Heart of the Race Audiobook By Mary Calmes cover art

Heart of the Race

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Heart of the Race

By: Mary Calmes
Narrated by: Greg Tremblay
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Varro Dacien spends his life riding toward the next adventure. Brian Christie, his best friend and touchstone, the one person who's always truly seen him, plays sidekick on these madcap adventures and subsequent trips to the hospital until he can't take it anymore. While Brian can see Varro, Varro has never caught on that he's breaking his best friend's heart.

Without Varro, Brian builds himself a life that's all about just getting by, doing his best to ignore the hole in his heart and his life. Without Brian to balance him, Varro pushes harder and takes more risks to reach that ultimate high. His job racing high-octane bikes on suicide-level courses makes it easy to get that rush...until it's no longer enough, and Varro realizes it's not the race but who's waiting at the finish line that truly matters. Now he just has to convince Brian to be there.

©2013 Mary Calmes (P)2015 Dreamspinner Press Contemporary Contemporary Romance Literature & Fiction Romance Feel-Good Heartfelt
Comfort Read • Engaging Characters • Sweet Storyline • Angsty Fun • Engaging Vocal Performance • Superb Accent Rendition
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Wish this could have been a much longer book. The main characters are lovable and you can’t rooting for them. As always Greg does an excellent narration!

Sweet

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This is a short novella, that I'll be honest, I would not have enjoyed as much if Greg Tremblay was not narrating it. The story is OK, I like Brian, but I really didn't like Varro; he was a jerk throughout the book IMHO. Yes, I know this is a coming out/gay for you tale; but really, he just didn't get redeemed for me when he finally pulled his head out of his ass. The story is told from Brian's POV, so the narrator made him so engaging that I was pulled into the story and really enjoyed it.

Just OK story; great narration

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*** 3 racy stars ***Audio edition, narrator Greg Tremblay.2 hours 5 minutesOverall: 3Performance: 5Story: 3A sweet audio shorty in true Mary Calmes fashion. The plot points don't really make sense, or they kinda do in Calmes. You just have to go along with them. 
Varro and Brian has been friends forever. Ever since Brian watched Varro drive down the roof of Varro's house and crash into a tree (!). Apparently Varro was chasing the adrenaline kick very early on. Brian is a foster kid, and Varro's mother takes him in to live with her and Varro and his brother Nico. They all grow up together. Brian is gay and comes out to them early on and everyone is fine with it. Brian have fallen in love with Varro, though, and is carrying a huge torch for his best friend slash foster brother. Brian loves Varro so much that it's becoming painful to stay with him, and also painful to watch Varro race and gamble with his life over and over again. Brian knows that Varro has his heart, but where does Varro's heart lay?As always, I liked this more because of Tremblay's narration. He is excellent, and he gives such life to the characters through his voice that I can't but help feel the characters. And I'm a sucker for happy ending when it's a long time coming.

An okay story made better by Tremblay

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Varro and Brian have been best friends since they were thrown together as foster kids. Varro is wild, crazy, an adrenaline junky and straight. Brian is quiet, studious, a rock and gay. Of course Brian has wanted Varro forever, but not been willing to act on it for the obvious reasons.

Varro is a motorcycle racer and Brian goes out on the circuit to help him stay focused and safe for an entire year. During that year it becomes clear that Brian can’t stay around Varro without completely losing his heart so he opts to leave the circuit to pursue his own dreams.

Varro misses Brian and begins to evaluate his feelings more closely.

When the two get together it is super-nova hot and sweet at the same time.

Though I hate to “spoil” things for you - this is one quote that epitomizes their relationship for me:

“I love you, Brian.” I leaned forward to meet his dark gaze and whisper the words he needed to hear and I needed to say.
“I love you, Varro, so much.”
“Swear it,” he said and held out his pinky with his right hand as he fisted my cock with his left.
“What’re we?” My voice dropped off. “Ten?”
“I am. You’re nine. Now swear.”
I hooked his pinky with mine as he pushed up from under me. “Jesus, Varro, you feel so good.”
“So do you.” His voice sounded like sandpaper as he reached up and hooked a hand behind my neck, drawing me down to him.

I highly recommend this amazing and wonderful book!



Audio

Greg Tremblay is one of my absolute favorite narrators. I simply adore him.
He always amazes me with his ability to infuse passion and emotion and humor into his narrations. He truly brings the words to life.

He does another amazing job with this – a fantastic Scottish accent, a slight Hispanic, and Italian… seemless and wonderful! My only complaint and I can’t say it’s anything he did poorly – but in my head Varro had a deep, rough, slightly accented, maybe East Coast accent – very growly and in Greg’s interpretation he doesn’t. So I was a little disappointed but – that’s really artistic opinion and all that…

A wonderful audiobook and still very, very highly recommended.

Lovely story with one of my fav narrators

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the storyline was awesome and the narrator brought the book to life . It is so romantic when two kindered spirit who know they belong to each other from kids.

love the book

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For a story that one of the MCs is a motorcycle rider, and a Mary Calmes story at that, it's very generic with no kind of detail to draw you in and make you believe that the story has a motorcycle rider in. Frankly Varro could have been anyone. So really there isn't much to the story which hurts the narration too since Greg didn't have much to work with.

Very generic

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What do I say? Brian was basically weak and an inconsiderate spineless person. All this I… I…I… Well “I” couldn’t believe it. This family took you in loved you which even allowed you to have a family. All he did was constantly hurt every member over and over again because he had stronger feelings for his “best friend”.

This man upset me at every turn to where I honestly did not think that he deserved to have his happily ever after. He acted in a way that his so called best friend felt that Brian hated him. Come on, what kind of friend is that, let alone a best friend?

What’s this epiphany crap? I thought he was gonna be like this is suppose to be my best friend. He shouldn’t have to tell me to hug him back. I’ve got to stop acting like this and be a real friend….. this is ridiculous. Is that what he did? No, he made things even worse. He eventually leaves again with zero intent on ever seeing V “his best friend” again. This because he he has no control of his “feelings”. He may not be about to control the fact that he has the feelings; however, he for dang sure should be able to have control over them and not allow his feelings to dictate his life. That’s exactly what he did. He allowed his life to be run by this 1 thing. His entire life, was run by the fact that he was in love with Varro.

And oh no! The audacity of this dude! You have no right to ask this of me?? What!? Are you kidding? She can most definitely ask. Now if she outright demanded, that’s different. That’s not what happened though. That didn’t prove she cared for 1 over the other more. All that showed was that she didn’t want her son to kill himself because his head isn’t completely in the task do to his (let’s just say it) longing for his friend. She knew what would help. She knew that her other “son” could continue his path just taking an alternate road. He was still working and earning money. And he still continued his education.

This story was cute and annoying

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Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Of course, it's Greg Tremblay!

What other book might you compare Heart of the Race to and why?

The Mangrove stories by Mary Calmes. Same author, narrator and type of stories.

Have you listened to any of Greg Tremblay’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Many, he's fantastic.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

The race is on.

Any additional comments?

Brian Christie and Varro Dacien have been best friends since the day Brian watched Varro launch a homemade contraption off his roof and subsequently wind up in the hospital. That day set the stage for their lives moving forward. Varro is the daredevil and Brian is his conscious. Best friends and foster brothers, the two were inseparable until Brian realized he was in love with Varro. While Brian tried to put distance between them, Varro continued to pull Brian closer all while tearing his heart in two with constant trysts with random women and groupies. When Brian finally has enough and completely pulls away, both men are left in stasis, not really moving on and constantly thinking about each other, both too damn stubborn to do anything about it. There is nothing like a little competition to make a man admit his feelings, in abundance.

Calmes is the queen of sexy short stores, and Greg Tremblay is her court jester. The only reason I’m giving this one 4 instead of 5 stars was the pain in my ass miscommunication and stubborn resolve to forever wallow in self-pity, miserably that Brian wore like a badge of honor. I seriously wanted to snatch him up by his hair and slap him a couple times. I tell you what though; the conversation on the phone toward the end, Tremblay used some amazing vocal chops during that part of the story. He gave voice to every word and emotion and had me hanging off every syllable and frustrated groan. And who knew that Tremblay could pull of an Irish baroque?

Great story for fans of the author and narrator, angsty but fun and I think the last thirty minutes was my favorite part.

The race is on.

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I actually had a hard time with this story. I just could not get passed the way Brian strung along the guy he was seeing by not being completely upfront about how he (Brian) felt for his best friend Varro.

It was borderline cruel every time the poor guy asked if he should stop trying and move on since Brian was clearly showing signs of his love for Varro, but Brian would give the poor guy a tiny piece of hope that he wasn't planning on anything romantic with Varro. I'm glad the guy told Brian exactly how he was acting (like a balancing 'maybe I will, maybe I won't) towards him and Varro.

Anyway, I couldn't enjoy the blossoming relationship of Varro and Brian because he truly did toy with that guys heart and emotions. I ended up disliking Brian completely.

SPOILERS

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I'm a huge fan of Mary Calmes but I didn't connect with the characters at all in this one. Greg Tremblay's narration was excellent as usual.

Not the best

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