Good Intentions is somewhere between male adolescent wish-fulfillment, soft-core erotica, paranormal romance, and urban fantasy. The plot revolves around a pretty ordinary guy, still living in his mom’s basement, who decides to sneak into the local graveyard to get a few atmospheric pictures. He’s hoping to use the pictures to impress a pair of cute goth chicks in his photography course, lacking the gumption to simply approach them without a prop.
As fate would have it, though, he interrupts a midnight ritual and ends up supernaturally bound to a succubus on one side and an angel on the other. Permanently bound. And of course they are both female, and supernaturally attractive, as you might expect.
It’s not exactly a fate worse than death.
Despite the rather Mary Sue nature of the story, it’s not entirely fun and games, nor is it an endless romp between the sheets. To be sure, there’s a lot of sex, making up at least half the book. The other half of the book involves an occasional threat from demonic forces and convincing the angelic third of the trio to let down her hair and join the fun.
The plot lacks the usual scale of supernatural murder investigation or world-ending threat found in most urban fantasy tales; the author is quite content to keep the stakes low, the action to a minimum, and the tone lighthearted and sexy. The main characters are refreshingly well drawn for what could easily have been an exercise in wish-fulfillment, though the villains are little more than stereotyped props. On the other hand, villains play such a small role that ordering from central casting is probably more appropriate than attempting a nuanced portrayal of a complex character within the few pages available.
This book should probably be kept away from awkward teenage boys who might mistake the contents for reasonable relationship strategies, or worse, start sneaking into graveyards in hopes of scoring a pair of hot chicks. For anyone who has the maturity to enjoy the wish-fulfillment while understanding that fantasy is not reality, this distinctly lighter-than-air fare is moderately enjoyable while containing absolutely no emotional impact whatsoever.
Just don’t read it in public, because there is absolutely no redeeming value you could use to explain why you are reading it. You’ll have to fess up to the truth: it’s mindless and mildly erotic entertainment. But if the ladies can have their 50 Shades of Grey, guys can have hot supernatural babes. And it could be worse; you could be watching prime time TV.
The sequel is Natural Consequences.
