Lights and Sirens, Lisa Henry

Lights and Sirens, Lisa Henry. #2 in the Emergency Services series (fairly loosely connected; Gio from the first book shows up briefly at a CPR recertification course). Paramedic Hayden likes driving fast, saving lives, and having guilt-free hook-ups; the only person he doesn’t get on with, after a misunderstanding over a speeding ticket, is police officer Matt Deakin, a by-the-book type who moved to Townsville to look after his elderly grandad. When the misunderstanding is sorted out they have sex, but it seems to be developing into something more…

The main obstacle here is Hayden’s emotional damage, past and present - he’s a former foster kid with abandonment issues, and then he breaks down after a terrible week at work (fatal car accident, young boy drowns in backyard pool, suicide of someone he knows) - and in some ways it feels as though the relationship is almost too easy, given all that. Matt gets less development, although the relationship with his grandad is great. I didn’t find this as engaging as the first one - there’s a lack of heat between the leads, and the tragedies they’re dealing with overwhelm the storyline to a degree. But I like the characters and the detail (both the Australianness and the emergency services stuff) and I’d like to read another in the series.

Invisibly Breathing, Eileen Merriman

Invisibly Breathing, Eileen Merriman.  NZ YA (set in Lower Hutt, for local readers :D ). Felix Catalan has few friends at school and his parents’ marriage is breaking up; he copes by listening to Green Day and obsessing over mathematical rituals. Then Bailey Hunter arrives at school: he’s the oldest of a large family with an alcoholic abusive father, he stutters, loves judo, and is bisexual. The two of them get together, but have to cope with bullying, the threat of discovery, and Bailey’s decompensating father. After a slightly rocky start (I feel that I have read more than enough children’s/YA in which the main character is quirky and has Strong Feelings about numbers, and Bailey is all too obviously a teenage problem character looking for a teenage problem novel) I got into this - the relationship develops well, the bullying isn’t totally over the top, Felix’s parents come across as actual people - but then, regrettably, the ending became more melodramatic and less believable).  

( “Spoilers.” )