Play It Again, Charlie by R. Cooper

After an accident left him broken in body and spirit, Charlie Howard retired from the police force to teach at a community college. Life has taught him that he’s unlikely to get what he wants, so he’s stopped asking. Instead, he hides from the world in the apartment complex he manages. After all, no one can leave him if he doesn’t let anyone in.

Will, a sexy, classic-film-loving twink, moves into the apartment across from him and—to Charlie’s surprise—makes it clear that he’d like nothing more than to hole up with Charlie and get kinky. Will has no problem expressing what he wants in bed or out of it, but he’s never dated anyone long-term, and Charlie isn’t sure Will’s ready for anything serious.

Charlie is a serious kind of guy. He wants Will and everything a relationship could mean, even if he doesn’t have any experience in that scene—even if that makes him vulnerable. As they grow closer, Charlie realizes that it’s time to start asking for what he wants, and if he wants to be happy, he’ll have to risk everything and ask Will to stay.

3.75/5 stars

This book was a little hard to get into, but once I did I found I liked it a lot. Some of the dialogue was hard to understand considering Will quotes old movies constantly and jumps around to different topics and it seemed like it took awhile to actually have anything happen between Will and Charlie and when things did start to get rolling between them it was full of misunderstandings and miscommunications. I wasn't to fond of the daddy issues, but I guess it fit with Will's character, even though I didn't really see Charlie as a "daddy" kind of guy. To me a "Daddy" is very alpha, communicates what he wants/needs, and just generally has the upper-hand in the relationship which is the opposite of how I saw Charlie. Will came across as a very young and at times naive guy who sees in Charlie a man he can have a real relationship with for the first time. Somehow the two guys fit together very nicely and I was happy to see them get their HEA. This being the first book I've read by R. Cooper I wasn't sure what to expect, but now I'm excited to read another one and hope others will give them a chance.