My Review
** 2.5 STARS **
So if you read my review of Rise Of The Sparrows, you know YA is not my thing, especially not YA fantasy. That being said, I went into that book with an open mind and I enjoyed it.
My goal this year is to read 12 books that are outside of my normal preferred genre, I picked another YA book hoping I'd find another one to enjoy. Since I didn't know what I like or didn't like in this genre I picked based off covers. I went to my handy Nook app and did a search for YA books and proceeded to scroll until I came across covers that caught my eye, then read the description. The Forgetting was my final choice of about 4. The cover was pretty and the premise sounded appealing.
The pacing of this book is rather slow. This book takes place over the course of seventy days but it felt much longer than that as I read. There were so many people, Nadia the Dyer's Daughter, Gray, the Glassblower's Son, Gretchen the Archivist, Jin (don't remember his fancy tag), Rose (who didn't have a fancy tag), etc. So much going on and so many to keep up with. I like to be able to picture each character and keep them straight in my head, something I did with great difficulty in this book. I have no real grasp on how anyone looked which is something else I like to have in my books. I know that Nadia apparently had long hair that kept coming out if its braids. Gray in turn also had long-ish hair that he kept tied back. Other than that, any descriptions given were vague.
The location, Canaan, apparently a city in the middle of nowhere surrounded by a large wall of some sort, but no one in the town ever got curious about going beyond the borders. No one wanted to know what life might be like outside of Canaan? Especially considering they had their memories wiped every twelve years. How is it that the whole town was just okay with that?
Nadia was an okay character. I liked that she wanted to know more. She wanted to figure out why the forgetting happened so she could protect her family. I can understand the hurt of having people you know and love not know you. Even still to me the book dragged. I guess it was that way so we could see the friendship grow between Nadia and Gray which later turned into romance. I didn't feel their connection. The hottest boy with outcast girl trope. I would have gladly taken less time on that and more time on unraveling the mystery behind the forgetting. Gray, well he was gray just as his name suggested. Nothing that made him stand out to me, he was there to be Nadia's sidekick and romantic interest.
The last ten percent or so of the book is when answers are given and some action is finally shown. The reveal of the villain wasn't the wow moment I'd hoped for. Even after things were all said and done some things didn't sit well with me. The situation with Nadia's father to be exact. How did he choose the way he did after explaining the why of his actions from the last forgetting? It made his whole explanation void in my opinion.
The book ends with things basically wrapped up and people are given their happy-ish endings. After finishing this book I learned there is to be a part two. This book for me was slow, had more telling than showing, and not enough action, so I'm not inclined to take on book two. Overall the book was an okay read for me. The half star for the cover and concept.
My goal this year is to read 12 books that are outside of my normal preferred genre, I picked another YA book hoping I'd find another one to enjoy. Since I didn't know what I like or didn't like in this genre I picked based off covers. I went to my handy Nook app and did a search for YA books and proceeded to scroll until I came across covers that caught my eye, then read the description. The Forgetting was my final choice of about 4. The cover was pretty and the premise sounded appealing.
The pacing of this book is rather slow. This book takes place over the course of seventy days but it felt much longer than that as I read. There were so many people, Nadia the Dyer's Daughter, Gray, the Glassblower's Son, Gretchen the Archivist, Jin (don't remember his fancy tag), Rose (who didn't have a fancy tag), etc. So much going on and so many to keep up with. I like to be able to picture each character and keep them straight in my head, something I did with great difficulty in this book. I have no real grasp on how anyone looked which is something else I like to have in my books. I know that Nadia apparently had long hair that kept coming out if its braids. Gray in turn also had long-ish hair that he kept tied back. Other than that, any descriptions given were vague.
The location, Canaan, apparently a city in the middle of nowhere surrounded by a large wall of some sort, but no one in the town ever got curious about going beyond the borders. No one wanted to know what life might be like outside of Canaan? Especially considering they had their memories wiped every twelve years. How is it that the whole town was just okay with that?
Nadia was an okay character. I liked that she wanted to know more. She wanted to figure out why the forgetting happened so she could protect her family. I can understand the hurt of having people you know and love not know you. Even still to me the book dragged. I guess it was that way so we could see the friendship grow between Nadia and Gray which later turned into romance. I didn't feel their connection. The hottest boy with outcast girl trope. I would have gladly taken less time on that and more time on unraveling the mystery behind the forgetting. Gray, well he was gray just as his name suggested. Nothing that made him stand out to me, he was there to be Nadia's sidekick and romantic interest.
The last ten percent or so of the book is when answers are given and some action is finally shown. The reveal of the villain wasn't the wow moment I'd hoped for. Even after things were all said and done some things didn't sit well with me. The situation with Nadia's father to be exact. How did he choose the way he did after explaining the why of his actions from the last forgetting? It made his whole explanation void in my opinion.
The book ends with things basically wrapped up and people are given their happy-ish endings. After finishing this book I learned there is to be a part two. This book for me was slow, had more telling than showing, and not enough action, so I'm not inclined to take on book two. Overall the book was an okay read for me. The half star for the cover and concept.
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