Jeopardy in Tights by K. Childs

Down on his luck ex-security meets CEO looking for special bodyguard. Fine print: hazardous working conditions.

Errol Mason got fired from his last job and put on a blacklist for a good reason. Now, scraping the bottom of the barrel and desperate for any job, he finally lands an interview with Stardust Global.

Errol’s interviewer, company CEO Nathan Parkes, has a secret, one that might get Errol killed. All Nate wants is a meatshield while he goes on a one-man crusade against a bunch of psycho cultists and tries to rescue his missing stepmother. Errol is the meatshield in this equation.

Things start pear-shaped and only get worse from there. Between military small-arms fire, freeway fisticuffs, and escaping the cult’s secret bases, the duo quickly forms a bond of trust and lust.

Warning: references to a past drinking and drug problem (off page) and some on-page violence

Book 1
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NineStar Press

Reviews by the Wicked Reads Review Team

Sarah – ☆☆☆
This is the story of a disgraced superhero who is given a last chance to redeem his reputation. When CEO Nathan hires Errol, the alcoholic deadbeat bodyguard doesn’t have much going for him. But desperation and a minor superpower make Errol a committed, if unlikely protector for the beleaguered CEO.

This is an action adventure that reads like a low budget Marvel film. Everything happens in this book with very little description or reflection. Readers lurch from one dramatic shootout to the next without pause or any sign of a deliberate narrative arc. I’m an infrequent science fiction reader but I usually appreciate the way the genre can frame and reframe the human condition, ask the bigger questions and provide anti-heroes that don’t necessarily work in contemporary fiction. This book does none of these things. It’s a book for people who like simplistic action movies.

There is a sexual connection between Nathan and Errol that leads to sexual encounters. I’m not sure I’d go so far as to suggest there is some romance in the story, but there is a bit of sex. While adventure fans might find it a sexy story, romance fans will be disappointed.

I read this book pre-publication so I’m hoping that some of the errors have been corrected prior to publication. However, the teacher in me was itching to take apart the story with a red pen. The writing is choppy and jarring and characters leap from adventure to adventure with very little character or relationship development. For a science fiction novel, the world building is minimal and incredibly confusing. By the midpoint, minor inconsistencies began to grate. Nate and Nathan are used interchangeably for no apparent reason. Some references in the book suggest a futuristic setting. Like 200 years in the future. Other references suggest the story takes place in a contemporary American city. I’m still not quite clear on the intended setting for the book. I honestly couldn’t quite make the various strands of this story work for me, so I gave up trying to think and just let the book take me to the end.

By day, Kristy works as an IT Project Coordinator. She wanted to be a fairy princess when she grew up but sadly discovered the job was no longer on the market. Instead, she embarked on a career to at least write about princesses in castles and grand adventures. She lives in Sydney, Australia, with an abundance of old comics and cute anime figurines.

By night, Kristy is a hippy and foodie, enjoying the life of a city-bred lady and trying all the latest restaurants and foodie crazes she can. She is most at home throwing money around in a handcrafts market, eating gourmet chocolate, discussing the various ramen recipes between restaurants, and browsing second-hand bookstores for undiscovered gems. She is a consummate spinster and lover of animals but has yet to receive a crazy cat lady starter kit.

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Reviewers on the Wicked Reads Review Team were provided a free copy of Jeopardy in Tights (Men of the Pantheon #1) by K. Childs to read and review.