Dustin Thao’s “You’ve Reached Sam” is a fantasy love story where the protagonist deals with loss, reconnection, and friendship.

Julie and Sam are high school sweethearts. They have dreams of becoming a writer and a musician. They planned on moving out of Ellensburg, renting an apartment, chasing after their dreams, and growing old together. Tragically, life doesn’t turn out as planned. Julie lost her boyfriend of two years, a blossoming relationship, to a vehicle accident. She feels guilty about the incident, because he was on his way to picking her up. She begins to shut herself off from her family, friends, and others around her. It’s her way of dealing with the loss of the love of her life.

At first she wants to forget Sam by throwing away his belongings and avoiding places that remind her of him. Then a “gift” or “glitch in the universe” brings Julie and Sam together. They are able to communicate through phone calls. It’s a chance for them to properly say “good-bye.”

Sam’s death not only brings Oliver, Julie, and the Asian group together, but Julie learns that everyone grieves the loss of Sam differently and at the end, she doesn’t have to forget Sam completely.

“You’ve Reach Sam” is a beautifully told story. I highly recommend it.

**This e-book was provided to me by NetGalley in exchange for my honest review**

This book follows Julie after she suddenly loses her boyfriend, Sam. This book was beautifully written and handled the grief aspect so well. The before parts of the book were too busy for me, I would have liked to see more focused memories of Julie and Sam. The after parts were so well written, that I could feel the grief throughout the book. The ending was wonderfully wrapped up and showed how grief is something that can be a part of our lives, but not something that will drown us.

At firt I didn't mean to read this book because I'm usually not a fan of these settings. I usually read fantasy, sci-fi or historical fiction and contemporaries are usually something I try to stay clear of. But then I read that this book was compared to <i>Your Name</i> which is one of my favourite anime movies (Ghibli ones not counting). And I think that was a mistake.

I might have had too high expectations going into this book because I expected it to affect me in a way that <i>Your Name</i> did, but it just didn't. Maybe I'm just not the ideal audience, maybe I expected too much or maybe it was something else.

What I know is that I just didn't really connect with the story or the characters in it. Sure, it's a sad story. A teenager dying with all his life still before him and his young girlfriend just overburdened by grief. But that alone doesn't make for a good book. I initially didn't like Julie, kind of startet liking her a little towards the ending, I didn't feel much for Sam either. I mean, I feel like I barely got to know him, except that he loved music, his family and was head over heals in love with Julie. All the other characters kind of felt flat to me too. You had the foreign exchange students, the cousin, the mum and so on but none of them really spoke to me.
Overall I felt the book was a little underdeveloped. The premise is great and could have made for a great book. But in the end it felt more like a slice of life (centered around grief) to me, kind of insubstantial. Maybe that's what the author intended but in that case the book just wasn't for me.

Recently I‘ve been consuming a fair amount of media dealing with loss, grieving and moving on. Every book I‘ve read so far gave me something else to think about and „You‘ve Reached Sam“ is no exception – above all, it talked about hope.

The story follows Julie, a high school senior, dealing with the recent death of her boyfriend, Sam. Julie finds it hard to accept the fact that Sam is gone – he was so young, and they had made plans together, and what if this is her fault? – and in a moment of desperation she decides to call Sam and leave him a voice mail. Except Sam picks up. Now Julie must figure out how to keep their newfound, once-in-a-lifetime connection, how to get used to the life after Sam, how to deal with their mutual friends and prepare for the inevitable goodbye.

The story consists of two alternating parts – Before and After. Through the Before part we get to learn more about the characters as well as the love story of Julie and Sam, as seen by Julie. The After deals with the main storyline and Julie‘s road to accepting Sam‘s death and learning to move on. I absolutely loved the transitions in the Before parts – they were so beautifully written and blended together that I could easily visualize them, as if scenes from a movie.

The characters in the story were diverse and it was interesting to see how different traditions and thoughts about death and the dead influenced the way characters dealt with losing their family/lover/friend. I felt like I learned new things without getting info dumps or representation for representations’ sake; instead, it was realistic and genuine.

While the book mostly focuses on grief and acceptance of having lost, the part that hit closest to home and that felt like looking in the mirror was during the scene where Julie talks with her mother about how life is more about the journey than it is about the results. It’s a short scene, but the way Julie felt about this conversation punched me in the face. Maybe it’s not the best example, but I am sure that this story has something for everyone and is absolutely worth the read.

I received an advance review copy for free from NetGalley, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I was really excited for this book, but it just didn't live up to my expectations. The concept for the story was good, but the execution was just really slow. I didn't feel connected to any of the characters and their overall growth was lacking.

304 pages and countless unnecessary ellipses later, I have finally finished this book, and I am nothing short of underwhelmed. Although the exploration of grief was done well, I struggled to get invested in Sam and Julie’s relationship, which is unfortunate given that the emotional impact of this book hinges almost entirely upon it. I don’t think enough time was spent on depicting their relationship before Sam’s death, and as a result, I failed to understand the enormity of what Julie had lost apart from her idealized vision of the future. I also failed to connect with Julie, which made for an incredibly dull reading experience. Surprisingly, the final chapter and the epilogue ended up hitting me like a ton of bricks—I could feel a palpable ache in my chest when I read them—but apart from that, only two other scenes actually dragged any emotion out of me, and even then, it was just a vague, fleeting pang of sadness. Until the final moments of the book, I never truly felt like i was grieving along with Julie. I’m not upset at the time I spent on reading this; I don’t feel like it was a waste of my time. I just feel that it could have offered so much more.

So I think it’s a miracle I actually finished the book cause I simply couldn’t physically read it with all the crying. This story felt so close to my heart like I knew these people and I could understand the heroines pain. God Sam somehow being “back” to her life made this 100 times harder cause no matter how many times you talk to someone you crave to see them, you crave their touch. Amazing writing I will definitely pick up more of this author’s work !!!

What a truly beautiful story. It is really hard to put words to how someone feels about loss, and this book put it in a really approachable and realistic perspective. It is the dream for anyone who has lost someone close to them to be able to talk to them just one last time. Julie gets that and more with Sam. I really enjoyed the story and going through the grieving process with Julie was so realistic and heartbreaking. Thank you for this beautiful book!

After the death of her boyfriend Sam, Julie calls his cell phone to listen to his voicemail—and he picks up. Connected by an unknown force, they're able to speak to each other again. But how? And for how long?

These are the questions that haunt Julie, and understandably so. The exploration of Julie's connection to Sam and how it both helps and hinders her because no one else can know about or experience it (and, of course, because he's dead) was really heartfelt and interesting. I also loved the secondary characters in this book – Oliver, Mika, Jay, Yuki, Rachel, and James. As Sam's friends, they all helped illustrate what kind of person he was and the impact he had on them.

Unfortunately, I did feel that the plot was lacking. Julie didn't have a lot of goals or motivation of her own, and since Sam was unable to have his own active goals, the story fell a bit flat. Some of the secondary characters also felt quite one-dimensional, and often that dimension was conflict with Julie. When Sam's friends, Julie's friends, and Sam's family all resent Julie for things that happened both in his life and after his death, it starts to feel a bit repetitive.

Overall, I appreciated the exploration of death, grief and moving on, and I definitely teared up a couple of times. I'm sure this book will speak to people with similar experiences and I look forward to its publication.

Thanks to the publisher for providing an eARC of You've Reached Sam in exchange for an honest review.

This book has been getting a lot of hype and it's clear to see why. The description is basically a recipe for soul-crushing emotional turmoil. That's why I'm have a lot of trouble trying to figure out what I want to say here because while I enjoyed it and Dustin Thao is really good at writing some standout, really impactful lines (particularly at the end of chapters), there's this weird numbness that I feel like also persisted throughout. It's not because Julie or Sam didn't have personalities because they did, but it kind of felt like every time something impactful happened it was done in a really constructed way that made any emotional response it did cause feel a bit cheap.

I want to stress that this wasn't bad. I'm glad I read it. But while I liked this thematically, I don't think it was quite as emotional as it was aiming for.

This book had me in tears for days. It was so well written and emotional. As someone who has suffered a lot of loss recently i understood exactly how Julie felt and could relate to what she was feeling

This story was both sad and sweet; touching. Sweet in the way the characters helped each other through their loss. I thought it was a good portrayal of grief and moving on. It also had a touch of magical realism which I liked. However, I would have loved to know more about the side characters such as Oliver, Tristan, Yuki, and Sam’s family. Julie and Sam’s relationship was endearing, but I thought it could have used a little more depth- I guess I could say this for all characters. There were also some conversations and/or interactions I found repetitive, while reading I knew there was no progress to be made and it sort of through me off. Writing style also wasn't up my alley. But the message was nice and I still found the characters good.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the arc!

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

First, let me start off this review with 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭. Second, I will state that even though I knew this was going to be an emotional read, due to reading the synopsis, I wasn't prepared for any of it whatsoever. Hot damn, You've Reached Sam definitely pulled on all my heart strings and I just sat back like a damn harp and wept.

In this, you will meet Julie and Sam. At seventeen, they had dreams of going to college and living a life together. Unfortunately, not all dreams come true and there was a tragic accident. Everyone deals with grief in their own way. So for Julie, she just wanted to forget. She didn't want anything that reminded her of Sam because she couldn't handle the heartbreak anymore.

She's not the only one in pain and it takes her a while to see this. Eventually everyone starts to heal in their own way. It was really nice seeing Julie hanging out with people again. A lot of what happened in this book hurt my heart because I just wanted everyone to be okay again. Different but okay. Sam wasn't gone forever because he was still in their hearts and memories.

In the end, I just wanted to gather everyone up and hug them. They needed it and this book made me feel all their pain and happiness. I'm so happy that I got the chance to dive into this and I recommend You've Reached Sam to everyone. It's amazing! Just have some tissues, chocolate, and wine near by.

Grieving girlfriend calls her deceased boyfriend and he picks up the phone? Sounds like an interesting premise...and so much more could have been done with the concept! However in You've Reached Sam, the author, Dustin Thao chose to show virtually no growth in his main character Julie as she grieved for Sam after an accident took his life. At first she questioned him on how she could be talking to him, which would have been an interesting route to take, but then went on to complain about how lonely she was without him, even though she made no effort to reach out to others, attend his memorials, etc. His friends reached out to her, she made promises to go out with them and broke them. I understand how difficult it was for her, but don't promise to attend memorials if you don't plan to attend. The whole book just felt flat to me...no character growth, no moving in the right direction, I found it to be repetitive and boring.

Thank you to the author, St. Martin's Press - Wednesday Books and NetGalley for an ARC of this novel in exchange for my honest review.

Rating: 3.5*

Okay so i kind of have mixed feelings about this one.

You’ve reached Sam was a beautiful novel following Julie, who previously lost her boyfriend Sam - yet somehow when she calls him he manages to pick up and talk with Julie once more.

Through following Julie and Sams story with both the flashbacks and phone calls, it felt very bittersweet as you were simultaneously watching their relationship unfolding but then it contrasts back to present time when there relationship is no more and Sam is gone, and that really enabled you to see the loss, and feel what Julie is going through (hitting quite hard emotionally).

The story is very focused around Julie and her grief, yet you still get to see the effects of the loss of Sam on the other characters and if anything i wish this had been more present, but it was really emotional and lovely to see everything start to come together towards the end of the book, when Julie, Mika and Oliver could lean on each other a bit more.

However, there did feel like there were quite a few loose ends. Some of the characters felt as though they disappeared a bit, for instance Taylor and Liam both felt as though they should have at least been in one additional scene where maybe their actions could have been addressed. I would also have loved to have seen more of Julie with Sam’s family, as the ending felt slightly rushed and just as though there could have been more.

My biggest problem was probably the lack of explanation of the phone call too. Especially as it felt in particularly the first half of the book that Julie would often be repeating herself asking ‘how is this happening?’, yet after all of that we still got no explanation.

Overall this was a beautifully written journey of grief, loss and love and whilst it didn’t make me cry or have a strong reaction emotionally, I definitely felt things at several moments within the book and would still really recommend!

This book was an easy 5 stars for me. I honestly enjoyed every second of it. It's one of the rare books that keeps me up till 2 am to finish it. There's just so much I loved about it! Okay first of all I am so excited for anything else Dustin Thao writes because he is so great at writing VIBES. Like the magic and beauty and nostalgia he is able to capture in his words was just wonderful. Oh and on nostalgia, this book has some chapters dedicated to memories and OH MY GOD they were so fun and heartbreaking and adorable and I just loved reading them so much. The characters in this book were all super lovable. Julie is such a relatable protagonist for me. All of the side characters like Oliver, Yuki, Jay, Rachel, and more were all somehow just so great to read and interact with. At this books core is a journey of grief and saying goodbye to a loved one. Losing someone so close to me sounds so scary, and this book dives into so many feelings that come with losing someone. It shows how devastating that experience can be, but tells you that everything is going to be okay. For all of the above reasons, this is a must-read that I can't wait for November because of!

You’ve reached Sam is an amazing book written by debut writer Dustin Thao. This book broke my heart and pieced it back together in 300 pages. That is an achievement indeed.
This is the story of Julie, a seventeen-year-old girl with her whole life ahead of her. She and her boyfriend Sam have everything planned and they already see their future unfolding, until the day when it all comes down crushing. Unexpectedly Sam dies and Julie is left behind with shattered dreams and a broken heart.
The book starts with a heartbroken Julie who does not know how to navigate her pain, her loss, and her guilt. She starts by throwing everything that she has that links her to Sam, she deletes all is texts and messages and breaks clean from his family. She does not even go to his funeral or send flowers and condolences to his family. At the start of the book, she can appear as cold and distance, maybe even heartless. She is in pain and we all process pain differently. Sam was the love of her life and her best friend. She has lost it all in one night. And not only this, but Julie is also feeling guilty – she thinks her actions and her demands lead to Sam’s accident. Her way of surviving this loss is a clean and total break. Lonely, heartbroken, and sad, she calls Sam hoping she can listen to his voicemail one more time, but unexpectedly Sam picks up. Julie is given a second chance. She can say goodbye and try to move forward. Will she?
This is a character driven book, and the plot is quite slow. There are a few twists, but nothing major. Does this diminish the appeal of this book? No. This is an incredibly well written book, that had me hooked from page 1. I enjoyed reading the flashback their blooming relationship. It was sad to see how wonderful their relationship had been, and how much they both lost. But these little snippets gave the story power and made us feel even more for Julie and Sam. Their loss was deep and will have huge ramifications.
The characters are heartbroken, upset, some depressed, some angry. They all try their best to navigate the new world that Sam’s death reshaped and they all struggle. Julie is not perfect, and she hurts people with her actions and her words, but she is also hurt by others. She is bullied by people who do not understand her pain, she is shunned by those she believed were her friends, however she does also find friendship in unexpected places. They are all suffering and trying to deal with loss. Death is not pretty and is not clean. Expecting these characters to make perfect choices and have a nice straight path out of misery is unrealistic. This book presents their journey perfectly.
I loved it and I cannot wait for the paper back to come out.

I must preface that this novel's cover is gorgeous and immediately engaging! The concept of a deceased loved one being able to speak with the grieving girlfriend is certainly attention-grabbing, but the storyline only allowed Julie's character to develop. You've Reached Sam deals with grief and mourning, recognizing that sometimes people who are grieving do things that they regret. Even so, I found the character of Julie to be selfish for much too long in the novel. Her eventual acceptance of Sam's death seems to be brought about because of the fizzling phone connection rather than her own character development. Additionally, it would have been nice to see Sam's development as well -- even though he's only a voice on a phone. Rather than mine through the history of relationship and allow both members to grow, Sam was just an unconditional support system for Julie, who only talked about the difficulties she was going through in the present. For that reason, the conclusion fell short. Sam's Japanese American heritage is very rarely highlighted, so if you are looking for representation in this novel, you won't find much. Despite these things, the novel was engaging enough for us readers to want to see how Julie ends up at the end. The theme of moving on when the future seems destroyed is a powerful one, and is likely relatable for many young adult readers. You've Reached Sam takes a situation that no one would want to find themselves in, offers an unlikely solution, and then shows how one young girl confronts and overcomes it.

Thank you netgalley for the opportunity to read you've reached Sam

While the back and forth of memories and present day confused me alittle at first it wasn't long before I started to enjoy this book.
Heartbreaking and a real tear jerker. Loved this story even if the end nearly killed me.

This was a book that I was very much excited to read about the moment I heard what it was going to be about. Unfortunately, I was a little bit let down. It's an okay book. I had a great time reading it. However, the concept of the story could've been better executed and gave the story a more impactful and meaningful message had it been better developed. This book had parts where it hit me emotionally. The beginning and the end were definitely its stronger points, however the middle of the book did not quite do the same thing for me. I also had a hard time connecting with the characters especially with Sam since I could never see him beyond the memories of Julie about him. Moreover, I didn't really like the fact that we, as well as the characters themselves, never got an explanation for why things were happening the way they were happening. Since there were no explanations, there was no way to bridge the plot inconsistencies to make the story stronger and well developed. Nonetheless, it was still a good read. The book is short with a very easy-to-get-into writing style so I basically flew through it. I liked how it discussed and showed grief and how not everyone will process it in the same way. I liked how realistically Julie was written in the sense that she's not really a likeable main character because of her irrational, and sometimes selfish actions, which all goes back to her processing her grief. I also really liked how the characters were able to, in a way, help each other out in coping with the loss of their friend. It shows that you do not have to go through grief all alone because there will always be people who will be there with you as well.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher for sending an e-ARC copy of this book.