Mike Shade

The first in the new Pets series by Mike Shade is a good mix of fantasy and sci-fic genre; Tynde is the king’s younger son in a remote and retrograde planet. Tynde’s lifestyle is a mix of ancient customs, being him the third son he is destined to the priesthood (first son is the heir, second son is the replacement, just in case, third son is not necessary and can be given over to the church). Plus Tynde is a seer, and so the Church highly wants to take possession of his powers; a man fated to being a priest has to be pure, and to avoid any temptation, Tynde is living with a chastity belt that not only prevent him to touch himself, but makes also very painful to have any sexual desires or thoughts. Tynde doesn’t know nothing of the real life, he is like a child with the body of a man, and moreover, he has also a very quiet and submissive core, and so he has no rebellion feelings, if not being scared of when he will eventually become a real priest, since he will be castrated.

Then one day Tynde’s brother, Towan, the heir, disappear, and voices are that he was taken in slavery in a near planet; Tynde’s father, the king, asks him to go to the rescue, and this is probably the most unlikely rescue team, since Tynde is totally unaware and useless in a stranger world. As soon as he reaches Kion, the new planet, Tynde is taken under custody of Koss, a businessman who took a fancy on him in the shuttle between the two planets. Without much of Tynde’s opinion, he is turned in a Kundi, basically a concubine, something slightly better than a slave for only the reason that he is cherished and taken care of like an important treasure. Koss tells Tynde that he will help him find his brother Towan, but this first novel is more or less spent with Tynde in Koss’s bedroom, learning all the wicked flesh pleasure he was always unaware of.

Kion’s planet is very different from Alaquis, Tynde’s home planet: where Alaquis is almost a medieval society, with people living of farming and trade, in a mostly green space, Kion is a futurist society, with skyscrapers and pollution. It’s like changing genres inside the same novel, when the story is set in Alaquis it has almost a fantasy feeling, and instead, when changing planets, in Kion it becomes a sci-fiction tale. Plus there is the limbo, meaning Koss’s house, and specifically Koss’s bedroom, where the story is without time, the story of a Master who is teaching is pet to become the perfect lover.

Koss is really gentle and kind with Tynde, and he would be almost paternalistic if not for the simple reason that Tynde has not in him to be independent; I have never felt in him any rebellion feelings, he was resigned to become a priest, and when that changed, he is good with the idea of being a concubine, if only someone tells him that is good and not sin. Tynde has not really a strong core, he is like a sweet pet, trusting and innocent, easy to be harmed since he has no a bad bone in him. If you like the submissive partner to being a “top from the bottom”, Tynde is absolutely not like that: he is the perfect submissive and his only desire is to be good for his Master, and he wants, and needs, to be told how to do that.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003K16V1I/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (more)