You’ve Reached Sam

You’ve Reached Sam by Dustin Thao

Reviewed by Tanya
📘📘📘📘📘

I love you @thedustinthao but I hate you just as much for making me this emotional mess.

This has been one of the saddest books I may have read to the point where I was actually ugly crying. Just silent furious, lump in throat tears. I was left feeling sad and I don’t think I’ve felt like that in a while after reading a book or ever.

Julie has her life planned out, to move out of Ellensburg with her boyfriend Sam, attend College in the city and spend the summer in Japan but then Sam dies. And everything changes for Julie. Heartbroken, Julie misses his funeral, throws out his things and tries to forget him and the awful way he died. But a message Sam wrote in her yearbook brings back memories. Julie calls Sam’s phone desperate to hear his voice again…and Sam picks up. She’s given a second chance to say goodbye!

Grief is…I don’t know to explain it…weird? Hard? Messy? I feel like Dustin really nailed the emotions and feelings so well. I really felt for Julie and her not wanting to let go of Sam. That fear of feeling like you’ll forget them or their voice. The sadness of moving on with life, knowing that theirs was taken so early. This book just really hit home. It felt really personal, there was a moment that felt so real to me that it just broke me. I don’t even know what to say but as sad of a book as it was it was also great!

I think this is one book that I’ll never forget and will stick with me forever. I know I’ll be thinking about it often. If you want an emotional yet beautiful read, I would definitely recommend this one.