Mark of Cain by Kate Sherwood

Publication date: May 20 2014
Published by: Samhain Publishing 
Genre: MM, Adult, Romance, Contemporary, Religion 
Rating: 

When a man is consumed by hatred, is there anything left to love?

After a tough day of counseling sessions, Anglican priest Mark Webber is looking forward to a relaxing dinner at a local restaurant. When he sees who’s bellied up to the bar, though, he reaches for his cell phone to call the police.
It’s Lucas Cain, the man who killed Mark’s brother three years ago. Apparently he’s out of jail and hanging out with his old crowd, which has to be a breach of parole, right?

Pulled over upon leaving the bar, Lucas blows a clean breathalyzer and hopes this isn’t a harbinger of things to come. He’s ready to build a sober, peaceful life. His friends aren’t ready to let him move on, though, and he ends up taking refuge in an Anglican half-way house.

Thrown together, Mark and Lucas find common ground in the struggle to help a young gay man come to terms with his sexuality—and the fight against homophobic townsfolk. As attraction grows, the past is the last stumbling block between them and a future filled with hope.

I am so disappointed. I wanted to love this book because it started out great. There was so much potential for a good story there, Lucas's past, his relationship with Sean and his connection to Mark.

However, Lucas and Mark didn't start really talking to each other until around 65-70%! There were kept apart for the majority of the book, doing their own thing. Their individual stories were both well done, but that's not what I was looking for. I appreciate the fact that their history is so bad that it takes double the time than your average enemies-to-lovers conversion. What bothered me was that there was no interaction between the two MCs whatsoever until they suddenly felt things for each other. They worked in the farm together a couple of times (I am guessing more, but reader was never shown them) and then at 70% you have the first indication of romance. Again, I didn't want them to be all over each other from the start (Lucas did kill Mark's brother, let's not forget that tiny detail) but at least show me these two being together and talking and getting to know each other. And not near the end because it doesn't really cut it. It makes it even less believable actually, Mark falling so hard for his brother's murderer after almost zero interaction.

I knew it would be a hard issue to tackle and I thought that the author would be so spot on in the beginning, but I lost interest around halfway in and found it difficult to connect with the characters and buy into their love story after that.