Books & Literature

Book Review: Soul Mates, by KA Moll

In Soul Mates, the protagonist, Zane, is a lesbian Pastor, and survivor of sexual assault. The story is an old one: the search for redemption and healing through love. Zane’s object of desire is Jaina, who is a survivor of foster care.

This is one of KA Moll’s earlier novels. Based in Illinois, Moll’s background in psychology and therapy, forms the basis for her books, which often deal with women overcoming past trauma. She also self-identifies as a “lesbian author”.

Her work clearly comes from an authentic place, and she deserves kudos for that. However, her writing is simplistic and clunky at best.

Soul Mates200In Soul Mates, the protagonist, Zane, is a lesbian Pastor, and survivor of sexual assault. The story is an old one: the search for redemption and healing through love. Zane’s object of desire is Jaina, who is a survivor of foster care. It’s already too much for one, small book.

Interestingly, Zane has a close friendship with an ostensibly straight woman, Irene, and I must say that I thought there would be a psychological twist, with her finding Irene to be her soul mate, rather than the obvious choice of Jaina. I was disappointed. Irene seems to be nothing more than a prop, and is never fully developed as a character.

Mind you, neither are Zane and Jaina.

Moll has fallen into the trap of drawing characters that are nothing more than the sum total of their trauma. And in that sense they are ciphers rather than people.

The book contains the expected, soft erotic scenes, which are tender and titillating. Yet they, like everything in this novel, are just too self-conscious. For instance, once a character has been introduced as someone’s “wife” we don’t need to have her referred to as“her wife” at every opportunity. We get it.

Moll consistently under-rates her readers’ intelligence. She seems allergic to pronouns, and uses characters names at every, unnecessary turn. This ruins the flow, and makes the book more difficult to read. She generally needs to do some serious work on her writing of dialogue, which is almost an object lesson in how NOT to write.

In essence, this is a light romance, with some dark psychology thrown on top. It would make a good, summer read, and may particularly appeal to the young, adult reader.

I think Moll has some better writing in her. Let’s hope she does the work she needs to do in order to produce that.

Reviewed by Tracey Korsten
Twitter: @TraceyKorsten

Rating out of 10:  6.5

Publisher: Triplicity Publishing
Release Date: May 2015
RRP: US$14.99 paperback, US$9.99 eBook

@ka_moll @TriPubBooks @TraceyKorsten

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