SUSAN: BOOK REVIEW "Skybound" by Aleksandr Voinov

SUMMARY:

Germany, 1945. The Third Reich is on its knees as Allied forces bomb Berlin to break the last resistance. Yet on an airfield near Berlin, the battle is far from over for a young mechanic, Felix, who’s attached to a squadron of fighter pilots. He’s especially attached to fighter ace Baldur Vogt, a man he admires and secretly loves. But there’s no room for love at the end of the world, never mind in Nazi Germany.

When Baldur narrowly cheats death, Felix pulls him from his plane, and the pilot makes his riskiest move yet. He takes a few days’ leave to recover, and he takes Felix with him. Away from the pressures of the airfield, their bond deepens, and Baldur shows Felix the kind of brotherhood he’d only ever dreamed of before.

But there’s no escaping the war, and when they return, Baldur joins the fray again in the skies over Berlin. As the Allies close in on the airfield where Felix waits for his lover, Baldur must face the truth that he is no longer the only one in mortal danger.

REVIEW:

I should be angry with Aleksandr Voinov for writing such SHORT "books", not even novellas...pamphlets, maybe. BUT, it would be impossible to be angry with Aleksandr Voinov because he could write ONE sentence and you'd love it, it would be THAT good.

"Skybound" felt like one sentence long...started and ended way too quickly. But it was beautiful. I don't classify it in any one genre (historical, M/M, romance, political)...but rather, a love letter, maybe, written from one to another. Where I'd normally get frustrated that I didn't get to know enough about the characters of Felix and Baldur in such a short read, I feel like I was actually rewarded with simply a strong sense of longing and love between the two. I felt almost voyeuristic into something so intimate shared between glances, clicks of a safety belt, shared cigarettes with much deeper meaning.

IN A NUTSHELL:
All in all, hard to describe how something so short could be so good. But it was...so, so good.  Beautiful and quick read.