Brief Encounters

Title: The V in Virtue (V Series #4)
Author: JM Snyder
Length: 16,775 words
Publisher: JMS Books
Genre: m/m paranormal romance
Rating: B+

Blurb: The V in Virtue is book 4 in my V series. From the beginning of their relationship, Vic and Matt have celebrated their anniversary on New Year’s Eve. Somehow it’s become tradition for the men to swear off intercourse for the week between Christmas and New Years, a long stretch of seven days Matt finds especially difficult to weather. Vic’s blasé attitude about their lack of sex only makes Matt hornier, and he comes close to breaking down several times when Vic toys with him throughout the week.

Matt is looking forward to midnight on New Year’s Eve and claiming Vic as his own after such a trying dry spell. But when his coworker Roxie invites the guys to a year-end bash at her place, Matt’s plans are thwarted. Will Vic still make the evening special for Matt and himself even though they aren’t spending it alone?

Review: Once again Vic and Matt are up to their usual shenanigans, this time with Vic falling through the floor from his latest new power, given to him by Matt’s supernatural sperm. I just love these guys because they’re hot, they have such a great connection over such a long time, and these stories are always a lot of fun to read, whether because of Matt’s snarky friend Roxie or the unusual situations they seem to find themselves in, often with a superpower that is totally useless except for laughs.

In Virtue, we see the two guys at the holidays, when they spend the week between Christmas and New Year’s in celibacy. Part of it is a celebration of their anniversary by creating anticipation and making New Years special year after year. But, another part is the difficulty Vic sometimes has with accruing so many different powers since he met Matt and his super-sperm. Constantly waking up with weird powers takes its toll and it is nice for Vic to have one week a year where he doesn’t wake up breathing fire or with x-ray vision, simply as a normal human.

No matter how much they fight it and continue to lay the blame on exactly whose idea it was to not have sex every year in the first place, they end up making it through the week with minimal fondling, which for two guys who have very active sex drives, especially for one another, is a pretty big deal. Then, while highly anticipating their private New Year’s celebration, the two get sucked into going to Roxie’s party, which ends up being fun, yet still terrifying in a few interesting ways. They’re still together, though, and some booze, some really funny situations, and an empty room with a locked door make for a very fun (and funny) New Year’s.

I actually think this is one of my favorite Vic and Matt stories so far. I went about reading these the wrong way, which I think I understood a bit when I read the first story in the V series. It wasn’t until after reading the second V book, The V in Vengeance, that I realized there have been something like 30 stories and novels about this couple in the past. So that shows that while I don’t like to do it, just because of my reading preferences, you can read these as standalone stories, though reading them as a series, even just the V books together makes a more cohesive story.

But I like this story the most because my favorite stories with this couple are the funny ones. Usually involving a very drunk Matt, a mischievous Vic, and their ever present surprise superpower at the most inopportune moments creates a bit of a comedy show routine, where Murphy’s Law wins out every time. Those situations are the best, because this couple is so great when they laugh and have kinky funny sex.

There is a bit more setup in this story for the conclusion of the overall plot arc going on — the quest for rings in making their relationship more permanent, but in this installment of the series it was mostly passed over for hijinks and bawdy humor.

I’ve definitely enjoyed reading these stories and I’m already buying up stories so I can start at the beginning of their relationship and read in a proper order. It will be interesting to see things that I missed now that I’ve read much of their future stories. I can’t wait Definitely recommended.