What Alice Forgot: A Close-Up Review (Adult)

"Remember the woman you used to be ...

Alice is twenty-nine. She is whimsical, optimistic and adores sleep, chocolate, her ramshackle new house and her wonderful husband Nick. What's more, she's looking forward to the birth of the 'Sultana' - her first baby.

But now Alice has slipped and hit her head in her step-aerobics class and everyone's telling her she's misplaced the last ten years of her life.

In fact, it would seem that Alice is actually thirty-nine and now she loves schedules, expensive lingerie, caffeine and manicures. She has three children and the honeymoon is well and truly over for her and Nick. In fact, he looks at her like she's his worst enemy. What's more, her beloved sister Elisabeth isn't speaking to her either. And who is this 'Gina' everyone is so carefully trying not to mention?

Alice isn't sure that she likes life ten years on. Every photo is another memory she doesn't have and nothing makes sense. Just how much can happen in a decade? Has she really lost her lovely husband forever?" (from Goodreads)

 
What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty

Characters:

Alice: In a way, there are sort of three different Alices in this story. There's the Alice who's just hit her head and lost 10 years of memories, and is seeing the world through the eyes of her 29-year-old self. There's glimpses of the 39-year-old Alice that she's become in those 10 years. And then there's the "new" Alice we see at the end of the story.

I loved the 29-year-old version of Alice. She was such a fantastic character, with a wry sense of humour that, frankly, was uncannily similar to mine at times. This made for quite a funny first third of the book or so, as she reacts to all of this "new" information she's learning that she doesn't remember. And this younger version of Alice is introverted, so we had that in common as well. Even the slightly snarky, internal running commentary of her thoughts as she observes people throughout the day felt familiar — so yeah, I definitely connected with her.

In stark contrast, I strongly disliked the glimpses we're shown of the 39-year-old that Alice was before the accident. She's a sanctimonious, bitter, jaded, snooty, type-A sort of personality. To put it bluntly: she's just plain mean. I was really worried at one point that the book was going to end with Alice transformed once more into this horrible person, and I was going, "if that happens, I am going to hate the ending." I was feeling really sad and missing the younger, slightly clueless but innocent, sweet, and well-meaning 29-year-old Alice. Thankfully, though, Liane Moriarty came through for me and I actually liked how it ended. I do wish we'd been shown more of Alice becoming this final, third version of herself. Major spoilers, highlight to read: I had a little bit of difficulty seeing the two Alices merge to become one, so to speak. The Alice at the very end isn't the same as the younger Alice — she's more serious and doesn't seem to have the same sense of humor, which is a shame — but she obviously loves her kids and Nick very much. I was relieved that she and Nick end up together; their marriage is a constant work in progress but they didn't give up on each other. And it sounds like she's started to patch things up with her sister as well.

Elisabeth: Alice's sister's story is really sad because of her depressing situation of repeatedly miscarrying and not being able to carry a baby to term. It didn't make me cry or anything, but I understood how it could have contributed to a strain between the sisters; Alice has three beautiful kids and Elisabeth just wants one child, and she's despairing and beginning to lose hope. The little excerpts we're given of Elisabeth's perspective help to flesh out her nuanced thoughts and feelings on this please-let-me-have-a-baby situation, which has pretty much taken over her life.

Premise:

The premise is fantastic as a way to showcase how people and their lives can change in ways they wouldn't have expected when they were younger. In Alice's case, nothing that she thought her life would be like is actually how it is ten years down the road. This is demonstrated by placing these two different versions of Alice (the 29-again Alice and the 39-year-old Alice that she discovers she's become) in stark contrast. It's a simple and yet effective way of showing that your life can turn out to be something you didn't expect, and also that you can change in ways you thought you might never change. Alice herself is quite shocked at what her life's become, now that she's looking at it through new eyes.

Stories that play with memory can either be done really well or really poorly, so I was pleased to see that What Alice Forgot falls into the first category. Moriarty seems to have a pretty strong grasp of how memory works and she uses it to great effect here. Of course, the retrograde amnesia Alice experiences is quite sweeping and severe (she can't remember anything from the past 10 years), and I'm not sure how realistic a consequence that is for the nature of Alice's injury, but that's something the reader will have to accept in order to go along with the general premise. The idea of odors evoking memories is strongly based in research and certainly rings true for me. So does the fact that Alice's body remembers to do some things that she can't retrieve from her explicit memory. 

The way Alice gets her memories back at first just in bits and pieces is also very believable. Everyone expects her to get her memory back instantaneously, but anyone who's studied some psychology will know that memory is a complex, messy matter. People seem to keep blaming her because she can't remember stuff, and think that if they just talk about it a little longer she'll remember. (Nope.) I'm a little dubious about the resolution of this storyline (spoiler: many of Alice's memories flood back with a particular trigger) but I suppose it's possible — memory can't be pinned down easily and varies a lot between individuals.

Plot:

I preferred the first third to the latter 2/3rds for the simple fact that I found it more humorous. As Alice starts to figure out that her life is pretty crappy — a terrible relationship with her estranged husband Nick, a strained relationship with her sister, difficulties with her daughter Madison, and friendships that have fallen apart — things got really depressing and the humor died down. Add to that the storyline involving Elisabeth, and the whole thing was feeling bleak for a while there. Thankfully, Alice manages to repair her relationships to some extent, and the mood does pick up towards the end (although the earlier humor of just-been-hit-on-the-head-Alice never resurfaces, sadly).

I would have liked a deeper examination of the sister relationship, as we don't get much discussion between them about why they drifted apart. I wish we'd seen more of them reconnecting, and not just because of how the sub-plot involving Elisabeth is resolved (spoiler: the miracle baby — which I thought was a little too HEA, but I was still glad for Elisabeth and I liked that she ended up adopting as well), but because it was an important step in their relationship. I also didn't really care much about the storyline involving Frannie. Generally, though, I really enjoyed the family dynamics and psychology that What Alice Forgot delves into.

Writing style:

I don't have anything specific to say about the writing style — just that through both humorous sections and depressing ones, the quality of writing is consistently excellent.

Final verdict: 4.5 shooting stars. It's unusual for me to connect with a book about a 39-year-old, but in the case of What Alice Forgot, I could! I didn't have too much trouble even in the latter stages where she takes on the more mature role of actually being a 39-year-old. I feel like the author really understands human nature and how relationships can deteriorate. In short, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It reminded me of the TV shows Samantha Who? and, in a more abstract, conceptual way, Being Erica (most of my readers probably won't be familiar with that one, but it was an awesome Canadian TV series!)

This book counts toward my goal for the TBR Pile reading challenge.

Slated: A Close-Up Review

"Kyla’s memory has been erased,
her personality wiped blank,
her memories lost for ever.

She’s been Slated.

The government claims she was a terrorist, and that they are giving her a second chance - as long as she plays by their rules. But echoes of the past whisper in Kyla’s mind. Someone is lying to her, and nothing is as it seems. Who can she trust in her search for the truth?" (from Goodreads) 

Slated by Teri Terry

Characters: 

I really liked Kyla's character and voice for most of the book. She's quiet but tenacious, and shy sometimes but she doesn't care what other people think. Her mental/emotional toughness is admirable; while she may get upset when provoked, she's not whiny. Kyla's also not afraid of speaking her mind on occasion (even to authority), but at the same time she doesn't make a big deal out of it or show off. The fact that she's Slated provides a bit of a weakness for her, in that she might not know some things that most people do. She also develops a little as a character: at the beginning, she may be smarter than the average Slated but she's still coming to understand her world and herself, and settling in. As the book goes along, she becomes a stronger person who is more aware of the importance of keeping secrets. And at the end, her character takes a turn that you might just find unsettling.


It's interesting to see adults of various ages present in the story. There are a couple of college-aged characters, Mac (aged 22) and Amy (aged 19), as well as Dr. Lysander, Penny the nurse, Mr. Gianelli the art teacher, and of course Kyla's "parents." The mom really grew on me, and I liked how she turned out to be completely different from how Kyla saw her at first. The adults here are not trustworthy by default, and you might find yourself questioning the motives of more than one individual.


Most of the side characters, even if they don't play a major role, don't feel flat, but there are a couple exceptions: Ben and Phoebe. Phoebe seems to be a pretty stereotypical "frenemy," and Ben just didn't stand out to me amongst the sea of YA love interests — he's your standard good-looking nice guy who takes an interest in the protagonist and wants to help her. I thought he needed more personality; Ben is rather bland, and it didn't feel like there was a whole lot of chemistry between him and Kyla. Those readers who despise love triangles will be happy to hear there is none to be found here, however!

World-building:

 

Teri Terry has a complicated set-up going on here in Slated. There are lots of different groups and organizations involved: the scientists, the government, the terrorists... and then, of course, there are the Slateds. I'm quite dubious about the actual Slating procedure; I find it very difficult to believe they've completely wiped memories of everything (declarative and procedural). There does seem to be some research indicating connections between handedness and memory, so perhaps Teri Terry is not too far off, but memory is known to be a murky business that has outwitted psychologists for a long time. I'd certainly like to know more about how memory retrieval is explained in this society, and how the Slating procedure fits into this.


I thought the concept of the Levo — in essence, an emotion monitor — was pretty cool, but I have my doubts about its scientific believability. How exactly does it work? If it's reading various biological indicators like pulse rate, how does it distinguish between excitement, fear, and rage? I liked the fact that she has to keep the level up by various means of increasing her endorphins (like by eating chocolate), since this did make some sense to me. 

Plot/pacing:  

This book is brimming with secrets, not the least of which are secrets about Kyla's past that she doesn't know, given the whole memory-has-been-wiped scenario she faces. I thought the use of the "knowledge is power" theme and the gradual revealing of information was well-done, as it kept the tension pretty high throughout, despite the fact that there's not a lot of action. Admittedly, the pace is rather slow-moving, but there are plenty of clues along the way to draw the mystery out. Kyla's dreams do a good job of giving hints about her childhood without giving too much away.

The revelations towards the very end were not explained well enough for my liking, and presented in a way that is more coincidental than I think the plot deserved. I would have liked more answers — and not just vague, "half-answers" either like the type we see here. After such a long build-up, it wraps up hastily on an unsatisfying note that doesn't live up to the rest of the book. I know there's a sequel coming, but I wanted a better explanation. The one we are given may make sense to Kyla, but it didn't make a whole lot of sense to me!

I actually had my own theory for why Kyla was different from the other Slateds, and I thought it was rather clever, so I was a bit disappointed to discover that it wasn't the same as the author's (at least as far as I could tell. The whole thing wasn't explained all that clearly, so perhaps my theory is still tenable). Spoilery, highlight to read: since memory access is apparently linked to handedness, my theory was that when Kyla was Slated, the people performing the procedure didn't realize she was ambidextrous (or originally left-handed) because she'd been forced to use her right hand when the fingers of her left hand were broken. So they focused the lesioning on the left side of her brain, as though she were right-handed. Thus, when she draws with her left hand, this triggers repressed memories because it activates the right side of her brain. Makes sense, right? But instead the explanation given seems to point more towards Kyla having dissociative identity disorder and an alter-ego being behind the repressed memories.

Writing style:


I had a few problems with the writing style. Kyla's internal monologue becomes somewhat repetitive — she is constantly going over things in her head, trying to figure out what everyone knows, and this rehashing gets frustrating at times. Just generally, I think the whole thing could have been shorter — it clocks in at 440 pages, after all — with some of the similar conversations and repetition removed.

Final verdict: 3.5 shooting stars. 

 
Disclaimer: I received this book as an ARC for review from the publisher.

This book counts towards my goal for the Debut Author challenge.

Forgotten: Review

Goodreads' description:

"Each night when 16 year-old London Lane goes to sleep, her whole world disappears. In the morning, all that's left is a note telling her about a day she can't remember. The whole scenario doesn't exactly make high school or dating that hot guy whose name she can't seem to recall any easier. But when London starts experiencing disturbing visions she can't make sense of, she realizes it's time to learn a little more about the past she keeps forgetting-before it destroys her future.

Part psychological drama, part romance, and part mystery, this thought-provoking novel will inspire readers to consider the what-if's in their own lives and recognize the power they have to control their destinies."

Forgotten by Cat Patrick

Premise:

The concept behind Forgotten really intrigued me from the synopsis. However, in its execution I feel like it was just too bizarre to be handled the way it was. I think if London's memory had erased at 4:33 am every morning, and that was the only issue, I could have bought it much more easily. There have been case studies of individuals who have short-term memory loss, after all. But combine that with "remembering" the future and you open a whole other can of worms. First of all, if she can see the future and change the future...um, exactly how does that work? Why doesn't she see herself changing the future? Or see glimpses of a variety of possible futures, that depend on the choices she makes? We don't really know how she sees it, or what her limitations are, and the future "memories" are lacking in description; we are told what will happen rather than getting a peek at them along with London.

Secondly, nitty-gritty of her future-seeing aside...basically, she possesses a supernatural ability in an otherwise magic-less story. I'm pretty sure before I read Forgotten I saw some other reviews criticize it for having no explanation for this ability of London's, and I'm very much inclined to agree with them. The unbelievability quotient is simply over the top. Yes, we are given some revelations about her past that provide an explanation (albeit far-fetched and probably not scientifically viable) for the memory loss. But I don't see how that can be stretched to explain her future-seeing as well.

Characters:

Honestly, I had a very difficult time connecting with any of the characters in this book, even the narrator London. I think this was partly due to the writing style, which I found rather dry and distancing, and also to the fact that we don't learn a lot about the characters' interests, hobbies or personality quirks. I'm not sure I could name one activity London enjoys doing in her spare time if I had to (I'm not counting hanging out with her friend or boyfriend). Her unusual memory problems define her and largely define her relationships and the storyline. Her whole life is basically just trying to get through each day, and at the beginning I did feel the frustration that anyone with a memory loss like hers must feel. After a while, however, it just became tiring to read about.

London's friend Jamie feels the most "alive" of any of them, yet even she is pretty much the required best friend sidekick. Sure, she and London have a fight partway through, but you know they will patch things up by the end. How can you be so sure? Well, a) that's usually how BFF arguments end up getting resolved, and b) London "remembers" the future in any case.

Luke is introduced as the perfect guy: attractive, charming, considerate — and unfortunately lacking much depth. He doesn't seem to have any flaws; at one point I remember wondering if I could trust him. Thankfully we do find out a bit more about him through a revelation that explains his interest in London and gives their relationship at least some dimension, but I still wasn't crazy about him by the end. (But he does have an obsession with ears that makes him a bit more distinctive...even if it does weird me out.) I did feel kind of sorry for him though, because he has a girlfriend who wakes up every single day and doesn't remember him; frankly I didn't really get why he stuck with her.

The only other really central character is London's mom, and I had a hard time understanding how she could be so blasé about London's memory problems. I mean, yes, it's been years and they haven't found a medical explanation, but her mom really takes it all in stride and doesn't seem to be too concerned about it. If I had a daughter and she forgot each day but "remembered" the future, I'd be more than a little worried. The relationship dynamic between London and her mom is interesting, though; at some points they seem almost more like friends than mother/daughter, and London confides in her more closely than many teens we see in YA do.

Plot:

There didn't really seem to be one central storyline here, which meant the book lacked direction or much momentum. There's a plot revolving around London's relationship with Luke, another with her friend Jamie, and a third — the most mysterious and significant, I think — related to her unsettling visions of a funeral. Each of these seems to get resolved without too much work on London's part. Okay, she does take steps to get her friendship with Jamie back on track, but since she knew she'd be friends with her in the future...was that really necessary at all? And as for the funeral storyline, there appeared to be some build-up and a few revelations, but then no climactic scene. It was like the action was over before it even began, and London herself isn't really even involved in its resolution — she just finds out about it afterward. Spoilery details, highlight to read: once London's memory of her brother's kidnapping is conveniently triggered and she sees that in the future Luke will die, the police use her clues to discover the house with the stolen children and find out that London's brother's "body" was really a body stolen from the morgue.

And I'm assuming there's a sequel, because there's at least one plot thread completely left dangling. Spoiler: what about Luke dying in the future? Not resolved at all.

Also, given the unique premise, you'd think this would be a gripping read. But I found the opposite to be true — there were so many mundane minuscule details included that I kept losing interest. There were a few scenes that would pull me back into it — usually ones that played on London's memory problems, leading to unexpected situations (spoilery example: I really liked the scene where her memory resets while she's out with Luke and then she wakes up and has no idea where she is or who she's with). And I did like some of the unexpected twists, especially the one involving Luke. But then it would go back to recounting every little encounter that London has, however commonplace. She's constantly forgetting the same things and having similar kinds of conversations, so it gets repetitive. And you can have the most fascinating premise in the world, but if your book is lacking in plot it can only take you so far.

Writing style:

Like I mentioned before, I found the writing kind of dry and clinical, with more telling than showing happening for London's emotional reactions. There wasn't anything blatantly wrong with it, but it didn't sparkle, and some of the dialogue felt inauthentic and stilted. There's also a bit of a disconnect between London's POV and what the reader experiences. London is used to her memory problems and so she's not usually surprised or confused that she forgets the past, or conversely "remembers" something from the future. But to the reader, this is all new and it's frustrating to try to keep track of what London knows, since we can remember everything that's gone on and London can't. I'm not sure there would be any way to really make the reader "forget" along with London, but I just wasn't on the same page as her. Overall, it makes for a confusing reading experience.

Final verdict: 2 shooting stars. A premise with creative potential, but it just didn't happen for me in the execution. I didn't find myself caring about the characters and the whole story ended up feeling pretty pointless.

If you'd like to see a few other bloggers' takes on Forgotten, since I seem to be in the minority, check these more positive reviews out:

The Bookish Type
Poetry to Prose
Amaterasu Reads

Disclaimer: I received this book as an ARC from Big Honcho Media for review.

Forget You: Review

Zoey's a control freak who's losing her grip on the events of her life. Her dad's gotten his girlfriend pregnant, her mother's mentally ill and attempts suicide, and Zoey impulsively decides to sleep with her close friend Brandon. A week later, things spin thoroughly out of her control, when she finds herself in the aftermath of a car accident with the events of the preceding hours wiped completely from her memory. The only one who seems to know anything about it is Doug, the guy she's had a silent war with for years - and the guy who pulls her out of the wreckage. Did she crash the party like she intended that night? Did she sleep with Brandon for a second time? And just why is Doug acting so different towards her now?

Just about every review I read of Forget You beforehand was extremely positive, so I was expecting quite a lot coming into it. It didn't exactly deliver for me, mainly because I couldn't identify that much with the main character.

I understood Zoey's need for control easily, so I got that part of her just fine. However, her lack of self-awareness - and at some times total denial of the situation - really started to grate on my nerves. All right, so she slept with Brandon and they had always been close friends. But she knew he was a player who was never satisfied with one girl and always moved on to somebody else. Yet she kept insisting that he was her boyfriend and blowing off Doug (who was clearly the much more deserving guy, even if he did have a chip on his shoulder about certain things) because of it. Brandon didn't call her, we barely ever saw him talking to her, he was constantly hanging out with this other girl - and yet Zoey just wouldn't give up this ridiculous illusion that they were dating.

Also, it irritated me that Zoey took so long before asking Doug to explain the large gaps in her memory. He clearly knew something she didn't right from the beginning, but for some reason she just kept pretending that her memory was totally and utterly fine. Maybe she was just too proud to admit that to him, or too embarrassed? Zoey later claims it's because she's worried she'll have psychological problems like her mom does...but a concussion and bipolar disorder are completely different things. Amnesia surrounding a particular event can be quite common if you hit your head! I suppose as a means of furthering the plot, it was a necessary evil (otherwise Doug could have explained everything at the very beginning and the book would have been much shorter), but I wish the reader had been provided with a better reason for it.

Furthermore, she blows up at Doug for lying to her about that night - and I agree, he certainly could have been a bit more forthcoming, especially when he finally figures out she has no memory of the events. But still, it's like the pot calling the kettle black when she's been faking a perfectly good memory (not to mention a relationship with Brandon, not just to her acquaintances but to herself) this whole time. And finally, towards the end of the novel, she spontaneously announces that her feelings towards certain characters have changed. Frankly this comes as a bit of a surprise to the reader, as Zoey has so far been shown to be amazingly out of touch with her emotions, and we have not really seen this change of heart develop (and certainly not seen her realization of it).

Apart from wanting to shake the protagonist several times, I actually quite enjoyed the storyline. The pacing was excellent, the mother's mental illness was well handled, and I particularly appreciated that (mild spoiler alert) Zoey's memory of that night never returns. Indeed, I was a bit worried that her memory of that night would come back to her in bits and pieces, but happily it did not follow that cliche. Hey, that's real life, after all - sometimes those memories are gone forever. Also, the scary idea of having such a memory loss made it just a little bit easier to sympathize with what Zoey was going through as she gradually discovers what she can't remember.

And, despite my issues with the protagonist, Echols does a great job with characterization. Virtually all her characters are flawed in some way, with issues that need to be worked out - Zoey I think I've already covered, Doug has a lot of trouble with his father as well as a mixed-bag of emotions regarding Zoey, Zoey's mother is battling bipolar disorder, Zoey's father is an extremely controlling bully of a man, and her friends Keke and Lila are too concerned with appearances and too little concerned with what's actually going on with Zoey. Some of these characters do mature and grow throughout the novel, namely Zoey (at least somewhat), Doug, and Zoey's mother, but others remain stagnant. This is also realistic, and I think I would have been disappointed if, for instance, Zoey's dad had repented of his nasty treatment of Zoey and completely turned around.

It's difficult for me to give an overall rating of this one, but I think I'll go with 3.5 out of 5 shooting stars.