A review by bookstosoothethesoul
The Ghost of Us by James L. Sutter

4.0

Wow this definitely lives up to the Cemetery Boys comparison! It has all the heart of that story that I adored so much. The main draw of the book for me was Aiden's relationship with Cara. In Cemetery Boy's the connection with the ghost is romantic, but I found Cara's platonic connection with Aiden to be just as compelling. Watching Cara's excitement about meeting a ghost turn to sadness as she becomes close friends with him and realizes that helping him means losing him was so emotional. Especially since she's a bit of an outsider, her making a close friend who understands her so well only to watch him get closer to moving on was incredibly angsty. The sapphic romance plot was also adorable. I loved watching two queer teens navigate their first relationship. YA can be hit or miss for me because sometimes the characters feel too immature to be relatable for me. However, that wasn't the case at all with The Ghost of Us. Watching Cara struggle with the change that will come when her only (alive) friend graduates high school and leaves her felt so similar to my experience. That anticipatory grief during senior year is painfully relatable and I really felt for her as she tried to build a network of people only to realize that she couldn't keep them and was guaranteed to lose at least one. I 100% recommend this book and now I'm really excited to read more from this author!

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC!