• Knight of Ocean Avenue

  • By: Tara Lain
  • Narrated by: K.C. Kelly
  • Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (334 ratings)

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Knight of Ocean Avenue  By  cover art

Knight of Ocean Avenue

By: Tara Lain
Narrated by: K.C. Kelly
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Publisher's summary

How can you be 25 and not know you're gay? Billy Ballew runs from that question. A high school dropout, barely able to read until he taught himself, Billy's life is driven by his need to help support his parents as a construction worker, put his sisters through college, coach his Little League team, and not think about being a three-time loser in the engagement department. Being terrified of taking tests keeps Billy from getting the contractor's license he so desires, and fear of his mother's judgment blinds Billy to what could make him truly happy.

Then, in preparation for his sister's big wedding, Billy meets Shaz - alias Chase Phillips - a rising-star celebrity stylist who defines the word gay. To Shaz, Billy embodies everything he's ever wanted - stalwart, honest, brave - but even if Billy turns out to be gay, he could never endure the censure he'd get for being with a queen like Shaz. How can two men with so little in common find a way to be together? Can the Stylist of the Year end up with the Knight of Ocean Avenue?

©2015 Tara Lain (P)2015 Dreamspinner Press

What listeners say about Knight of Ocean Avenue

Average customer ratings
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  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Fantastic!

Everything I was looking for!

I hesitated to try this book because other reviews complaining about Rue being over-the-top, even borderline a homophobic portrayal of a gay guy. that's ridiculous. the truth is lots of gay guys are just like that, art reflecting life and all that. several of the best laugh out loud comments in the book for me came from his calm comments.

that being said, I loved the lead characters in this book! an unlikely couple for sure, but together they do a great job of describing the various shades of the gay experience. playful light happy, a colorful cast, and a believable setting. if you're looking for an enjoyable story with gay characters enjoying love and sex together, this is the book for you!

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2 people found this helpful

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    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Good story with the wrong narrator

This was a charming story. The characters were a little implausible but it was sweet and charming and fun. The identity politics are handled with a degree of strength by the MCs and because of that the happy ending was earned which isn’t something all romances can say, especially not the fluffy ones like this.

The downfall of this audio book is the narrator and how utterly tone deaf he is to the subject matter. He sounds far too old and his execution of the more effite gay men was borderline offensive. There has to be a way to read effeminate men w/o sounding ludicrous and mildly offensive. His Shazz was bad enough but his Ru was awful beyond belief. I am just staggered by the fact that with a story about self-acceptence as the theme, the narrator doubled down on hypercamp as their go-to way of reading gay men so that you will know FOR SURE that he's reading a gay man. Even for the characters who were, in fact, campy it seemed over the top and he also came off as too old for a group for construction workers and fashionistas 20somethings running around SoCal. Take this same voice, cast it on a love story about 40-60 year olds and possibly some actual drag queens and you’d have had a real hit.Hes a genuinely poor match for this series. The narration brought down an otherwise lovely book to the point where I just flipped through the other ebooks in this series rather than getting the audio to find out what happened to the other characters in later books. YMMV but I am totally thrown.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Light and slow for me

This story was too slow paced and uneventful for me. I don't think there was anything the narrator did but I was easily bored. I know many people like angst free reading, but I am not one of them. i don't need it overly angsty but this one was just meh on the emotional draw for me.

I found Billy's confusion as to his sexuality a tad baffling at his age, but I liked the growth in him as a result his relationship with Shaz. Shaz, on the other hand, was too over the top for me. While Billy was just oblivious and clueless, Shaz was like Boy George's cousin. I just couldn't connect with anyone in this novel though I found the family dynamics interesting.

If you like light and fluffy, then you will probably love this one.

*Special thanks to Dreamspinner Audio for the audiobook given in exchange for an honest review.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Great coming out listen

This was a wonderful coming out/GFY story about Billy, a blue collar construction worker who is 25 and can't figure out why none of his relationships with women work out. He has a close knit family and a domineering mother who is always putting pressure on him to settle down with a nice woman. Then he meets Chase (aka - Shaz) and his world is rocked; in a good way. The story is told from both POVs, which I love because I want to know what each character is feeling. There is a little drama, a little angst and a lot of good feeling; it is a great comfort listen. The narrator does a really good job on most of the characters, except Rue, Chase's best friend. Both Rue and Chase are out and proud flamboyant gay men and I think he just goes slightly over board with Rue. He interpretation of Chase and Billy are spot on. Overall, I really enjoyed it.

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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Really liked it except for one thing

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I thought the story was great, I just could not get past the way the character Ru was voiced.

What didn’t you like about K.C. Kelly’s performance?

The way the speaker voiced Ru was off-putting. Yes, Ru is gay. But did the speaker need to make Ru sound so very mincing? Ru sounds like some homophobe's idea of what gay men sound like.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Loved it

Sometimes it’s nice to have a story with characters that don’t use the inner struggles as a reason to lash out at others. This is a sweet story of good people going through major life changes. Without the mean attempts to tare down their friends and family out of emotional distress before realizing they are being asshats and apologizing. The narrator is someone to get used to but he grows on you.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

?

This story was very very bland to me. Nothing exciting. And quite honestly I’m not a fan of those voices.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

horrible stereotype voices

I've read this story and really enjoyed it, but the narrator was awful. The voice for the character Ru was such an over the top stereotype, it was barely understandable. Shaz's inner voice was fine but the "speaking" voice was intermittently lispy and sometimes slow like fake posh. Very inconsistent. The main character Billy sound like he was from the East coast with a stereotypical blue collar "accent." The narrator was wrong for all the characters. The sample reading did not reflect how bad the narrator was. Completely ruined a fun book.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

STRONG STORY SURVIVED WEAK NARRATION

I enjoy Tara Lain, just wish a different reader was chosen for her work. Perhaps a voice coach or director is needed.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great story but...

I really enjoyed this book; however, I was not a fan of the narrator's voice for Ru AT ALL - it was actually really off-putting. It probably doesn't help that I listened to Ru's story right before this one though. I usually listen to audio books' full series back to back, and one of the things that really bugs me about audio books in general is having the same characters throughout the series with different voices - regardless of whether or not the narrator is the same. Thankfully in Ru's book, he doesn't sound anything like he did in this one...

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