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Tigers on the Way
BY Sean Kennedy
Dreamspinner Press, 2019
Five stars

Yikes, I bought the first book in this series, “Tigers and Devils,�� in 2012, which was first published in 2009…long before I owned a Kindle or started writing reviews. So clearly, for Sean Kennedy, whoever he really is in his isolated town in Australia, this story is a long, slow burn.

The saga of Declan Tyler and Simon Murray started out in a classic gay romance way. A decade after that first book was published, their story has moved far, far away from the “closeted celebrity jock falls for nerdy gay film buff�� paradigm of the first book. The thing is, all the good stuff about that first book �� its humor, its emotional weight, its tender, detailed characterization of Dec, Simon, and all their friends and family �� has carried on. Everything that gave this book its impact for me has simply matured and ripened.

Seven years into their relationship, Simon and Declan find themselves in a position lots of gay couples have faced �� the desire to have children, to make a family of more than two. Declan’s celebrity status still has its effect on their daily lives, but they’re used to that. It is still only 2016, before Australia finally legalized same-sex marriages, and so our two still-young men have to face this goal as my husband and I did, without the benefit of legal sanction of their relationship.

Wanting to be a parent is not an automatic decision, especially when it involves a lot of hard work and complicated emotional choices. Especially not when a medical surprise adds a painful shift in perspective. How lovely it is to see two men in their early thirties still considering themselves to be boys (and not maundering about getting old, blah blah blah), and thinking seriously about the ramifications of parenthood. But also how lovely to see them bolstered by their straight friends from way back in book one �� friends who now have families of their own, and who have incorporated Declan and Simon into their lives as deeply as anyone could wish.

Declan is still kind of an unfairly awesome jock god, and Simon is still kind of an insecure pissy jerk (sometimes). However, instead of a seven-year-itch in their relationship, we see that it has solidified into something that will stand the test of time. As the plotline moves them toward fatherhood, the main action is really their interactions with each other and their friends, as they face fears, fight and make up, and settle into a deeper understanding of what it means to be a couple.

There is no on-page sex, so this is not m/m. This is real life (in Australia!) at its romantic best.