There were so many things wrong with this book. The premise was solid, but I couldn't get past the misogyny and negative stereotypes. Women were portrayed as weak and hysterical. And the MCs were really unlikeable.

I am having the hardest time putting this review together. 4.5 stars for me for this friends to lovers + second chance romance + gay for you story. Two of those tropes are not in my favorites category but it didn't seem to matter in this story. Even the switching from present to past and back again, which often annoys me, simply fit here.

It started out hot, hot, fan-needed hot.

"Holy shit," he says, when he recovers. "Where the fuck did you learn to do that?" .......... "Will?" North says. "What?" I groan, mimicking his sleepy annoyance to a tee. "I'm gonna need to borrow that magazine..."

Will and North are two extremely alpha males whose banter is non-stop action. The ribbing and snark remind me so much of a couple I know, long time friends of mine. You'd think they were enemies as much as they snap at each other, but their love is stronger than any I've seen.

So I'm sitting back, enjoying the hell out of this book. Then, just when I had the AC turned way down, the fans blowing and my squirming under control, ready for more smoking hot scenes, it turned scarily raw and heart-breaking.

We are witness to extreme homophobia, total animosity, hate crimes, abuse, cruelty, and FEAR. Afraid, beat down, feeling worthless, North throws all their years of friendship away and shatters Will's heart.

"I don't get to say shit about who he sleeps with because I'm not man enough to front up and claim him as my own."

I highlighted over half the book. There are so many poignant scenes and quotes. So much truth presented in raw language. It is a shocking portrayal of how wrong society can really go when it thinks it has good intentions.

I dream of a life where things are very different between us, and him wrapping his arms around me as we slept doesn't have to be dirty or secret or shameful---it's just love, comfort and companionship, and it's beautiful.

Beautiful and gripping, tummy-turning, heart-stopping rawness, is what this book delivers. It left me happy, but completely wrung out.

This book was so frustrating! North was so annoying and a coward *sigh*

Read the full review on Bookaholics Not-So-Anonymous.

Note: This ARC was provided by Give Me Books Promotions in exchange for an honest review.

What do you do when the one person you want and need just happens to be the very person who's hurt you unlike any other? And what do you do when the one person you want and need just happens to be the very person you've hurt to the point of hatred? My heart broke for both Will and North because they deserved to be happy and that happiness could only be found with one another. Unfortunately, neither was leaving Red Maine any time soon, so they were stuck in a town that looked at homosexuality as something disgusting and a reason to treat a fellow human being like they were less than what they were. But sometimes, when you push aside the fear, the anger, and the pain, and you focus on who and what matters--the person you want to spend forever with and those shared feelings--then love, indeed, prevails.

Will and North. North and Will. This is one of those cases where one without the other doesn't work or make sense. They're a unit and I prefer thinking of them that way, so I can't really compare the two and choose which one I like better. They both have issues and they're far from perfect, but they provide one another with that sense of acceptance that allows them to feel vulnerable without the fear of being judged. Of course, it wasn't always that way, but then we can blame the twelve-year "cold war" on that. Aside from them, I also have a soft spot for Will's father, who is what every parent should aspire to be like. With characters I adore and a story I love, Finding North is a five-plus-starred highly recommended read, one that I pre-ordered on Kobo and am now the happy owner of because this book is too good to not purchase. ♥

For grown men, they acted like kids. Which made me disbelieve their path to commitment and think very little of their happily ever after.

This was a little long, and I didn't really feel the chemistry between the MCs. I feel like they were just together because they never got closure for what happened when they were younger. Also, they didn't communicate. They really needed to sit down and talk about what happened previously and work that all out before becoming a couple and having a real relationship. They'd get jealous but they'd just fall into bed to fix it and never discuss it. But they weren't really in a relationship, so no one had the right to be mad. That was just aggravating for me as the reader. And for the love of God could North find a pair and admit he's gay already?! That dragged out far too long. The other thing that bothered me where the flashbacks. This is purely preference, but I'd rather get the whole backstory at the beginning of the end, not in flashbacks in bits and pieces. There was always something indicating that it was a flashback, but there was never anything saying you were back to the present. You just had to start reading to figure it out. Overall it was a decent story, but I could have done with it being shorter and less mis/non-communication.

Beautiful story about good and evil, love and hate and heartbreak.
Highlighting the struggles of LGBT's face all over the world..

3.25 stars

Freefalling straight into perfection

"I hope I always feel like this. I want to always be right where we are now, my hand in his, freefalling. Not into the water, but into one another. But even twelve-year-old me knows that once North finds out my secret, this feeling, these butterflies torpedoing inside my gut, will all be ripped away, replaced with thorns, fear, hatred, and ugly words."

Carmen Jenner is one phenomenally talented Australian author and when I realised that she had written a mm (male-male) romance novel I was shocked but not surprised. And only shocked because it wasn’t until I read the blurb that I realised it was about two guys ... Carmen’s talent is boundless so I knew that if she wanted to write about two men falling in love, it’d be a fabulous story. And Finding North is certainly one incredible romance.

Will and North are best friends - well, were best friends until an incident that happened 12 years ago pushed them and their potential love apart. Will is openly gay; something that isn’t easy to do in a small steel mill country town in NSW, Australia. And North, he’s the one man that Will has truly loved and the one man who has the power to break Will’s heart over and over again. North has a lot of demons to battle when it comes to his sexuality, but the biggest is the fear of losing Will, if only he was brave enough to admit it. He’s not keen on labelling whatever it is he feels for Will, and herein lies the problem - because when you live in a town full of prejudiced, homophobic people, not making a decision about who you are can almost be as bad as identifying with a group that is (unfortunately) looked down upon.

"Everywhere I look it seems everyone is comfortable in their skin. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like that—completely comfortable with who I am."

Carmen treats the subject of gay romance, of love between two men, of homophobic behaviour and homophobia, with such respect and realism. My heart was in my throat for so much of this book and I spent a good portion of the second half with tears pricking my eyes. Will and North are characters you can’t help but fall in love with and I am no exception. Their story isn’t easy, it isn’t without heartache, it isn’t a comfortable read - but it’s a book about learning to love yourself, learning to accept that you can fall in love with a person regardless of their gender, and learning that there are some horrible people in this world but you can’t live your life for them, you have to live it for you.

I absolutely adore this book - words can’t adequately express how much I love it. Will and North are two men who won’t be leaving my heart and mind anytime soon.

nicandbooks â¤ï¸â¤ï¸â¤ï¸â¤ï¸â¤ï¸
Amazon/Goodreads â­ï¸â­ï¸â­ï¸â­ï¸â­ï¸

3.5 stars