Choosing the Light is the second book of A. J. Wilde’s Moment of Truth series. This is not a standalone story, so readers should read To Serve and Protect first.

While Toronto Detective Gary Carson lies in a hospital bed recovering from self-inflicted injuries, ghosts from his past begin to creep out of the woodwork. Ghosts that he can no longer keep secret from his partner and now lover Detective Sergeant Daniel Mason. Dan listens to Gary’s story of childhood abuse and horror and vows that he loves Gary, even though he knows that loving this damaged man is going to be a difficult road.

When an ex-lover of Gary’s is kidnapped, he and Dan work together to rescue her, and in doing so, they come face-to-face with the very horror that has followed Gary for years. When they all come out of the situation relatively unscathed, they figure that life has given them a second chance…and that they need to hold on to their happiness.

Dan knows that Gary holds shadows inside him that he will probably never be free of. But when their relationship becomes strained, Dan overreacts. Sometimes words are said in anger that are better left unsaid, and Dan finds just the right – or the wrong – words that could possibly drive Gary away from him forever.

A. J. Wilde’s Choosing the Light picks up the story of Dan and Gary where the previous story’s cliffhanger left them dangling. Although it contains conflict on a man-against-man level, it is the emotional or psychological conflict that serves as the core of the story. The struggle between the detectives and old enemies is only a pale ghost of the struggle that the men go through on an interpersonal level. Dan remains a relatively rigid straight shooter who sees the world pretty much in black and white, and this includes his relationship with his lover. Gary is much less stable, is prone to self-mutilation with razor blades to relieve his emotional anguish, and probably should be taking some sort of antidepressant medication. They find that just plain love isn’t enough sometimes. When that love isn’t accompanied by understanding, there is a definite chance of disaster.

And so this story leaves us on yet another cliff’s edge, wondering which direction the relationship between these two such different men will take.

Reviewed by: Whitney