Reviewed by Chris
TITLE: Connection
SERIES: Evan and Jeremy #1
AUTHOR: Brigham Vaughn
PUBLISHER: Self-Published
LENGTH: 189 pages
RELEASE DATE: October 15, 2015
BLURB:
After a lifetime of being told he’s worthless, shy, sheltered Evan Harris is forced out of the closet and kicked out of his home. Friends in Atlanta give him a place to stay while he gets on his feet, but despite his eagerness to explore the city, it isn’t exactly what he expected.
Physically and emotionally scarred from a devastating car accident, Jeremy Lewis struggles to reconcile the brash, outgoing man he used to be with the social recluse he’s become.
Loneliness draws them to each other, but a strong mutual attraction isn’t enough to overcome their pasts. In order to be together, Evan must discover his own worth and Jeremy must trust someone to see past his scars.
REVIEW:
I’ve only ever read one other book by this author before (the first in the Equals series) but I found I enjoyed it so I thought I would give this one a try. While I probably should have finished the rest of the Equals series before tackling this, I found that what I didn’t know didn’t seem to stop me from liking Evan, Jeremy, or their story.
Evan, a funeral director (which is a pretty interesting job even if I wouldn’t be caught dead doing it) has been kicked out of his house for being gay. With nowhere to go, he turns to an acquaintance in Atlanta in the hopes they can give him a place to crash while he gets his life in order. It is thru them that he meets Jeremy, an ex of his friend’s boyfriend. Jeremy was pretty severely hurt in a car crash over a decade ago, and is still suffering from it. Despite being attracted to Evan from almost the get-go, he refuses to have anything more than friendship with the young man. It is, in the end, a bit of a losing battle.
This book is a bit (ha!) of a slow burn. Which I admit is one of my favorite types. I like the anticipation, the angst. It works well with me. So I enjoyed this aspect of the book quite a bit. There was just enough almost-there-but-not-quite moments to keep me in suspense and to keep me hooked.
These were two very well written characters. I liked the age difference (about 15-ish years I think) and I really liked how they felt their age. Jeremy, with all his problems, is a nice big ball of messed-up. And Evan is insecure enough to make me want to hug him, but not so annoying in it that I want to smack him. It is a fine balance, and I like that the author was able to pull it off.
A lot of the tension in this books comes from Jeremy not being able to (at least he thinks) have a relationship anymore thanks to his scars and his still present injuries. I could have felt a bit disingenuous, but the constant flair ups of pain and depression made Jeremy’s reticence a bit more believable, if not any less frustrating. I guess I trusted that Evan would wait out Jeremy (and wear him down), and in the end I got a nice reward.
Not a perfect reward, though, since this definitely falls in the HFN category. Not my favorite of endings, but it did leave us on a high note so I’ll deal. I get that it will probably take a whole lot longer for these two to work out their issues, so I am willing to hang on till I read book two in the series to see how they deal.
Overall I found this book pretty enjoyable. And it has kinda made me want to go back and finish the first series in this universe so that I can catch up with some of the secondary characters in this one. I do like a well written slow burn and this book does it really well. Totally recommend it, if that is your kind of thing.
RATING: 
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