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Your next favorite book
is waiting.
by Seán Farrelly
A stunning new voice in YA, exploring grief and loneliness. Perfect for fans of Kathleen Glasgow and Adam Silvera.
This wasn't my phone. This was real. Tom had died today, literally died, and here I was, picking through the digital carrion like some sort of virtual vulture.
When micro-influencer Tom Burne takes his own life, he leaves behind his phone, its password and a cryptic message that needs decoding.
Seventeen-year-old Jamie doesn't intend to take the phone, but once he does, he knows it was meant for him. Fuelled by his own sense of isolation and the recent passing of his father, Jamie loses himself in uncovering the truth. The more he investigates the digital fragments contained within the phone, the deeper into Tom's dark world he falls.
As his own grief resurfaces and with his mother pushing for them to move to a different country for a fresh start, Jamie has very little time to find out the harsh reality that led to Tom's tragic end.
Can he clear Tom's name before it is too late?
"Wistful and unsettling, this raw, perceptive novel expertly captures the tension between digital perception and lived reality." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Clever, moving, and often disturbing - this is a terrific novel." —Roddy Doyle, Booker Prize winning author of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
"A touching, beautiful and wholly unique exploration of grief in this age of social media, that examines the stories we tell and what we leave behind of ourselves." —Margaret McDonald, Carnegie Award winning author of Glasgow Boys
This information about Tom Burne Has Left the Chat was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Seán Farrelly has had four plays produced and two short stories published in the Irish Times as part of a young writers' supplement. He has worked as a writing mentor and workshop facilitator for young people since 2018. He lives in Dublin.
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