thewildnorry's reviews
213 reviews

I Know You Remember by Jennifer Donaldson

adventurous mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

I've said it once, and I'll say it again: If you never would have guessed the twist, it's not a good twist.

The big issue is that the author hardly put any work into foreshadowing it. There were about four and two half instances of foreshadowing that I could count:

The twist? Ruthie is not actually Zahra's bff who moved away cuz her parents were divorced. She's Zahra's ex-bff who roped Zahra into covering up a murder and threatened to hurt Zahra should she ever tell anyone about it or distance herself. She's a psychotic stalker, not a concerned best friend.

And here is the "foreshadowing".

Her mother moving with her suddenly to Portland. (This is a stretch as it also isn't really explained how her mother knows about Bailey and the move happens the day after Ruthie kills her.)
The absurdity of her mother dying by falling off a cliff, and it being the first time that Ruthie ever went hiking with her.
The way she didn't remember how she was mean to Seb.
Her comment that being in a friendship of two was better than three.
The nickname of Ruthless. (This is, again, also a stretch.)
Her reaction to the violence she commits against Grace.

You might notice that I did not add in Ruthie's mechanical descriptions of her disassociation or other characters noticing her go far away and fall into herself. That's because it's not really foreshadowing. It's a way that a lot of people deal with traumatic events and depression. I don't think I've ever heard someone describing someone with a violent personality disorder in such a way.

I'm guessing based on the epilogue that the author was going for Dissociative Identity Disorder that grew out of a reaction to her father's alcoholism, and that's why she can't remember and is so ok with having two personalities for herself and Zahra. Unfortunately, having different identities is a thing a lot of imaginative kids and writers do. It's a fact that the author could have used to her advantage, but we unfortunately didn't get any moments of Lyr's cold absolutism shining through. Just Ruthie's resurfacing. The book suffers for this because if there'd been just hints (other than her conversation with Seb) of, for example, her scaring her father when they have an argument or saying something that Ingrid brings up later as concerning, that would have done a lot to foreshadow.

The ending of this book felt rushed. For one thing, it relied very heavily on an info-dump and detailed flashback sequence at the end of the book in order for the plot twist to make sense. Without the big info-dump at the end, I don't think anyone would have figured out the twist or even realized there was going to be a twist? This book was not written in a way that made readers feel like they were missing out on on some information.

Sure, I was wondering if we'd know what happened to Bailey, but I also wouldn't have been surprised if the author's answer was that the town never found out because of her circumstances whereas Zahra was found and saved because of hers. It'd be an interesting commentary and not farfetched from some of the other themes the author put forth.

Due to the lack of foreshadowing, the twist almost seemed like it was tacked on because the author finished the book and then was told by the publishers to make it longer. So, she added in the new ending, threw in a couple of hints and called it a day. As it stands now, the book feels like it's over at 85% but then there's a last second twist nobody asked for that makes it go on for another hour and a half or so. Plus the final confrontation just ends up ending. Like nothing happened to cause the confrontation to stop. It just...did.

So, once again: If the twist comes out of nowhere, it's not a good twist.

Besides that though, and the fact that it was rather slow going, I only had one other major issue with the book which is that the choice of and inclusion of the love interest was weird and concerning.

Even without the twist, I was sitting there the whole time like: Girl, why?

Ok, I lied, while explaining this book to a friend, I realized that the title doesn't make sense or even come into play until 85% of the way through the book. So it's a bad title.

That said, there were things the author did that I really enjoyed and thought was well done.

- I thought the author was really clever in their use of the name ruth. I especially liked that she added in the Bible reference in a way that made sense to the story while also giving the reader a hint as to the meaning of her name.

- I also really liked the description of and treatment of the character of Bailey. Having worked with students in similar situations, I found the characterization dead on and very humanizing.

- The characterization of Grace was also well-done. We get glimmers of who she really is before we find out the whole picture at the end of the book.

Which makes it all the more disappointing we don't get this for Ruthie.

All in all, it's an ok read. Quick and a great background book if you got the audiobook. Would I recommend it though? Nah.

Content Warnings