The Forgotten Girl isn’t by any means a slow book. It begins by plunging the readers straight into the action of the central mystery as the book’s protagonist, Harvey, is kidnapped and tortured for information about a girl that he has no memory of. It’s a stunning start that drops you into the middle of the same confusing situation that Harvey is in, giving you little information and expecting you to keep up.
This becomes one of the main thrusts of the book, as both the reader and Harvey must work to gain the information that everyone else seems to have about the mysterious Sally Starling, the girl that has erased herself from Harvey’s mind.
Over the course of the book Harvey begins to find pieces of this puzzle, through his own detective work, and through conversations with people who knew him and Sally, and we begin to get a sense of the woman that Sally was, the effect that she had on Harvey’s life, and what her being missing really means to him.
Without going into huge details about the plot, as it’s really one that you should come to relatively unspoiled, Harvey’s story eventually shifts from a mystery thriller into a chase story filled with suspense, revenge, and violence.
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The Forgotten Girl has more layers to it than you’d first think, slowly revealing more about its world and characters as the narrative unfolds, opening up a world of psychic powers, conspiracies, and evil masterminds, yet also managing to to stay grounded and personal, tying it all back to Harvey and his experiences.
Filled with interesting characters, and sub-plots that weave throughout the narrative to make some surprising appearances and twists that you won’t see coming, The Forgotten Girl is a wonderful journey. Packed with emotion, mystery, and pain, it’s a story about human strength. The strength to survive, the strength to achieve power, and the strength it takes to put everything on the line to save the one that you love.
The Forgotten Girl by Rio Youers is available now from Titan Books.
