Review: Torment by Iona Blair

This story arrived in my inbox with the title "Review Request" and that was it apart from a blurb and publisher URL.  I was slightly taken aback because I don't usually get sent books for review without the publisher asking me first if I want to do the review.  I'd not heard of the publisher before - Club Lighthouse Publishing - nor had I heard of the author.  I checked out both the publisher site and the blurb which stated that this was a GBLT book.  The blurb sounded interesting so I sat down to read.  After a short while I decided that this book must have just been mailed out generally to all review sites because if this publisher had known anything about me or this site then they definitely would not have sent me this book which contains just as much m/f sex as it does m/m.

It's a long time since I've read a book where I've wanted to throw a book at the wall on so many occasions.  In fact I stopped reading the book many, many times as I became increasingly disgusted at what I was reading, but each time I picked up the book again in horrified fascination as, like watching a train wreck, I couldn't prevent myself from finding out how the book was going to end.

The story begins with army officer, Jay, who has almost finished his tour of duty in Afghanistan.  He's looking forward to going back to his wife in Toronto, but that anticipation is slightly marred by the uncomfortable sexual feelings he's been having for one of the men under his command, Darren.  When circumstances conspire to put the men alone in a store cupboard, all that pent up desire explodes and they shag each other's brains out, leaving Jay disgusted with himself for having sex with a man and for his infidelity.  After leaving Afghanistan for the required adjustment period in Cyprus, Jay, is still confused about whether he is gay or not.  In order for him to regain some of his equilibrium he pays a prostitute to have sex with him, after which he feels more like the proper heterosexual man he wants to be.  However, before he can head back to Canada, he gets a call from his superior officer in Afghanistan to say that his patrol has gone missing and asking for his help in locating them.

Where do I start to explain why I didn't like this book?  Firstly, I hated Jay and I mean hated.  He's your classic anti-hero, except that in this case I could find no redeeming features whatsoever.  I was first put off by the infidelity with Darren, but then again I also understood that situation.  He had confused feelings and had been without sex for a long time.  It was a heat of the moment thing which he seemed to regret afterwards.  It was the later infidelities that I couldn't forgive.  Jay has sex with three female prostitutes throughout the book, plus he continues to see Darren even whilst still married.  I felt so sorry for his wife who was a lovely woman who didn't deserve all the lies Jay fed her.  Jay also lies constantly to himself and everyone else.  It's only the niggly voice of his conscience which shows that he has any feelings of remorse for his actions and if it hadn't been for that voice in his head I would have given up on the book long before the end.

As Jay's lies and infidelity and confusion about his sexuality start to build up he starts to drink more and more. he seems to be one of those men who can function well even when tanked up on whisky, so he drives and goes to work whilst drunk.  However, he begins to become increasingly irrational leading to a scene where he rapes a woman in a lap dancing club.  It was this point where I lost any sympathy for Jay at all as he taunts the woman after she confronts him:

“Don’t flatter yourself, darling. You were hot to trot and panting for it.” He kept a hold of her as she struggled to get free. “Who do you think the cops will believe?” he demanded, “a tramp who “lap dances” in a sleazy bar, or an army officer?”

At that point this book was nearly a DNF, but as I said earlier, I wanted to know how it was going to all pan out.  Surely Jay was going to get his comeuppance?  Sadly, no he doesn't.  His marriage breaks down and he gets his HEA with Darren - all the while I was shouting unfair, unfair.  Jay didn't deserve the happy ending he got.  He deserved to be rotting in a jail cell somewhere.

I suppose you are wondering whether there was anything redeemable about this book.  I will say that the author writes well, and although I hated the character of Jay, the fact that I had such strong emotions towards him is a sign that he was a well rounded character.  A lot of the first part of the book was interesting in that it's set in Afghanistan and I thought the descriptions of the setting and the life of a soldier were realistically done.  As a story of a man in free-fall, conflicted and self-destructive, this book does fulfil the task and if it wasn't for my utter gall that Jay ends the book relatively unscathed then I would have admired the author's bravery in writing such a book.

Can I recommend this book?  No I can't.  There were just too many things on top of the rape scene and the m/f sex that I disliked, such as the weak mystery sub-plot, for example.  If you want to read a book which sends your blood pressure soaring sky high and which doesn't contain a single likeable character, then by all means buy and read this book.  Despite the fact that I admire what the author has tried to do here and also acknowledge that she has some skills in creating a novel, this still gets one of my very rare 'Terrible' grades.

Buy this book HERE.