Review of Forget Me Not by Anca Antoci12/17/2021 Surprisingly, for a lover of horror, it’s not often that you’ll find me reading a book about vampires. This may be in part due to the saturation of them in the media, or my preference of werewolves (#teamjacob) but this only makes it more intriguing for me to find well written pieces of vampire fiction. That’s why I was lucky to come across the Forget Me Not book tour and engross myself in its first chapter. Before I go on, here is a quick blurb of the book: Deceiving the vampire that saved her could get her killed, but it's a risk she's willing to take. When tragedy strikes, Rae makes a terrible choice and struggles with the aftermath. In the wilderness of the Tongass rainforest, she finds herself hunted by creatures of hell, monsters she never dreamed could be real. A hidden world, an ancient race, and a secret she discovers by accident give a new meaning to her life but only if she can escape and return to civilization. If she is to survive, Rae must comply with Ari, her reluctant hero, and allow him to wipe away any memory of this realm. Knowledge is power, but is it worth dying for? When push comes to shove, that's when real strength emerges. What would it take to discover what you're made of? This book starts off with a bang, starting in the middle of an action sequence. It catches you off guard and pulls you in. It can be a bit disorienting on your first read, but it does a good job of getting you interested in what’s going on. As you read on, we get a bit of backstory on the main character, Rae, and her fight for the resistance against what seems to be an ancient council. She is powerful, important and confident - and she knows it. You begin to think that this story is going to be a typical adventure quest where the underdogs fight against the bad guys and undoubtedly claim victory in the end, but then everything gets flipped on its head. Rae wakes up, and it is revealed that this fantasy world she lives in is nothing but a dream that she uses to cope with the trauma of losing her estranged sister. Although many writers have their qualms about the ‘it was all a dream’ cliche, I find that it works quite well here. It introduced a deviation from the story that I wasn’t expecting to see, and opened up a realm of possibilities for the story to follow. I always like a good surprise and if you’re someone who enjoys them too, I’m sure you’d like this twist. Overall, my main complaint about this excerpt was a bit of on the nose exposition. We are told a lot of details about Rae’s thoughts and feelings which makes it hard for me to infer things from the text or come to any natural conclusions about the character. Everything I know about her was told directly to me, which kills some of the fun of reading. At one point, for a long stretch of time, we are told the main character’s past - including the fact that her sister has died, which comes as quite the surprise since we were introduced to her a short while beforehand, and we never got the chance to bond with her. However, what it lacked in subtly, it made up for doubly in the story. If you want to find out more, the story is available for purchase on amazon. About the Author Anca's overactive imagination pours into her stories bringing otherworldly creatures to life. She writes about mystical creatures, mystery, and adventure with a hint of Romance. Her debut novel, Forget Me Not, is the first part of a trilogy published in 2020. Before starting her writing journey, Anca was active in the blogging community as a fantasy book reviewer. The fanfiction stories she wrote long before she dreamed of being a writer are still popular and available on her blog. Although not as often, she still posts book reviews and book recommendations on her blog www.summonfantasy.com. Living in Romania, Anca speaks English as a second language and is quite self-conscious about her accent, which is why she never speaks in her videos on TikTok. She loves taking long walks through the parks to recharge her batteries before a writing sprint. She loves cooking and can often be found in the kitchen trying out a new recipe while an audiobook keeps her entertained. Jaidah-Leigh Wyattis a Canadian-Jamaican student, slowly making her way through the writing world. She aims to not only write, but be impactful and play her part in making the world a less judgemental and more accepting place for people everywhere.
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