Rating: 4.25 stars
Buy Link:
Amazon | iBooks | Amazon UK
Length: Novel

 

It was a big change for Avi to move from NYC to Boston and to a new high school in the middle of the year, and it’s an even bigger change when his mother remarries. Included in the package is Kyran, Avi’s new stepbrother, who hates Avi at first sight. Kyran is the star quarterback and he’s driven and has no room for Avi in his life and he lets everyone know it. Avi is his complete opposite, as he’s an artist and a dreamer and is always getting high. Kyran thinks that Avi is a stoner that doesn’t care about anything and Avi thinks Kyran is a mean jock, but neither of them know the other at all. Kyran thought going to college would mean getting away from his uncaring father and away from Avi, but Avi winds up at the same school.

When financial constraints mean there is no money for college, the guys find themselves in a compromising situation. When Avi proposes the two of them team up for an Only Fans account, Kyran is not on board. But he needs the money to keep his football dream alive and maybe he doesn’t hate Avi as much as he has always insisted. The heat between the two of them is scorching and the cash rolling in has them making riskier videos. But Kyran is going to fight this attraction with everything he has and, anyway, Avi doesn’t know the truth about Kyran and Kyran never wants Avi to know his darkest secret.

This book certainly packs a lot into it, as it is over 700 pages. All of those pages lead to great character development for both Avi and Kyran, as well as a tumultuous relationship between the two. They start off as enemies, as Kyran wants nothing to do with Avi either at home or at school. He’s vicious and violent at times and Avi mostly shrugs it off, but there are moments where it’s clear Kyran gets to him.

Kyran has lived with his father, with whom he has a strained relationship. There are indicators dropped of what happened to Kyran and that gets written in throughout the story. The guys present themselves as enemies at first, but there is really a lot they need to get through, especially Kyran.

Kyran will tell you that he has no interest in spending time with Avi, but when they are alone together, their hostility turns into some seriously heated encounters and Kyran consoles himself by believing it’s “only for the fans.” While Kyran will insist he doesn’t like Avi and will insist he’s not interested in men and he’s truly vicious to Avi at times, there is a lot to uncover in his story. Each scene brings the guys closer together in remarkable ways, along with jealousy mixed in with the heat and hostility to get these guys to a better place where they become everything to each other.

For most of the book, I was impressed that the 700+ pages didn’t feel too long and Kyran and Avi’s story moved at a good pace and held my interest. It was in the later part of the book where Kyran’s story comes out and he deals with his parents and Avi deals with some fallout of his own that it went a bit sideways for me. Along the way, sure, there were scenes I felt weren’t needed or that could have been tightened up, but the family interactions didn’t work for me.

The ending leaves these guys in the best place they could be and, after so many pages, still leaves an opening for more to their story ,which the author states she intends to write and I will then intend to read.