I was reading this book during my lunch break at the office and ended up sobbing. That’s how good and heart-wrenching it is.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and to the publisher for this e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

So - this cover intrigued me and is the reason I requested and downloaded it. However, I had no idea what to expect based on the blurb (that I actually read! Once I downloaded the book.... but hey, that's still progress). I really enjoyed the snapshot-esque writing and the focus was intensely on coming of age.... with a twist; there was a central focus on recovering from being heavily bullied. It was a different perspective, and really let me lean into my own experiences with being bullied as well. Pretty insightful and raw.

Not sure if this one will be for everyone but I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the writing - especially when it came to the journal entries!

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for giving me this eARC to review.

This book is very raw and brutal and while there are some moments that made me wince, it felt like it made the characters a bit more authentic. Will say there was one part that I didn't think was necessary but that can be personal preference.

This book is not linear and it is reminiscent of memories and how they can jump back and forth which is great and sometimes a bit confusing but it works! The book can be described as bleak at times and you start off the book knowing Lamb is missing and there are times where I was begging for things to go differently because the outcome is known from the start.

While I think this book could have done with a tiny bit more editing, I still enjoyed this book. It felt like I was sat down with D and he was telling me everything in person.

Please, please, please look up the content warnings though as there was one part that was honestly horrifc (for me) to read.

This was such a unique take on a young man’s life story. We get the majority of the story through anecdotes told by an old friend, interspersed with diary entries and poetry written by the main focus of the story ‘Lamb’. Filled with heartbreak and tough subjects, following gay men through the aftermath of the aids epidemic, this story was a hard read at times.
Through bullying, friendships, relationships and rehab, Lamb is a story about a young man just trying to find his place in the world and having a hard time doing so.
Definitely worth a read.

3 stars

D.’s friend Lamb drops off his things at their new shared apartment…and then he disappears. Now as is looking through Lamb’s belongings some time later and has found his journals which remind him of his enigmatic friend.

This is a debut novel and it shows, but there is real promise here. Your heart will break a little for Lamb, over and over again.

Lamb is a gut-punch of a novel—raw, lyrical, and devastating in all the ways that matter. Troy Ford writes with the kind of emotional precision that leaves you breathless, weaving a story that’s as much about silence and survival as it is about pain and identity.

From the opening pages, I was pulled into a world that felt both brutally real and poetically surreal. The narrative doesn’t flinch—it stares directly at trauma, masculinity, and the complex weight of being Black and queer in a world that so often refuses to make space for either. But there’s also tenderness here. So much of it. Worn, hard-earned, and deeply human.

Ford’s prose is stunning—sparse but powerful, like every word was carved out with intention. The emotional undercurrents run deep, and I found myself sitting with certain passages, just absorbing the ache and beauty of them. This is not a comfortable read, but it is an essential one.

If you’re drawn to coming-of-age stories that are fierce, vulnerable, and unflinchingly honest, Lamb is one that will stay with you long after the final page. It hurt to read, and I’m grateful for every moment of it.

It was good but not quite what I expected based on the blurb, I guess I just expected more of the "mixed media" (snapshot) aspect but in the end it was mostly about the coming of age part with a heavy focus on the before and the pain of being a bullied teen.

Lamb was definitely a little autistic coded (maybe not entirely intentionally), his coming across as both quite intelligent but socially a little inept/unable to accurately read social cues from other people and unable to connect emotionally on the level he needed made him quite the tragic figure. I liked how Ford conveyed that without making it feel like it was the people who loved him's fault, it's easy to forget the gulf between intentions and perception and a large part of this book lives solidly in that gulf.

You really get a sense of what it was like at the time and how much of a different world it was the anxieties of the time but also that sense that things were somehow fleeting and that while the world was big yours was so very small. This book is quite the unique vibe I don't think I've read many (or any) books that capture the feeling of the era in such a raw, honest and somehow homesick way, it's well worth the read just for that part.

To make a long story short, it was a bleak, quick and sometimes heartbreakingly beautiful read.

I received an eARC of this book for review consideration, many thanks to Book Whisperer | Sweet Flag Books and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this book.