Full disclosure - my sister is an Autistic adult & I am her caretaker. I say this upfront because this colored my reaction to this book. I decided to give it a go because the subject matter is one I can fully relate to from my personal experience. That said the character of Sammy was nothing like my sister up to the point where I kept wondering, "Is he supposed to really have Aspergers or is this lack of research?" I know that everyone is different, no two people on the spectrum are going to act the same way but as I read on his diagnosis felt more and more off to me. So much so that it took me out of the story several times. In my experiences no one with autism would willingly bear hug a total stranger. My sister is a very sweet, happy -hearted individual but she hates being touched. I've known many people on the spectrum who are also like this. It's not that they don't show affection in their own way but a bear hug is generally something that would take time to lead up to. (I had no trouble accepting Sammy would hug his brother, I just questioned him hugging Nick upon first meeting him.)

I also felt a bit of research regarding the hospital procedures would have benefited the story greatly. I found it a bit too easy to have the nurses readily give information to someone who was not a relative and flowers in ICU would not have been allowed under any circumstances.

I wanted to love this book and there are things I did enjoy about it. While it's rather formula and cliched it does have some enjoyable characters (despite the fact Sammy didn't seem to fall onto the spectrum he is a very lovable character) and it did engage me to keep reading on but the above mentioned issues as well as aspects of telling and not showing prevent me from giving it a better rating.


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