Lose You to Find Me

By: Erik J. Brown

Narrated by: Kirt Graves

Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's summary

USA Today bestseller!

A romantic, heartfelt, and hilarious queer coming-of-age story from All That's Left in the World author Erik J. Brown, perfect for fans of What If It’s Us and If This Gets Out.

Tommy Dees is in the weeds—restaurant speak for beyond overwhelmed. He’s been working as a server at Sunset Estates retirement community to get the experience he needs to attend one of the best culinary schools in the world. And to make his application shine, he also needs a letter of recommendation from his sadistic manager. But in exchange for the letter, Tommy has to meet three conditions—including training the new hire.

What he doesn’t expect is for the newbie to be an old crush: Gabe, with the dimples and kind heart, who Tommy fell for during summer camp at age eleven and then never saw again. Unfortunately, Gabe doesn’t remember Tommy at all. The training proves distracting as old feelings resurface and the universe seems to be conspiring against them.

With the application deadline looming and Gabe on his mind, Tommy is determined to keep it all together—but what if life isn’t meant to follow a recipe?

©2023 Erik J. Brown (P)2023 HarperCollins Publishers

A story with a unique, yet predictable twist.

Let me start by saying, I listened to What If It’s Us & Here’s To Us multiple times before giving this a listen. So it’s very possible I was spoiled by Froy Gutierrez and Noah Galvin’s performances. I expected more life from the narration, but once I moved past the performance I got to the heart of a story that was amazing. What Thomas went through and his relationship with Gabe, was so interesting and relatable for the most part. There are a decent amount of loose ends by the end of the book simply because the focus deters from Thomas and Gabe to Thomas’s friends, but I wish there was a little more about them featured. Whether that means more story or less time spent on Thomas and Gabe is uncertain, but overall and really sweet listen and the ending is for sure one of the cutest

1.21 Gigawatts

This book is electrifying. The struggle of maintaining friendships and how not to be selfish. The complexities of falling in love with the idea of a person and losing sight of what is right in front of you. The disillusion of the construct that everything must fallow a set plan.

Also, can we just talk about how the author is a super fan of Back to the Future and I’m living for it?

Very sweet, although a bit overly fraught.

There is much to love in this novel, will be vague so as not to give anything away.

Thomas is generally believable as our protagonist, he is driven and thoughtful. Trying to navigate his way through his last year of high school — a time of much anxiety for teens on the edge of their next big step. He is not only trying to get into the school of his dreams but is also confronted with someone from his past who was very important to him. Fortunately he is surrounded by wise voices of all ages, both gay and straight.

Love interest Gabe is at times left to be a bit one dimensional as the story is only told from Thomas' point of view. The book covers a full year, and when dealing with Thomas pining for Gabe, it can feel like the story is being told in real time.

I think where this book really shines is with the supporting characters. Brown does a great job of populating this world - I recognized some of these people! Where it falls off a bit is the pacing. As alluded to above, there is a bit too much hand wringing and it nearly brings the action to a halt.

If you haven't figured out how the book ends pretty early on, you don't read enough rom-com. For me, these stories are about the journey, and in this title there were some points where the journey needed to pick up and go, not dig in deeper. I was delighted with a couple of surprising things that happened along the way, some crazy situations I didn't see coming.

Kirt Graves did a great job with the narration, his tone for female characters is amazing.

Happy to recommend this title for anyone who is in the mood for a sweet story that doesn't make you feel creepy for reading a book about teens.

Another Fantastic Kirt Graves Performance

I recommend all lovers of a good romance book give this book a try if you're ever looking for something different. The ending was sweet and really drove home what Brown was trying to say with this book, it completely stuck the landing for me. Beautiful book, fantastic performance, will be relistening again I'm sure.

Great LGBTQ storyline

All around great story, great narration, and fun cadence. Would have loved to read a book like this when I first came out. Queer literature is really evolving and more stories like this are sure to help.

the nice story it's slow and pulls you in boys and bread

it makes you feel happy and very relaxing the title says it all but the character are well made for my taste anyway

I would’ve liked a better ending

I liked it. Made me laugh, gasp and swoon during a few of the scenes but it left something to be desired, especially with the ending. As someone else pointed out, the cast is way too big and I found myself lost sometimes with what was going on and who was who. Again, i liked it but having previously read All Thats Left in the World, I was expecting more from this book.

Little slow

It was a good story but it all sewed together a little late .. that’s my only concern

Fun and Playful/Serious

Let's be real: I generally listen to these novels, as an adult, for mind candy escape. I didn't get it. It wasn't mind candy (ok maybe a bit of boy-pines-for-boy).

I very much enjoyed that there were multiple side stories that kept the book interesting and amusing. Fun and funny characters, queer and non,

Hella props for diversity and going after assumptions we all make.

The voice actor was exceptional for novels in the genre and honestly for fancier more expensive ones. We all know this -- the voice actor can make or break the book. This gentleman pulled it all off, like a magic trick, like a great voice actor they drift off to the background.

I really appreciated the main character who was self reflective but also like me when I was 17, thick as a cement wall, but with some satisfying self growth.

Imagine one of these M2M novels that you've loved for its PG romance but better written, with some surprising and not so surprising twists, and a happy ending that doesn't quite tile the knots (I'll buy the sequel).

Here's the clincher: my Enjoy.

Been there, sister

I am uniquely positioned to be biased towards this book as someone who has a lived experience shockingly similar to the main character. I think one would hope this is just a charming YA romance, I probably did when I started, but what it’s really about is a lesson. It’s about learning to not expect things and decide for yourself. I learned the same lesson through the same heartbreak in this book and I found I really really connected to what was said. I’m still processing certain parts of myself and this opened a line of questions I really enjoyed being asked. I don’t wanna make it sound like it was Shakespeare, it was still mostly charming and silly, but the main relationship is so realistic in the way it unfolds. Again, I’m biased, but I think there’s a really clear vision here that in the end, allows for a lot more growth rather than just quick satisfaction.
I really enjoyed the characters, and I felt that the performance for this was excellently done. I am leaving one star off for the beginning of the third act feeling a little drawn out. There’s maybe a shorter version of this that’s just as effective.