The Restoration
Owen Calloway knows how to restore damaged things. Two hundred years of grime and neglect, paintings that have been painted over, forgotten — he can find what's underneath. He's patient. Methodical. He works in millimeters.
He is considerably less equipped to handle his own damage.
When he catches his boyfriend in their bed with someone else, Owen does what feels safest: he goes numb. A hookup app. A username that says everything — nothere4chat. No names, no mornings, no risk. He's gotten good at empty.
Then he matches with watershedben.
Ben Navarro is a bartender with a nose ring, a bar full of regulars who'd take a bullet for him, and a smile that Owen cannot stop looking at. He's also grieving someone he lost, and he's not looking for anything serious either. But he keeps asking Owen to stay a little longer. And Owen keeps saying yes.
The Restoration is a slow-burn MM romance about two men learning that the things most worth keeping are the ones you have to be brave enough not to walk away from.
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Available in: Paperback
Reader Reviews
1 rating
Sabrina D.
Beautiful story of love and healing.
Owen's job is restoring old paintings, millimeter by millimeter, hours of patience and a steady hand. He is a very realistic character who feels everything so deeply to the point he ends up feeling nothing at all.
The pain Owen experiences after the ultimate betrayal from his ex, he stops feeling everything, everything is dull and bland. No more color or flavor. Until he meets Ben.
Someone who is beyond understanding, caring and loving. Gentle in the hopes of making the world feel a little less sad.
The way their relationship slowly builds, the trust that is formed is one that makes my heart ache. But sometimes that's not enough. You know the saying, you don't know what you've got until it's gone. Owen's fear of being in love again and then being hurt overtook all of him and he did the hurting first. But all that did was teach him that he was truly in love this time, in a way that time doesn’t heal.
The beautiful story explores mental health, romantic love, platonic love, the beauty of art, and how your past can define you in both the bad and the good, but you choose what to make of it.
I started reading at 9 pm and had to force myself to go to bed after 11 because I would stay up until I finished it. I finished it this morning, this book was addictive in the best way.