She Packed Her Things. I Carried the Rest.
COMING April 21, 2027
ABOUT THE BOOK
Suitcase or Blame continues the story that began in Becoming Joshua: His First Two Lives. While Becoming Joshua tells the story of Joshua’s life in Iran, imprisonment, his journey as a refugee, and beginning again in America, Suitcase or Blame follows what happened in the years that came afterward.
This deeply personal story explores love, relationships, cultural differences, family, belonging, expectations, heartbreak, and the emotional cost of building a new life in America. Joshua believed he had finally found someone with whom he could build a future. What began with love and hope eventually became a five-year journey that would challenge his understanding of relationships, loyalty, family, and himself.
At its heart, the book asks a painful question: When two people walk away from the same relationship, why does one person sometimes leave carrying the suitcase while the other is left carrying the blame?
Suitcase or Blame is not simply a story about a relationship ending. It is the next chapter of Joshua’s life—the story of what happened after he survived, arrived, rebuilt, and then discovered that starting a new life does not protect a person from losing something they believed would last.
WHO THIS BOOK IS FOR
Suitcase or Blame is for anyone who has loved deeply, built a future with someone, and then watched that future disappear. It is for those who have experienced heartbreak, separation, cultural differences, family pressures, or the difficult questions that remain when a long relationship ends.
It is also for readers of Becoming Joshua: His First Two Lives who want to continue Joshua’s story and discover what happened after he began rebuilding his life in America.
WHAT YOU WILL DISCOVER
Through personal experiences and reflection, Suitcase or Blame explores what happens when love, culture, family, identity, and expectations collide. It follows the journey from falling in love and imagining a future together to conflict, separation, and the painful reality of beginning again.
The book also explores the questions people often carry after a relationship ends: What went wrong? Who carries the responsibility? What should we learn from the people we loved? And how do we move forward without allowing heartbreak to define the rest of our lives?
A MESSAGE FROM JOSHUA
“Becoming Joshua: His First Two Lives told the story of where I came from, what I survived, and how I arrived in America. Suitcase or Blame continues that journey. It is about what happened when I opened my heart to love, imagined a future with someone, and then watched that future disappear. I wrote this book not simply to tell the story of a relationship that ended, but to explore what love, loss, responsibility, and beginning again taught me about myself.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Joshua Ehm is an author, educator, leader, and former refugee whose writing is shaped by experiences of survival, rebuilding, relationships, identity, and beginning again. After leaving Iran and rebuilding his life in the United States, Joshua spent nearly a decade working in college education.
Suitcase or Blame continues the personal journey introduced in Becoming Joshua: His First Two Lives, taking readers into a later chapter of Joshua’s life in America and exploring love, loss, relationships, belonging, and what it means to rebuild when the future you expected suddenly changes.
COMING April 21, 2027
Suitcase or Blame continues the story of Becoming Joshua: His First Two Lives.
A story of love, loss, responsibility, and what happens when one person takes the suitcase—and the other is left carrying the blame.