This book is a beautiful reckoning with grief. The author writes about dealing with the passing of his father, with whom he has had a close relationship. Dai Woolridge does not offer platitudes, or quick fixes, or a seven-step program for healing. He grapples with the realities of pain, mental health and faith. I loved his creative and honest prayers, even if I couldn't connect with many of  the "RE: PRAYER" sections of the book where he writes responses to his prayers from God. I like that he included his wife's perspective in the last chapter, in which she talks about the very complex grieving process of those who walk beside grievers.

I really enjoyed this book! Grief is such a hard subject to talk about and I appreciated how honest the author was about his journey through the loss of his father. I felt as though he were chatting with me as a friend and the verses and prayers were beautiful. I would recommend this book to anyone going  through grief and those who want to help and understand how grieving really feels.

This book was very timely for me and I found Dai's openness very refreshing and healing.  Grief isn't necessarily as a result of losing someone but in this case it was. 

Dai he didn't have much time between learning about his fathers illness and his death, not that anything can prepare you for losing someone you love.  His emotions were all over the place, this saw him questioning his faith, then leaning into it, coping with the diagnosis of depression and accepting these new feelings and working through them.

I liked the Dai Dictionary throughout the book, it was both entertaining and a learning tool but even more I thought it was great that he referred to God's work throughout with bible verses and prayer.

There were two parts of the book that really struck a chord with me, equally so.  The first is the Prayers throughout which were done first from Dai and the second prayer he has written from the perspective of God.  The moving prayer from the book consisted of Dai's prayer being blank (he was really struggling) and the prayer from God being so intimate and loving.
Dai's Prayer ...  
God's Response: I hear you. Every silence. Every pause. Every intake of breath followed with no words. Know I hear them all. I know. I hear. So know that I AM here.

The second part of the book that was moving for me was the chapter written by Dai's wife Cath.  From a wife's perspective I see it as a love letter to her husband.  I will end with the words that Cath wrote that were perhaps the most intimate in the whole book.
"I have seen beauty in the brokenness like no other beauty I have experienced...I have seen it in Dafs and known it in me.  This loss has left us both with a limp but somehow it's a beautiful limp."

This book reads a little like it could have been titled "What to expect when you're not expecting to lose someone." It details the author's personal experience with losing his father unexpectedly in a memoir-like style that some people may really enjoy. I felt that provided some good insight for people who are reading and have never personally experienced loss but would like to know how best to support people in their lives who have. It may also be comforting for some people who need to be reassured that what they are thinking and feeling is all completely normal and acceptable but don't want to read a coldly distant textbook that just says that. There's something about knowing another human being has been through it, isn't there? I found myself nodding along with some of the things the author described. 
All of that said, I felt this book focused so much on the personal experience that the connections to scripture and prayer were a little loose, almost like the prayers were thrown in as an afterthought in some chapters. Only three chapters stood out in my mind as having that clear scriptural connection and they were tucked in the middle of the book. I didn't care at all for the responses to the prayers and would have preferred to see more about the scripture that's included after the reply instead. If these were things the author heard from God, that should have been explained more clearly, I couldn't quite tell. I also felt the "Dai Dictionary" was completely unnecessary - most of the terms on those lists didn't require explanation, could have been explained in the narrative or even replaced entirely.  
Overall, I felt like this book could be a good read for someone who isn't experiencing their own personal loss or has had enough time to heal and is ready to read someone else's experience. I would have a hard time recommending this to a friend without giving a few disclaimers along with it. It's also a pretty quick read, I finished in one sitting.
**I received a copy of this book for review from NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.**

I loved this book. It's wonderful for if you're grieving anything in your life. I was hoping it would be a little more helpful to those helping people walk through the grieving process, but it's mostly for people struggling with where God is in their grief. Part memoir, part inspirational. So many parts of this book spoke to me!

*gracias a netgalley for my copy of this book*