Reviews with content warning for Adult/minor relationship - Lose You to Find Me

So this is my first read by Erik J. Brown! A lot of friends of mine had read All That's Left in the World and really loved it, so I was interested in this since it's by the same author. I'll definitely be reading All That's Left in the World after reading this, because this was such a nice book with good surprises in it.

First, as many reviews have stated, there are some instances of cheating in this book. However, I think the circumstances around it are important. Especially with how the book ends, it's clear the author didn't put these instances in frivolously. So I disagree with some reviews calling the MC a "homewrecker" especially since they are 17 yr olds and also

the person being cheated on was an adult college student (at least 21 yrs old) who had no business being with a child anyway (there is an important subplot to this and it, thankfully they aren't together by the end, but these details should be noted. That, along with some other behaviors from the bf, as well as some background info on the MC and the LI, there's just a lot going on.

While I don't think these things make the cheating okay by any means, I think context matters a lot.

So, with that being said, the characters ! I loved the MC, Tommy. He was a messy character, but what I felt in all this was that these characters felt so real and authentic, it was kind of wild how well Erik J. Brown was able to capture the woes of being a teenager. That was probably my favorite aspect of this entire book. The teenagers felt like teenagers. Tommy was stupid at times and made really bad decisions, same for Gabe. Sometimes, I wanted to shake Tommy and plead for him to stop this nonsense and attempts on getting someone to like him. But I feel like that's kinda what having an unrequited crush as a teenager feels like? I remember feeling the exact same way as him and I can't applaud the author enough for capturing such complex feelings so authentically. Not only that, but all the characters felt very authentic to me in their motivations and reactions. And I liked that this book will show teenagers there's not one, correct path to take after high school.

This brings me to my next point: the message of this book is beautiful. I truly want to cry just thinking about it. Life doesn't always go how we plan, no matter how hard we plan. And it's so amazing how the author weaved this into the storyline so many different ways. I think it's an extremely important message that any teenager reading this book needs to know. I wish I had this book when I was in high school because I think it would've done wonders for me (it's still done wonders for me as someone in her early twenties).

My main critique for this is that I felt like some scenes/plotlines went on longer than they needed and some should've been longer. Also, I would've liked to have seen more scenes with Brad (for reasons more obvious once you finish the book). He stole every scene he was in and I liked his growth a lot, but I needed like 2 scenes more with him haha. But, those are small gripes. The ending was exactly how I wanted it to be and it made me smile so big. This book is really great and I will be recommending it to many. I'm so happy Erik J. Brown wrote it.

Thank you so much to Balzer + Bray and NetGalley for an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

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