The Superstar by Patricia Logan

 Storm Ellison is the sexiest man on two legs. The gorgeous young star of “Trapped on an Island”, the hottest reality show on television, is instantly recognizable the moment he leaves his palatial mansion. Paparazzi follow him everywhere, leaving him no peace or privacy, selling his pictures to the tabloids, and cementing his reputation in the press as a slutty gay playboy. As Storm prepares to sign his first major movie deal, his manager decides he needs protection. What he doesn’t expect, is to be attracted to the cold bastard who’s now running his life.
Balthazar Grant, freelance bodyguard, is a huge, handsome, rough and ready former Marine, trained by the best, and willing to step between Storm and anyone stupid enough to come at him. Always stoic and serious, Taz lends a deadly presence to Storm’s entourage whenever he ventures out in public. Storm doesn’t want a bodyguard, much less one who won’t let him live his fast and loose lifestyle with impunity and he’s certainly not one to be dictated to by an overconfident Marine who has opinions about everything including who he should hook-up with.
When a deadly threat hits Storm’s world, he’s suddenly living his own reality show, only this one has an outcome which doesn’t involve being voted off an island. Will Storm wake up before it’s too late and will Taz be able to fight his attraction to the handsome young superstar while trying to convince him he’s in very real danger? The pair will soon learn that reality is stranger than fiction.

I was really looking forward to reading this book because it contains a trope (the bodyguard and star falling in love) that I really like. It’s been told a lot, but besides being an interracial romance *rubs hands together with glee* I thought that it might also be a new take on this trope. There were a few moments in this story that I honestly enjoyed, but beyond that it was a hot mess.

We’re introduced to Taz, the beefy sexy ex-Marine bodyguard and the leaner, guyliner wearing blond Storm Ellison who’s apparently a superstar. Taz has been hired to replace a former bodyguard and because Storm’s star is rising (the first of many contradictions since Storm is supposed to already be a ‘superstar’). Taz assumes that Storm will be a drug-addled brat but discovers he’s not. Over and over and over again. It was like this hot Marine was struck in the head and had developed short term memory loss. But, so did Storm in constantly musing and re-musing on his attraction to Taz – so maybe that was one of the things they had in common.

The story is basically a series of club visits and yoga sessions. In between all of that, Taz protects Storm from European bears who want to potentially rape him and slutty twinks who are on drugs. As a matter of fact, according to Logan, the only gay men that exist in L.A. are bears and twinks. There’s also a subplot about an extortionist guru who Storm’s dog hates – but by the time I realized this was a plot point – I’d stopped caring.

Another frustration? The aforementioned situation with the men forgetting that they were really attracted to each other and fighting it. In between that – Taz was either kissing or masturbating while  thinking about the chauffeur David. Huh? Storm was having potential sex with random strangers at clubs, except that he kept getting cold feet and begging off – which of course turned the bears into rapists at which point Taz had to save him. Double huh? But my main frustration was how flippin’ long it took these two to get together. Even though I did love their first encounter, loved their chemistry, what ruined it was how it didn’t make sense to me. The couple days leading up to it was not only filled with short term memory loss, but bi-polar behavior.

There were some additional issues with whether Alan was his agent or his business manager as he was referred to as both (two entirely different professions). Then, an ‘Anthony’ was thrown in there randomly a couple times as being the actual business manager. Some timelines were off (i.e. his housekeeper had been with him from the ‘beginning’ which should have been about four or five years according to other statements, yet she’d only been with him two years.) All of these things had me swiping back several pages to try and figure out what was going on. I was constantly being thrown out of the story.

Overall, if you like interracial romance between two hot men and the bodyguard/star trope – and story details as well as cheesy dialogue aren’t big issues for you – you might like this book. I’m afraid I can only give it two lizard claws.

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