Reviewed by Valerie

TITLE:  Where There’s a Will

SERIES:  Lost Boys Duet #1

AUTHOR:  Jessie Walker

PUBLISHER:  Self-Published

LENGTH:  497 pages

RELEASE DATE:  October 15, 2021

BLURB:

He was everything I never wanted.

Impulsive. Careless. Self-Destructive. I’m the cliché they all warn you about. The head case with a pretty face. If I’m not chasing the bottom of a bottle, I’m snorting a line off a girl’s ass. That guy you know who plays Russian Roulette at parties? That’s me.

But that all changes when he comes barreling back into my life.
Will Foster.

The boy from my childhood. The boy I told myself was a fluke. A mistake. Nothing.

It’s only a matter of time before he learns the truth. Before he sees me for who I really am under all the bullshit. Broken. Tainted. Worthless.

He wants to love me whole, but shouldn’t he know better than that by now?
Saving someone who doesn’t want to be saved is a recipe for disaster…

And loving someone who doesn’t want to be loved? Fucking hopeless.

* Where There’s A Will is a full-length, slow-burn, emotional MM romance novel. The story continues in If There’s A Way, which is set to release Winter 2022. This book deals with topics that may be difficult for some to read.

Trigger Warnings: Grief, mental illness (including suicidal thoughts/behaviors, and on-page mentions of a death by suicide), substance abuse/addiction, homophobia (internalized and externalized), and trauma as a result of child abuse (physical/verbal/psychological)

REVIEW:

I am drowning. Drowning in overwhelming want for this guy. This fucking guy who just told me I was once his everything, when I was sure I was only ever his nothing.”

Where There’s a Will is an extraordinary novel, as close to perfect as any book I’ve read. Its rawness lends an authenticity that makes it read like an autobiography rather than a work of fiction. Jessie Walker – astoundingly, a first-time novelist – makes the agony of grief, substance abuse and addiction, suicide, and child abuse feel like it’s a first hand experience. There’s a shocking amount on loss – of life, innocence, friendship, and humanity – but there’s an even greater amount of love and hope to keep the book from falling over the precipice irretrievably into darkness. None of the horrors feel gratuitous; all aspects are integral to the lives of childhood friends, Will and Way, now twenty-one. The critical parts of their childhoods are told through flashbacks.  

The book has so much complexity that describing the plot risks spoiling it so I’ll be brief. In the tiny Pennsylvania town of Shiloh, Will Foster and Waylon McAllister were best friends for a short time when they were eleven years old. Will was a lifeline for Way, whose home life was awful. Their friendship broke apart and Will’s family moved away, but their hearts remained bonded, for better or worse. A decade later, Will’s life is in shambles. He drops out of college and after driving somewhat aimlessly for two months, he impulsively returns to Shiloh, not sure who or what he’ll find. Way is not pleased to see him, but Will doesn’t know where else to turn. He can’t go back home to Philly – there’s nothing there for him anymore other than the torment of bad memories – so he faces Way and their painful past.  

This is what I came back for. Not for answers. Not for closure. I came back to remember what it was like to be happy. To be whole.”

I think about how many times I’ve used the word “heartbreaking” in my reviews. I’ll be more judicious in the usage from now on because this book showed me the true meaning of that word. It’s on a whole other level of soul shattering. I cried when Way snarled “I hate you” to Will. Perhaps it’s really himself he hates, or he hates that Will’s reappearance makes Way face a part of himself he has long denied. It’s not that he doesn’t want to be with Will, it’s that he can’t. Childhood trauma is mentally blocking him from accepting Will as a lover. He’s terrified of his feelings. Which will win – fear or hunger? 

There’s an indelible scene when Will and Way are trashed, laying next to each other on the floor of a bar after hours. It’s dark except for bursts of lightning. Their drunken dialogue reads almost like a stream of (barely) consciousness. The alcohol breaks down their inhibitions and allows honesty to shine through. The writing is brilliant.  

The sex is desperate. Ms. Walker takes us along on Will and Way’s exquisite sensual journey as they wrap themselves around each other, touching – memorizing – with fingers, lips, and tongues. It’s sometimes brutal, always emotional.  

Waylon watches me through slitted eyes. He looks angry. Fucking wrecked. He’s never looked more beautiful than he does now—light bruises from my mouth littering the column of his neck. His collarbone. Right above that fucking hot-as-sin piercing. He’s a goddamn wet dream.” 

Music is essential to the narrative and is cleverly incorporated into scenes throughout the book. It speaks the words the troubled men of the talented Lost Boys band – Waylon, Mason, and Shawn – can’t always articulate through their pain. There are songs representing five decades of music. 

The supporting characters – including Mason, Shawn, Way’s cousin Ivy, and his uncle Reggie – are all well-developed with distinct attributes that affect the leading men positively and negatively. They are essential in Will and Way’s journey. As with everything else, they are gritty and real. 

Unfortunately, this book is part one of two and it ends with a distressing cliffhanger. But at almost five hundred pages, it’s clear why the story had to be split into two. If There’s a Way is scheduled for a winter 2022 release. I hope that’s accurate and it’s not longer; three to five months is going to be an unbearable wait. 

But don’t let that deter you. Where There’s a Will is a powerful look at loss and love and hope with two complicated man who I pray will find a way to a well-deserved happily ever after. 

RATING: 

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