great book that really dives into the mentality behind why we have certain relationships. It gets behind the physical attraction to let the reader understand the emotional appeal of non-traditional, often taboo associations between men and women.

What I enjoyed most about this book is the fact that it is very real. The characters in it are extremely relatable, as are the situations that each one faces. It opens your mind to how some relationships work.

Growing numb to life, to his on-and-off girlfriend of many years, his career, even Scotch, a man turns fifty. He is a translator who can no longer dream of translating beautiful works of fiction. He is an amateur musician who can no longer dream of expressing his life on a higher plane, without words. As he glares inside himself he sees little but his declining sexuality, his crumbling hold on life, a growing list of failed relationships, and a darkening well of loneliness.

Stumbling upon an image on the Internet one night, he suddenly hears cell doors sliding open. He stares at a young woman, in profile, beautiful, unblinking, regal. Instinctively he knows that by lingering on that image he will shatter a relationship that has kept him on the sane side of loneliness as surely as if he stepped in front of a speeding eighteen-wheeler. But desperate to feel alive again before time runs out, he knows he must see the stranger behind the pixels on his laptop screen.

Although it is her image that first transfixes him, his eye afterwards chances on a handful of words on the Internet page. She is a dominatrix. The word triggers something inside him, blows the dust off fantasies trickling back to adolescence, and slowly begins to re-choreograph his decades of sexual memories. Was he ever really the dominant male he thought he was? Did he have a sexual alter-ego? Was this the last card he had to play in life? The face on the screen held the answer. He would find out even if it killed him.

This story isn’t just about sex. It is a story about a man coming to terms with his sexuality. The author was creative and kept everything in perspective. This is a must read novel.