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.