I absolutely loved this book! I found it hard to put down. I highly recommend reading it! You won’t be disappointed.

There is something about youth, a lack of perspective perhaps, but everything seems so much bigger and more important than it really is. Youth is a time for the disenfranchised, the disenchanted and the disheartened. To quote a line from one of my favorite movies, “Youth is wasted on the young!”

Straczynski has encapsulated this overly dramatic aspect of the current young generation and multiplied it to the nth degree: everyone hates me, I’ll never fit in, the world would be better off without me, etc. I had to laugh to myself about the characters (and the youth of today) and how they like to play this off as something unique to the here and now. I’ll let you in on a little secret, this theme has been been around for a very long time: The Breakfast Club, Rebel Without a Cause, Romeo and Juliet; I can keep going if you want. Straczynski has taken this theme and made it relevant again. In true millennial style, is it real if you can’t post it on the web?

The most important aspect in Together We Will Go is the eclectic cast of characters, as different as they all were, they all thought they wanted the same thing. Straczynski crafted each of his characters perfectly for this story; they are the most extreme cases you could imagine. He made it a real question: is it worth while to go on? I was held captive by their situations and how they reached their decisions.

Together We Will Go is one of those books that will make you laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time. Straczynski touches on some tough themes that really make the reader think. And above all else, he made me feel for the characters and their situations, hoping that they would just realize that they too could have a wonderful life.

*5 Stars

I didn't like this book. It is a cheesy, gimmicky novel about suicide. I don't think the author of this book has any real understanding of suicide or mental illness. It is a Hollywood dramatization where the moral of the story is that suicidal people need to wait and think about it some more so they don't do anything rash. Zero stars.

When I saw the premise of this book I really felt that I would love it. Please be aware that this story is about suicide and assisted suicide and there is content that may be triggering.

In this book 12 strangers embark on a cross country road trip on a bus, with the sole purpose of ending their lives. We are gradually introduced to each character and their reasons why they want to end their life which range from chronic pain, mental illness and terminal illness, among others. The book is also filled with journal entries from each character. The characters were unique and quirky, adding to the story in their own special way. And then we see them living, really living in this one last hurrah. Without spoilers I will say the story is both bittersweet and beautiful. We see characters knock off bucket list items, experience love, and feel understood and accepted for the first time.

Together We Will Go is not a book I can recommend to everyone because of the topic. However, the story had so much depth and the characters were fascinating. There were so many elements that made this book unique and memorable from the characters and their rapport, the adventures they experienced and the way the topic of suicide is explored. Without a doubt it's an emotional read, but it's also hilarious and heartfelt. The more I read the more I appreciated this book and its underlying message. I think the author did an amazing job at navigating such a sensitive subject and creating a book that will surely prompt reflection, empathy and potentially more understanding.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Gallery/Scout Press for this ARC!

CW: Depression, suicide, suicide ideation

Together We Will Go is a story that is supposed to be bleak, it’s about death, after all.
But it’s also about how we live in the time we have left, and so this it rings hopeful.

Author J. Michael Straczynski says it best at the end of the book – this story is an examination of depression and suicide ideation and the feelings involved in that.

Failed writer Mark puts out a wanted ad looking for people who want to join his road trip across the country – once they reach San Francisco, they will end their lives together in one poetic drive off a cliff. Each character who joins the crew has a different reason for being there, one has even decided that the rational decision in life is to end it. And through each of their lenses we see what makes people want to take their lives.

One of the characters explains that people leave themselves vulnerable to suicide because they don’t believe they could ever do it. The character says that suddenly something traumatic happens and they are pulling out a gun, or the pills, and doing it. Perhaps talking about suicide more, about how people can get to that place, will make people less susceptible. Or will encourage them to reach out and talk to someone.

It’s an interesting thought. I’ve had a number of people in my life die by suicide, and I could never understand how they got to that place. In reading this book and the character soliloquies about why they have made this decision, I can sympathize. When someone you know commits suicide, you don’t get that in-depth exploration of it from them, and I appreciated having that. It won’t tell me why the people I lost are gone, but it helps me to understand how they found their way there.

This book is sad, but it wasn’t as heavy as you’d imagine. As I said, there’s hope, and there’s some laughter.

Together We Will Go comes out July 6 – will you be reading it?

Thank you to Net Galley and Gallery/Scout Press for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was so lucky to receive a free advance copy of this book from NetGalley and Simon & Schuster , any opinions are mine.


Wow I was not sure what to expect reading this book.....I was hooked......it’s a look into a group of strangers who have come together for the soul purpose of a trek together with the end destination being that of a suicide pact......the characters were quirky, down to earth, young, old and the journey they share and emotions of their stories make you want to keep getting to know them. It’s a heart wrenching story and deals with a topic that maybe is not for everyone but I’m so glad I read it. It’s a story that will stay with me for awhile.....

Mark, a depressingly unsuccessful writer, posts an invitation online for a cross-country suicide road trip. Aboard an old tour bus with a hired driver named Dylan (who has no intention of dying; he’s quite literally just there to drive), they pick up hopeless individuals as they journey to San Francisco where they plan to yeet off a cliff to their willful demise.

Written in a multimedia format, this story is dark, hilarious, adventurous, and filled with friendship and love, sometimes all within the same page. Through journal entries, emails, and voice recordings, the reader is offered a glimpse into each characters’ unique voice, though some were more fleshed out than others. Unfortunately, this format also made some of the passages seem unrealistic in their retelling of events, i.e. were too detailed in their recounting of dialogue. I think it would have made more sense to have chapters told from a different perspective, and have the journal entries, etc. be separate but woven into them. Additionally, since only the passengers had to keep journals as a condition of their participation, the absence of a first-person narration from Dylan was stark given that, in my opinion, he was one of the most interesting characters in the story.

Needless to say, this book necessitates trigger warnings for suicidality and assisted suicide, in addition to sexual violence and self-harm. Though this is not a book for the mainstream (particularly those in vulnerable mental states), I appreciated that the author didn’t hold back in his discussion of these touchy topics, nor was he exceedingly preachy in a self-help kind of way. As someone with a history of suicidal ideation, I really appreciated that this story sympathized with the accompanying emotions and thought processes, their complexities, and the importance of autonomy. It’s a perspective you don’t hear too often, but one I’m really glad I stumbled upon.

Thank you to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster Canada, and J. Michael Straczynski for providing this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The initial “J.” in J. Michael Straczynski’s name might stand for “Jack of all trades.” He is probably best known for creating the science-fiction television series Babylon 5 during the 1990s, but he has also written everything from Hollywood screenplays (such as Changeling for Clint Eastwood) to comic books (such as a run during the 2000s of The Amazing Spider-Man). Together We Will Go marks a new chapter for Straczynski as it is his debut novel, and it might be with its share of controversy. The subject of the novel is suicide and is about a group of 12 people planning on ending their lives. I can say that the book is entertaining and sometimes even philosophical, but some may think the author is trying to make the subject look cool. I don’t think that’s the point as evidenced by the fact that, at one point early on in this read, Straczynski shoehorns a suicide hotline number into the text. You know, just in case you were having thoughts about ending your life while reading this work.

The book is centered around a thirty-something writer named Mark, who has suffered from receiving one rejection letter from a book or magazine publisher too many. He decides to end his life and to go out with a particularly big bang. He rents an old tour bus, hires an army vet to drive it, and then sends out an advertisement on the Internet looking to pick up people interested in ending their lives as well. Starting from Florida, the idea is to gather people interested in offing themselves from across the continental United States until the bus reaches San Francisco, at which put the bus will be driven off a cliff into the Pacific Ocean. Twelve people (and a cat!) answer the call to board the bus. One thing, though. The condition for being on the bus is that you must live journal proceedings to create a kind of long-form suicide note. Therefore, the novel is mostly an epistolary one, told in journal entries, emails, text messages, and audio recordings all uploaded to the bus’s server. (Yes, this is a high-tech bus.) The bus passengers are a practical cross-section of society, from a woman who experiences chronic pain, to a bi-polar drug-abusing neo-hippie, to a non-gender binary individual, to a man with a condition that makes his skin turn blue, to a young college student who treats suicide as a more intellectual than emotional decision, and so on.

The thing with Together We Will Go is that you must not think about it too hard and just go with the flow. For instance, it turns out that the 12 who board the bus are all seemingly budding novelists, as they journal with dialogue in it — meaning that you’ll never forget this is a story being told by a man who sits behind a curtain. And, again, you have to kind of go with the subject matter. Suicide is not a sexy subject to sell a novel on, but the point of this book — as it would turn out — is the journey and not the destination. Along the way, the participants come to realize that there is beauty in this world, and some things about life — for a few of the passengers — might be worth living for. The fun of the novel is watching these people having similar fun interacting with others positively for, in some cases, the first time in their lives. The book moves in fits and spurts but is compulsively readable. I devoured the book in mostly one sitting — it is that much of a page-turner and the characters are generally that likable. You want to find out what happens to them, and if the bus will ever wind up making it to its destination should the police get tipped off, which is one of Mark’s major worries as a character.

The book, while being a whirlwind of a read and fascinating, also takes time to ponder assisted suicide (which Together We Will Go argues these participants are engaging in) and the ethics and legalities of it. The novel raises other interesting questions, such as when a soldier throws him or herself on top of a live hand grenade, why is it considered heroism when it is just another form of killing oneself? That raises the volume above being simply a book whose purpose is to shock and awe the reader with the unsavoury subject matter. There’re brains to Together We Will Go, but it’s also a book with an emotional core — a heart. As these passengers get closer and closer together as friends, some even become lovers. Will that change their position on killing themselves? Their decisions propel what makes the novel so engaging and addictive.

I enjoyed Together We Will Go as much as I had some reservations that death might be romanticized in this tome. It is a book that tries — and, granted, succeeds to a degree — to walk the line between not condoning the act of suicide by running crisis hotline numbers by the reader in a couple of places, and also not condemning what is, in the end, a very personal act. I suppose I was entertained by Together We Will Go and felt a little guilty for it. While I don’t think the book trivializes the subject of suicide and is meticulously well researched on certain legalities that are central to the plot, the fact that the book is so pleasant and pleasurable to read might be a cause for some concern — particularly among younger readers who are easily swayed by this sort of thing.

In the end, this is a difficult book to pull off, but Straczynski’s goal is to primarily entertain (and entertain using a subject and conventions that are typically not entertaining) and he does so handsomely. I was also impressed that the author understood his characters (really getting youth lingo down for the younger characters especially), so I must recommend the book for these reasons and others despite having some reservations about suicide as a cool plot device. J. Michael Straczynski might be a “Jack of all trades” in terms of writing for different media, but, with his first novel, he shows that he’s a creative craftsman and it shouldn’t have taken him so long to move from television and the graphic novel to more conventional fare. Together We Will Go is a must-read, albeit one with caveats about whether or not you should be entertained by a novel about ending your life. Put bluntly, discretion is advised.

Wow, what an outstanding book!
It's important to know that 𝙏𝙤𝙜𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙒𝙚 𝙒𝙞𝙡𝙡 𝙂𝙤 takes an unflinching look at both suicide and assisted suicide. It's not a book I would recommend to just anyone but I think those who can handle the subject matter will appreciate it.

𝘍𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘥 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘬 𝘱𝘶𝘵𝘴 𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘥 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘦'𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘢 𝘣𝘶𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘢𝘤𝘳𝘰𝘴𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘳𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘚𝘢𝘯 𝘍𝘳𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘰 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘥𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘰𝘧𝘧 𝘢 𝘣𝘳𝘪𝘥𝘨𝘦, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘱𝘪𝘤𝘬 𝘶𝘱 𝘢𝘯𝘺𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘫𝘰𝘪𝘯 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘺.
𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘬 𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴 𝘶𝘱 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘢 𝘣𝘶𝘴 𝘧𝘶𝘭𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘰𝘯 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘦𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘭𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘴.

So yeah, it turns out to be a very unusual road trip.
Some if the characters form bonds but it's not like most friendships. These people accept each other's idea to end their lives and want to make it as comfortable as possible.

I came to love some of the characters. I certainly didn't agree with a lot of their choices but it was very though provoking.
I wondered 'Does the author dare...does he ACTUALLY DARE make me care for these people and then make me watch them drive off a bridge at the end?!' Then I thought 'WAIT, am I assisting their suicide by continuing to read this?! Can I just close the book before they reach their final destination and keep them alive forever?' But that wouldn't work, the end of the book was already written, whether I chose to read it or not. They didn't want to die alone so I decided to stick with them- no matter what.

I'm sure this will be on my BEST OF THE YEAR list.

** thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the early copy.
Released on July 6th

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for this heartfelt, compelling book in return for an honest review. This is about a cross-country bus journey like no other. Marc is a young aspiring writer who is discouraged after receiving rejection slips from publishers. He has a plan. He purchases a rickety old bus and hires a combative ex-soldier, Dylan, to drive it. He runs an ad asking for passengers who want to commit suicide in a spectacular manner. The intent is to drive the bus to San Francisco and plunge the bus off a cliff into the ocean below.

Marc interviews each prospective passenger to determine if they are serious about ending their lives. They must dictate a description of their lives and their reasons for ending it all once onboard the bus.
They also must sign an agreement relinquishing any rights to their stories.

The book has an interesting format. The story includes narratives from various passengers of this diverse group who have been encouraged to share their thoughts along the way. There are also text messages, e-mails, audio recordings and phone calls. The text messages are too small to be read on a Kindle e-book, so I switched to the Kindle app on my iPad, where I could enlarge them. This is a thought-provoking, character-driven book with the powerful and tragic theme of depression and suicide.

The distraught members on the bus were mostly likeable, and I felt myself heavily invested in what would happen to them. There were several I wished to be thrown off the bus or left behind. Would some change their minds and leave before reaching their destination? There were some peaceful moments at a botanical garden and a beautiful wooded area. There was also vandalism and destruction in a place that fueled their anger.

There was sadness in realizing that so many different strangers all concluded that their lives were hopeless for various reasons. This was a touching story involving conflicts, love, friendships, support of others in their grief and sorrow, heroism, with a glimmer of hope for some, deaths during the journey, and betrayal. There were touches of humour in the interactions of the individual characters.

I was in suspense and engrossed in the outcome. Would the police stop the bus and arrest them in their dash for the coast? Would any of my favourite characters die? Would the bus hurtle off a cliff at sunrise as planned? Would Marc finally get his story published? This was an intense, gripping story. Recommended.

**MILD SPOILER ALERT**

I loved the way the book was written, as kind of a collection of emails, texts, voice recordings, etc. It was a cool and unique way to read a story! The subject matter was written about well, and wasn't taken lightly. But at the same time here were some things that stuck out for me:
- The pictures of the text messages were too small to be readable on my Kindle.
- HOW old was Shanelle? And she got involved with a 66-year-old man?
- The characters seem to "fall in love" way too quickly. I can't see that happening in real life, but who knows I guess.
- I don't REALLY understand why the cops were after them? They could just say they were driving around in a bus sightseeing, who could prove otherwise? They can't be arrested for something they hadn't done yet, and there were no witnesses around when the event with Zeke happened, so it almost seems like there was "action" forced into the story that was there unnecessarily.
- @77% - Was this supposed to be a big surprising twist? Because if so the email from the publisher to Mark at the beginning of the book should probably be taken out, as it gives the whole thing away.
- It never said anything about what happened for Mark - DID he publish his book? The notes were uploaded - but then what? I feel like the ending could have wrapped up more completely.

This book... wow. I am honestly blown away. I think this is one of my favorite books ever. It’s a shame that I can’t quote it, because there are so many things that resonated with me as I was reading this. Obviously there were some really sad moments, but in between that there were beautiful moments, love, friendship, exciting parts, funny parts, conflict, and everything in between. What a whirlwind of a ride. I can honestly say that each one of these characters (with the exception of Mark) grabbed a little piece of my heart. Seriously, this is a must-read.

So grateful I got the opportunity to read and review this ARC. Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher, and the author.