Read my reviews of previous books in the Lost Boys series:
The Thief (#0.5) | The Skeptic (#1)
Sometimes you don’t know how much you need to hear (read) something until it comes along at exactly the right time in your life. Fox has been one of my favorite authors since I discovered the Wrecked series a few years ago, and I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve read by her, but The Crush will now always have a special place in my heart because of a moment in which one of the characters articulates a gap in my own life that I’d been experiencing, that the holiday season had made even harder.
“Acceptance is also a need.”
We all know by now that I cry at pretty much everything, but that line hit me particularly hard because of how important it is. Even though I am not anything like Walker or Ozzie, good fiction finds a way to speak to anyone in the audience.
On to the actual review portion of this post, before I start crying again, even though they’re definitely good tears.
I enjoy “bi-awakening” stories because I adore the evolution of people discovering their authentic selves. That there’s also a love story woven through that personal journey is just icing on the cake. The chemistry between Walker and Ozzie is blatantly obvious from the start, but Walker’s family and early life have conditioned him to think and feel a certain way. The crush on his side is an appreciation for a dear friend with a side helping of aesthetic admiration. On the other end, Ozzie understands that he’s experiencing the rite of passage of crushing on a straight man, and he’s so respectful of his friendship with Walker that he doesn’t see what literally everyone else does. Once their friend group smacks them with enough clue bats, Walker and Ozzie make that final connection with the delicious steam Fox writes so well, but also with a genuine friendship that so easily and sweetly transitions to love.
Unfortunately, nothing in life is easy. So, though Walker and Ozzie coming together is deliciously angst-free, the other shoe drops really hard. Fox has written about evil mobsters and human traffickers, but a couple of Texan small-business owners might be her worst villains yet. The extremes they go to “punish” Walker for living his truth (and finding love) are incredibly dramatic and might seem over the top, but Fox works an excellent explanation into the narrative that doesn’t justify their behavior but certainly explains it to readers who have the fortune not to know the horrible depths some families go to express their “love.”
This is very much Walker’s book, as he undergoes the bulk of the character development, but Ozzie is also a well-developed character that I enjoyed getting to know. We also learn more about the extended found family of the Lost Boys, as Fox sets up the context for the next book in this series, which I am very much looking forward to. And though this might not be a “holiday romance,” I hope other readers find the equivalent of a much-needed family hug they might also be missing this time of year in the pages of this lovely story.
Disclaimer: I received a digital review copy of this book from the author.