The suspense in When I Am Through with You builds and holds the tension from beginning to end. Kuehn takes her time with story building, and I mean that in a good way. She evenhandedly parses out the details of Ben's backstory to develop a fully realized, authentic protagonist. Readers will sympathize with his past trauma and understand how it colors those times when he is unsteady and lacking confidence. Ben is an unreliable narrator and focalizer, so readers see the other characters and situations through his shaky lens. This keeps the reader unsettled, uncomfortable, and never able to rest or take a deep breath.

Kuehn's multiethnic cast of secondary characters have their own emotional baggage, secrets, and motives that are uncovered little by little. There are no stock characters here. Their personality clashes create an embattled group. When bad decisions culminate in a life-and-death situation, they form a tenuous cohesion through the shared goal of getting rescued, and readers will wonder whether they can keep it together.

The wilderness setting and the situations they encounter during the hiking trip mirrors the character's lives. The trip is an opportunity for personal growth and adventure, but it also full of danger. Their decision to pursue a rumored life-changing/life-giving sum of money (in an uncertain location), is the precursor for devastating events that spiral out of control. They are trying to survive (and get rescued from) on an isolated mountain with many vistas and difficult hiking paths, unpredictable weather, and devastating storms. They are simultaneously in nature and alienated from it. Unskilled at wilderness survival, their shortage of man-made resources and conveniences intensifies their challenges.

By the story's end, Ben has a deeper understanding of life--it's beauty, pain, and suffering, holding on, letting go, and making choices, the value of life and money, desire and want, and, ultimately, self-acceptance--that Kuehn communicates in a taut, evocative prose. It's intimate, too, because Ben talks to the reader, inviting them into his story and confessing his inner thoughts, demons, hopes, and deeds.

I didn't want the book to end. I wanted to know what happened to everyone, especially Ben, and what will happen in the future. But the not knowing seems fitting given exploration of life, for none of us know the future. While we do have choices, life is an unpredictable hike through the wilderness. (How's that for poetic?)

This was my first experience with Stephanie Kuehn's work, and I was not disappointed. While I felt some situations stretched beyond reality, I was still engrossed in this story, and I was invested in the outcome. This book will definitely find an audience in my library. Definite purchase.

If Stephanie Kuehn is not yet on your radar, do yourself a favor and add her to your must-read author list now. In the last few years, she has written some of the darkest, most intriguing young adult novels I have read. There hasn’t been one that has just been so-so. They all have damaged characters and dark themes and in pretty much every book at one point I think “WTF” in the best way possible.
In When I Am Through With You, there is mystery, thriller, and even some survivalist adventure. Just when I thought Kuehn couldn’t bring more to the table, she goes and ups herself. Ben Gibson is being charged with murder. We know whatever happened happens on a school hiking trip in the mountains. And slowly, Ben is going to tell us his story of how the trip goes completely and utterly wrong.
I had no clue where the story was going to go, but I was hooked from the start. Kuehn has a way of writing the most compelling characters who have realistic flaws and are entirely complex. Her writing is engaging, smart, and concise. I could not stop from the moment I began. The only problem is that once you finish, you will still be begging for more.

Stephanie Kuehn is a master of the psychological thriller. I always love how she takes you right inside the delusions and the internal dance of a broken psyche. I'm still not convinced I understand everything that happened. So suspenseful.

I could not get past the first few chapters of this book. The writing style confused me and did not interest me.

A confession to murder. A camping trip gone wrong. A high school kid with a checkered past and a dead girlfriend. Nothing is quite as it seems in <i>When I am Through With You </i>, from the story of why Ben killed his girlfriend to what actually happened to him with his stepdad all those years ago. Told over the course of the weekend camping trip, this thrilling ride of a story will leave the reader guessing until the very end.

I am a sucker for an unreliable narrator and a mystery. This story had all of this and more. This was gritty, dark, and definitely twisty. The characters were vaguely Gothic, reminding me at turns of Nick Carroway, Holden Caufield, and the rest of the Gatsby cast. Highly recommend. Definitely for HS readers, probably grades 10 and up due to multiple casual references to sex, drugs, language, and the violence in the storyline.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Dutton Books for providing me with an electronic ARC of this title for review. All opinions are my own.

When I Am Through With You by Stephanie Kuehn has a strong premise (it's an edgy update of the Lois Duncan-style thriller) and a strong voice (what a ridiculously good first chapter!), but the story and its characters do not develop in natural, believable, or meaningful ways. The characters - who aren't likeable to begin with, which is fine - make one regrettable decision after another - which is also fine, I guess. But by the time you reach the climax, the mystery isn't much of a mystery: it's just a sucky situation that a group of teens get themselves into, and they really do not do a good job of getting themselves out.

If teen readers are meant to empathize with these characters, Kuehn needs to throw her readers a bone. Sure, not everything in a mystery story needs to be fully explained, but YA thrillers should be carefully plotted and characters should have decipherable motives. Instead, When I Am Through With You expects readers to understand and accept the bruised selfishness of its characters to the point where it's doesn't just feel like tragedy for tragedy's sake. Some teen readers can do this, but not many. And who would want to?

Recommend to: high schoolers who like to read about damaged protagonists and depressing situations

Teenager Ben Gibson is not winning at life. He has chronic migraines as a result of a car accident he and his mother had when he was a child. His mother is chronically ill and depends on Ben to provide care and emotional support, but does nothing in return but snipe, criticizes, and accuse. While many would think Ben's girlfriend Rose definitely puts him in the winner's circle, her over-whelming demands has Ben confused about what love might really look like. When Ben decides to assist one of his favorite teachers in a Mountain Orienteering class, he thinks maybe this is his chance to be successful. His teacher certainly seems to think highly of him and is perhaps one of the first people in Ben's life to truly believe in him. He has no idea that this one trip will brand him a murderer and send him to prison, perhaps for life. Stephanie Kuehn does an excellent job of creating high school life in a small town, where some of the teens recognize they will never go anywhere but where they are now and others are plotting to escape as soon as they get their diplomas. While some of her characters may seem cliche, their stories are believable tropes that any young adult reader will recognize from their own lives or other YA novels they know and love. Ben's desire to take care of everyone, no matter what price he pays, is both heroic and tragic. Rose's confusing mixed signals make her a character many will find both appalling and intriguing. As Ben's tale unwinds and the reader discovers some of the horrible secrets he hides, the pages won't turn fast enough to get to the end of story and the heart of Ben's truth. This novel will find a wide audience in both teen and YA loving adult audiences and offers something for nearly every kind of reader. Recommended for high school and up. Profanity, drinking, drug use, gun violence, and sexual situations make it inappropriate for most young audiences. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I gotta be honest...I did not love the way this book gave it all away in the beginning. I mean, I didn't think it would be possible for the author to pull me into the story when I already knew the end. But I SSSOOO did not know the end! I mean, bam! The truth of what happened was colored completely by WHAT happened. And how it happened. And why.
Really really well done suspense and action. I felt scared and frozen by the end of the book, just as the characters were. I enjoyed it thoroughly and will look for other books from this author.

When I'm Through With You, by Stephanie Kuehn was definitely an interesting read: one that kept me grabbing my kindle every free minute I had. While the story was not exactly a typical scenario I would expect to read about the lives of teens, it was much more believable and realistic (and enjoyable) than reading about alternate universes or magical realms. In a way, this book was about survival and the choices people make for themselves and for the good of loved ones.
These days, after tragic gun deaths, more and more children have to grow up with first hand knowledge about gun violence. This book addresses that and could be helpful to young people having to deal with the consequences or aftereffects of gun violence.
While this book isn't one where the heroes ride off into the sunset holding hands and waiting for an exciting new day, it is a very good book and in many ways it is also a hopeful book. I recommend it.

This one didn't go anything like I was expecting.  That's not necessarily a bad thing.  However, it does make for a difficult task writing a review without giving too much away. 

Teenagers, weekend hike in the mountains, somebody dies.  That's the story in a nutshell.  There's a bit more to it, of course.  Ben starts off the story by telling you that he killed someone.  Not just any someone, but his girlfriend while at the same time claiming to love her very much.  Just how and why he killed her remains a mystery for much of the story.  Along the way we're introduced to a host of other characters with their own bits of intrigue.  

While this was a good enough story, I feel like it could have been more.  I somehow felt cheated by the ending as I was expecting something a bit juicier.  Still, it's suspenseful enough to keep you interested as you wonder just what's going to happen with this ragtag group of teenagers out in the middle of nowhere. 

Read it and let me know what you think!

I had the opportunity to read a digital arc of this book from NetGalley. For me there was just too much graphic violence, sexual content, and foul language without any redeeming message for young people. I would not be able to recommend this book to teachers or parents to share with kids.

I was looking for a book that would draw me in so completely I couldn't put it down. Color me happy when this book proved to do just that!

When I Am Through with You is a a book I all but devoured in one sitting. I was engrossed from the start, and found the the storyline to be utterly thrilling. The book's main character is in jail for murder, this we find out straight away. What we read, however, is his journal detailing everything that brought him to that fateful, quintessential moment. It's a story of self discovery, heartache, love, survival, and ultimately freedom.

Definitely recommended!

Thanks to the author, publishers, and NetGalley for providing the review opportunity.

This book is so many different things on so many different levels. I initially picked it up on NetGalley because of this line:

“A gripping story of survival and the razor’s-edge difference between perfect cruelty and perfect love.”

It is a gripping story that is hard to put down. It is a story of survival. It is a story of tragic childhoods and messed up teenagers. It is a mystery and a thriller. But ultimately it is about love and sacrifice.

The book is a little hard to get into at first. Ben is a hard character to like. He is aloof and seemingly indifferent to his girlfriend of 2 years, Rose. But as you learn his back story and the abuse he has suffered over the years you come to feel very sorry for him. On the surface he acts like a typical teen from a small town, going to parties, getting high and drunk. But he craves to be accepted by people, he just doesn’t know how. He is also plagued by debilitating migraines caused by a head injury as a child. He has never left his small town, so when he is offered the chance to help with the orienteering club at school, he quickly agrees. His reaction to being in the northern California wilderness is childlike and I think it was at this point that I started to sympathize with his story. He tries really hard to be a leader to the misfits who go with him, and he succeeds sometimes, like when things start to go horribly wrong. But for the most part he is a lost soul in the wilderness.

There are lots of other characters in this story, but because everything is related by Ben it is hard to understand and see them for who they truly are. I didn’t like Rose very much. I found her to be too manipulative and a demanding spoiled rich kid who expected everything to be handed to her. I didn’t really understand at first why they were even together. However, I started to like her a little bit when she helps Ben manage one of his migraines during the trip. She truly appeared to care for him then. Avery was the only other girl who went on the trip, and she was also manipulative with both Ben and Archie. The rest of the boys on the trip appeared on the surface to be your typical teens. They mostly appeared to have only a couple of things on their minds, sex and partying. I’m still not sure what their motives were for going on the trip. Perhaps like Ben they felt trapped in their small towns and wanted to get out. Archie is the instigator of some of their troubles but it turns out as the story unfolds just how damaged he really is. In fact all of these teens have some serious baggage for such young lives.

I should mention that there is an adult who accompanies them on this trip. A teacher, Mr. Howe, who at times is a much needed father figure to Ben, but at other times is aloof and practically abandons him to deal with his peers misbehaviors. I think Mr. Howe was more to blame for some of the things that happen on that mountain then Ben was.

At the heart this story is one of survival against both man and nature. It will definitely leave you thinking about the nature of love and maybe even fate. Yes, Ben does commit the murder he is accused of, but the author leaves it up to you to decide his motives and if he deserves punishment.

This is the first novel I have read by this author, but if this is any indication of her how good her books are, than I will certainly be picking up more of her books in the future.

I really like and respect Stephanie Kuehn, but I felt like this novel was all over the place. The characters were underdeveloped, yet the author included details like which pills they were taking, which seemed pointless. There were several points in the story when I thought, "Where is this going?" Finally, I felt like the supposed depth of feelings Ben and arose had for each other was unconvincing.

This book captured really well the turmoil, constant inspection of self worth and self doubt that being a teen can involve. YOu think you have an idea of where the story is headed, but several left turns later, a completely different story has unfolded.

This is a the very dark and sad journey of Ben's young life. Ben is an extremely likable character who you genuinely feel sympathetic toward. He has not had an easy time of it in his 17 years and circumstances continue to spiral out of control. His father left when he was very young. His mom has brought a string of "wrong guys" into his life. Ben killing one of them "by accident" at the young age of ten. Mom is often drunk or spaced out on pain pills. Ben himself suffers from severe migraines due to an auto accident that occurred on the same day as the shooting so long ago. He now finds himself on a hiking trip with a his favorite teacher, several school mates and his girlfriend, Rose. Not everyone will return from the trip...several will die. Will Ben be held responsible for their deaths? Read When I Am Through With You and find out.

This is a bery edgy, intense and emotipnal sory. Ben's story is slowly revealed thoughout the story, thiugh readers are already hooked by the introduction.

This novel is a booklover's dream! Mystery, sex, and good ole Mother Nature! It's hard to find a Young Adult suspense novel nowadays that is truly suspenseful, but Kuehn grips the reader from the first chapter, and the twists just keep coming. I appreciate the male perspective; there's something authentically honest about Ben's point of view that not every female narrator can pull off. As a lover of the outdoors, I really enjoyed the landscape descriptions riddled throughout the novel; the native Californian in me gobbled up the lush details of the camping trip scenery. At the heart of this novel, though, is a story about suffering - emotional, physical, mental - and the tough choices that one is presented with on their path to healing. Recommended for teens 14+