A. B. Jackson – Stolen Moments book review: A queer love story born from a secret pop star romance
Stolen Moments leaves us still chewing, still listening - and unashamedly wanting another serving
Queer love stories shaped by secrecy tend to ask harder questions. Stolen Moments, the debut novel from A. B. Jackson, is one such story – a romance forged between an impossibly attractive but closeted global pop star and the man who unexpectedly becomes his refuge. Set against the machinery of fame and commercial control, the novel explores desire not as liberation, but as something negotiated and rationed.
At its heart, Stolen Moments is a fictionalised lived reality – one that sits uncomfortably close to the truth. Jackson’s dedication to “Sk8er Boi” is a breadcrumb easily missed: this story is inspired by real events, involving a real, living, extremely famous man whose queerness has remained, for some time, commercially inconvenient. Jackson is careful with his framing. “Loosely inspired by a true story” is an invitation to wonder – perhaps even to fantasise – but not to hunt. In a post-Baby Reindeer world, that distinction matters. Gay sleuths, stand the fuck down.
Stolen Moments reminds us that even in the 2020s, silence can still be the business model, and commercial viability the leash
What the novel quietly interrogates is closeting not as personal cowardice, but as commercial strategy. We are comfortable criticising elite sport – Premier League football, in particular – as one of the most aggressively closeted systems still standing. The music industry, by contrast, is often granted a progressive halo it does not always deserve. Stolen Moments reminds us that even in the 2020s, silence can still be the business model, and commercial viability the leash.
The story unfolds through dual perspectives: Alexander Morgan, an A-list pop star at the pinnacle of global fame, and Christopher Foster, a British man temporarily unmoored from his own life, who collides with Alexander’s world in a moment of improbable grace. Falling in love with an impossibly attractive, ostensibly “straight” celebrity is practically a rite of passage for many gay men – formative, humiliating, delicious, unreciprocated. What Stolen Moments dares to ask is: what if the universe cracked open just once?
The alternating viewpoints sizzle side by side. By granting Alexander interiority, Jackson avoids the trap of pure projection fantasy. We see the cost of his gag: the fragility beneath the sculpted muscles, the exhaustion of being endlessly consumed, the siren pull of alcohol. Christopher, meanwhile, is not simply the recipient of fantasy, but its counterweight. Marked by a toxic maternal relationship, family damage and a dry British wit, he brings friction and emotional weight to the romance. These are two men limping with baggage well over the limit, colliding under wildly unequal conditions.
The sex is unapologetically erotic, serving character rather than Fifty Shades of Grey-style eye-roll
There is a familiar ache in Christopher’s loneliness – not unlike the quiet agony of Notting Hill’s bookshop owner – loving someone the world deems too profitable to share. The fantasy layer here is potent: imagining truth where there is performance, and deep, unsanctioned desire beneath a public image rendered safely squeaky-clean.
Jackson’s prose carries the urgency of a debut. The pacing moves fast, scenes stack quickly, and the story surges forward with appetite. The sex is unapologetically erotic, serving character rather than Fifty Shades of Grey-style eye-roll. There are rough edges, but they’re part of the appeal. Like the first few bites of an outrageously good burger you absolutely didn’t plan to eat in January, it’s compulsion.
Accompanied by the release of Alexander Morgan’s music, the fantasy spills into sound. The tracks are catchy enough to deepen the fantasy and bring the character’s voice to life. As the first instalment in a trilogy, Stolen Moments leaves us still chewing, still listening – and unashamedly wanting another serving.
- Stolen Moments, the debut novel from A. B. Jackson, is available to pre-order now ahead of a 20 January 2026 release date. Follow the author on Instagram and TikTok.
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