Oliva made her debut in 2016 with The Last One, a genre-defying story in which technology fails with disastrous consequences for reality show contestants. I was delighted when I received the invitation to check out her current novel; big thanks go to Ballantine Books and Net Galley for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

Linda Russell lives alone. She has had a traumatic past, and she is naïve in some ways about the world around her, having been kept apart from it for so many years. Money isn’t a problem, though; she has inherited a pile of it. Yet we cannot envy her, because the unspeakable horrors she has seen outweigh the benefit of her wealth.

When we meet Linda, she is in her nest chair surfing the internet. Her sheath provides her with information, but we have to figure out what a sheath and nest chair actually are by examining context, which takes a little while. And this is a key part of the suspense, giving us some information about the time period, the place, the technology and the characters, but also withholding quite a lot, doling it out to us in small portions so that we can follow along, without ever getting a firm grip on the situation till we are far into the story. And for me, there were moments when I became confused enough that I wanted a little more information in order to follow events as they unfolded, but most of the time the narrative was paced effectively. I began to have a solid enough grip on the basic facts to follow the story well at about the 36% mark.

Linda is a clone, and her story went big several years ago, when she was found emaciated and filthy, having been more or less feral inside a walled property where her mother abandoned her. The part of her past that weighs on her mind most heavily is the fate of her twin. Lorelei, whom she must not call “Mother,” loved Emmer, but not Linda. Both of them were created in an effort to duplicate Lorelei’s deceased daughter, Madeleine, and Emmer resembled Madeleine more. Of course, everyone knows that eye witnesses are notoriously unreliable, and so it is with Linda’s memories, but she knows this for certain: after a particular point in time, Linda never saw either Emmer or Lorelei again.

Meanwhile, a cult of sorts has sprung up around Linda, whom social media has dubbed “clone girl.” Rumors are spread; even the tiniest hint as to her possible whereabouts is greedily devoured by those following her story. And so, Linda hides, and she talks to no one; that is, until her new neighbor, Anvi, pushes her way into Linda’s life. Anvi is new in these parts, and she wants a friend.

To say that this story is a thriller or a mystery is unfair, and will lead the reader to a dissatisfying end. The focus of the book is not on unraveling a crime, and the hair-on-fire pacing that marks a thriller isn’t present here. I keep turning the pages, not because my heart is slamming in my chest, but because I am curious. The story really is about our character. Likewise, although the story is technically science fiction, my interest isn’t captured and held by complicated new technology, but by Linda herself, wanting to see her unharmed and able to lead something resembling a normal life. So I urge interested parties to come to this novel with an eye for character, because that’s the anchor here.

At the climax—and I’m being fairly vague here so as not to spoil the ending—there’s a moment when Linda behaves fairly stupidly when she is faced with an urgent problem, and I feel let down, but then she rallies and pulls herself together, and I let my breath out and smile. Go, girl, go.

When I learn what is really in back of the personal mysteries Linda faces, I’m inclined at first to regard it as far-fetched, but then the sci fi aspect kicks in, and let’s face it: science fiction and fantasy both permit and even require far-fetched material. What needs to be credible and consistent is Linda, and Oliva does a fine job developing her protagonist. I believe Linda at the outset, and as she changes over the course of the story, I believe her every step of the way.

I enjoyed this story a great deal, and I look forward to seeing what Oliva comes up with next. I recommend this book to anyone that enjoys good fiction that is character driven.

I couldn’t put it down. And, it isn’t something I would normally choose to read but I like to expand my walls periodically. It’s a cross between sci-fi and psychological mystery. The characters are ‘ characters’. — weird, quirky, appealing, etc. For me, the plot was very different but it all intrigued me and help me captive.’

So different. Soooo good.

Shortest Summary Ever: It’s a few years into the future and Linda is living in busy Seattle, a far cry from where she escaped - where she was raised, isolated and alone in a house in the woods after her mother disappeared. More mysteries haunt her - what happened to her sister? Her mother? What role did her father play? Can she ever find a new normal with so many people knowing her as “The Clone Girl”? How can she live when she doesn’t quite know who she is?

Thoughts: Oliva dazzles me again with the unexpected, like The Last One (no that’s actually the name of her previous novel). There’s a science edge to the book which is NOT my jam but has made me question “Is this my jam?” and I agree this MIGHT be my jam and now I AM eating jam because that made me hungry.

I digress... I didn’t fall for this book until about 30%. The beginning is purposely scattered and I felt lost but then came the “ooooooooooh” and then, like links in a chain, it all synced up. I’m a teacher and often start lessons this way - the kids start by doing something and they have no idea why or what and after they start I connect a few dots and watch the light bulbs appear. Inductive... so hang in there! That moment was worth it.

This book to me was very psychologically fascinating because I recall learning about “feral kids” and how they developed (or didn’t develop). This is Linda. How difficult some every day actions would be when you grow up so isolated... it added a human edge , ok I’ll say it - emotion and I truly felt for her. The last 1/2 of the book is where is twists and yep... turns (like a mystery should) and I applaud Oliva for creating a novel that tickles my cerebral side while still offering the exciting escape of an intense mystery.

All my reviews available at scrappymags.com around time of publication.

Genre: Mystery/Science-edge

Recommend to: You don’t have to be “sciencey “ to like this but if you’re a natural learner or curious you’ll love it.

Not recommended to: If you’re not in the mood to think your way into the book

Thank you to the author, NetGalley and Random House Ballantyne for my advanced copy in exchange for my always-honest review and for asking Apple when the sheath will be available (admit it you know something!)

I really loved this book! I'm not a huge sci fi fan usually, but this one hooked me!
We meet Linda, who is isolated and seems like there is a back story with her isolation - well boy is there ever! We are introduced to Arthur, find out about her background and meet her new neighbor who may or not be suspicious. We learn that Linda is the "clone girl" and I couldn't get through the secrets fast enough to find out how and why this all happened.
What transpires is a little science fiction, combined with a mystery and plot twists for a fun, well done ride of a tale.
Highly recommend and thankful for the ARC!!

Forget Me Not has a fascinating, Black Mirror-reminiscent premise—VR gaming, a protagonist who has felt the need to flee and is still looking over her shoulder, a dark family story, a splash of thriller tropes, etc. Unfortunately these disparate pieces didn't quite come together for me, which made it challenging to buy into or get fully invested in the novel.

It's rare that I don't figure out a twist in a thriller novel - this was one of those occasions. It took me a while to get hooked, but the second half really gripped me. I enjoyed the elements of psychology/conditioning and virtual reality. I could see this as a future motion picture.

"Forget me Not" by Alexandra Oliva is a very unique read. It's the story of Linda Russell who, after failing to replace her dead sister, was left to raise herself on a rural walled property in Washington state. Linda is eventually found and has to adjust to living in the city. She eventually befriends her neighbor Anvi, and her life again changes.

Set in the near future, Alexandra Oliva deftly juxtaposes many different genres, including science fiction, psychological thriller, and mystery. The plot is creative and interesting, and the writing is good. There are many twists and turns that I did not see coming! I enjoyed the glimpses of how the future very well could be and how technology and social media change how people live.

This was my first book by Alexandra Oliva and I am excited to read more from her. Many thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for the opportunity to read an advanced digital copy of this great book in exchange for my honest review.

I haven’t read a sci-fi book in a long time and this book’s focus on virtual reality as well as cloning made me really want to get back into the genre! These are such interesting topics to think about since it already is becoming our future. The topics aren’t far fetched at all, which makes it creepier in a way when written with malintent.

I liked the overall plot of this book but I found myself not caring so much for the characters, and when that happens I tend to skip through the book rather quickly and get bored of it. I was interested enough to keep going through the end to see the resolution, but overall it was only okay.

Sooogood! What a crazy thrill ride that I highly recommend! I can’t wait to read more by this author

DNF at 40%. Forget Me Not has an interesting premise but the execution wasn’t coming together for me. There are a lot of different elements coming together and as soon as I would get invested in something that was happening there would be a hard pivot to something else. Most interesting to me were discussions with Anvi about her thesis and work on trying to stop viral transmission of disinformation through social media. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance reading copy.

Let me start by saying I had trouble putting this book down. I made excuses to read just a little more because the characters are fascinating. This is a hard story to classify. It has elements from thrillers, cold case examinations, relationships, and the effect of technology on society to name a few. Despite this, it’s easy to read. Whether Linda’s struggling to integrate with a society she doesn’t understand or Anvi’s on the hunt for some new tidbit not to share but just to explore, these elements are a natural extension of the story. These two are the main characters, each offering a different perspective of the near future world they live in.

Linda broke free of her isolated childhood, revealing herself torn and bloodied to a world, and a father, that didn’t know she existed. Her life story went viral when it came out her mother had Linda to replicate a sister who died. It’s been twelve years, but in that time, she’s had little success finding a place in the modern world. Linda longs to return to her feral upbringing rather than navigate the complexities of social interaction. If anyone recognizes her, she’ll have to create a new safe space to avoid being hounded by a social media full of morbid curiosity seekers or those after her money. Which skips over the fanatics who believe Linda is a cloned abomination of nature rather than artificially inseminated. Free will is more of a burden than a gift to Linda. The smallest of decisions are overwhelming, and likely to go wrong, because she lacks the necessary framework.

Anvi might be the more “normal” voice, but she’s also the view of social media. She is an extrovert who doesn’t shy away from strangers and who asks potentially uncomfortable questions. In her point of view, though, we see her ponder many of the problematic issues with social media. Anvi sees the need for a responsible voice in the heart of it. She’s driven by her studies of disinformation spread during the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the pandemic. This is only one example of how our contemporary events still influence those in the book. Her perspectives on privacy, the Internet, and what needs to change offers a window into the story Linda can never be.

The development of their friendship is beautiful. Each step forward Linda makes pairs with something threatening to send her back into hiding, whether provoked by Anvi or something external to their growing bond. Linda’s is a journey of discovery and trust, neither aspect a well-developed part of her character. Simple things like riding an elevator show change more dynamically than any statement of the events could. From Anvi’s side, wanting to be Linda’s friend is not enough. She must cross the treacherous ground others have filled with traps when they attempted to use Linda for their own benefit.

This is a story about people and perception. Whether it’s the debate about us being characters in a virtual reality simulation or how pre-knowledge about a person influences how you interact, there are strong psychological and philosophical elements. Linda and Anvi navigating the trials of new friendship is not the only thread that falls into these areas. We learn about the people surrounding both women, now and years before, with those relationships influencing the story present as well. Only Nibbler, the dog, stands out as straightforward, and even that relationship goes through a few twists and turns. The threat of a media storm is also tangible, expanding the story out to touch many lives. The book is complex and complicated in a fascinating way.

Systematic bias, primarily race and economic, plays an underlying role in part because Linda’s mother held her separate from society during her developmental years. She may not be affected by subconscious bias, but neither can she recognize when her actions play into them. The events between when she emerged and when the story starts demonstrate the gap between classes. Her wealth, and her father’s, shelters her from the trials of her upbringing and even reintegration. A poor child would have lived a vastly different life after emerging wild from the woods.

Anvi weighs in on this aspect as well, aware of the risks her skin tone imposes, especially when venturing out of Seattle. The state of Washington has many places where color is as rare as an astronomically wealthy feral child. She’s also aware of the economic standing that sets the two of them apart. Linda sees her wealth as a burden requiring even more caution and decisions she doesn’t want to make, but that doesn’t change the opportunities it affords.

It’s funny, but every time I question the categorization as science fiction, I realize just how much the near future tech impacts the story. It’s only slightly more advanced than where we are now in terms of wearable technology, virtual reality, and social networking. If our technological state is a boulder at the top of a hill, in the book it’s tipped over the edge and started the chaotic roll down. Reality itself comes in question in ways almost possible, or possible but little known, in our own time. But don’t be fooled into thinking the story sees no value in technology as a positive influence. It has that potential as portrayed. This book made me think, part of the reason reviewing it was so difficult, and will provoke many a fascinating book club or classroom discussion, I’m sure.

Ultimately, I enjoyed my time with these characters and the questions they raised. Little is as simple as it might first appear and the book should make you question your assumptions not once, but several times, as its story unfolds. This is the tale of a child raised to wear the shell of her dead sister, to fill a hole grief dug deep. For all the strange elements, the differences in economic power, and dangers of discovery, it’s a premise easy to identify with for a heartbeat, only to be horrified that you did a moment later. Anvi may be the easier window into their world, but the connection with Linda can be just as strong. Who hasn’t felt out of their depth after all?

P.S. I received this Advance Reader Copy from the publisher through NetGalley in the hopes of an honest review.

This was a late addition to my NetGalley request. When I read the synopsis, I was intrigued enough to want to see how this story will develop. I love a good mystery. That said, don't expect a typical mystery or thriller; this one dances to the beat of its own drum. The story takes place in the not-too-far distant future. Characters wear arm-wrapping "sheaths" that, I suppose, replace the cell phones, GPS trackers, and such that we know and love; SocialHub has replaced Facebook, Instagram and all the other popular online gatherings places we know and the COVID-19 pandemic is a thing of the past. Artificial intelligence and virtual reality are explored well in this novel and at times it left me intrigued and at times I was confused.
the story surrounds a mid-twenties woman named Linda, although it's not her real name. She's better known as Clone Girl - a child created by a mother who lost her beloved daughter years earlier and ever since has been trying to create an exact replacement. For a dozen years, Linda lived in secret, held behind walls at a remote Washington location, and for the most part left to forage for herself. One day, something bad happens and she runs away - managing to scale the wall and escape. Suddenly, she's in a whole new world - one filled with people who may or may not have her best interests at heart. She tries to live in seclusion, but keeping her location secret is difficult in this time of enhanced social media.

Then, Linda gets an unwanted knock on her door by a rather kooky-looking young woman named Anvi and her dog Nibbler. Her neighbor in the new apartment building she is living in Even though Anvi doesn't seem to have an ulterior motive, Linda is reluctant to strike up any kind of friendship because she trusts no one and doesn’t know the first thing about being a friend. This was a bit of a departure for me because I have a hard time finding my footing with science fiction novels and even though I am new to the genre I found this well written and easy to follow which I was grateful for.

Where the novel falls slightly short for me and why it is getting a three-star review from me is because I had a very hard time connecting with Linda as a character. I was able to follow the tech-talk in the book I wanted to know the mystery behind the “Clone Girl” but I could not get myself to like Linda. I would be interested to see what comes next if this will be a series or if the writer will create a new magical story for us to unfold.

I absolutely 💯 percent loved loved loved this book!! It is a definite must read for all suspense fans!!

I had a hard time with this book. It had great potential, but it didn't live up to the promise. I almost filed it as DNF at least half a dozen times, but I kept at it and I'm glad I did. The problem I had with Forget Me Not was that it took far too long to understand what had happened to the primary character, Linda, in her past so I had trouble feeling empathy for her. What we know is that as a child Linda escaped from a massive property in Washington where she had been left to raise herself. When we meet her, she's in her 20's. We also know she's infamous and known in the realms of social media as Clone Girl In fact, she wasn't a clone, but she was born via in vitro to a mother who wanted to bring her deceased daughter back to life. When that didn't happen, Linda's mother deserted her.

The book takes place in the near future, which is really neither here nor there as it's not pertinent to the plot. Not much happens for about 80% of the book, during which we still don't understand what happened to Linda nor what happened to her mother. Her father is still in the picture even though he lives in Connecticut. He is some kind of tech genius, worth a boatload of money, and he controls Linda financially, as well as watching over her mental health. The last 20% of the book finally gives us answers and the action ratchets up. Unfortunately, that happens too late to make this book worth reading.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for providing me an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

A genre-bending novel, when done right, can really reshape the way we think about what's possible both in fiction and in real life. Much like Sara Faring's <a href="https://www.criminalelement.com/book-review-tenth-girl-sara-faring/">The Tenth Girl</a>, this layered blend of literary genres has the reader reconsidering the processes of our everyday existence, what it takes to live in (or buck) the societies around us, and what we owe our parents in addition to ourselves (tho unlike in Ms Faring's excellent debut novel, the parents of our protagonist here are unfortunately varying shades of awful.)

Linda Russell was born to fill a hole left in the lives of her parents with the death of her older sister, Maddy. As is sadly the case with too many deaths of children, her parents' marriage did not survive for very long after Maddy passed away. Lorelei, her mother, grew more and more obsessed with rebirthing her beloved girl. And so Linda was born, to be raised on a remote, walled-off estate, her only companions her mother and her twin sister, Emmer. One day, an incident occurs that has Linda fleeing the estate in a panic: when she returns to an empty house, she decides to strike out for help. Her arrival in the nearby town of Cedar Lake causes a hubbub, drawing unwanted media attention as questions swirl around who, and what, she really is.

Fast-forward almost two decades and Linda is living alone in a Seattle apartment building, listlessly following the health-maintaining instructions sent to her via her Sheath, the wearable smart device that's a logical extrapolation from modern technology to a reasonable near-future conclusion. The media firestorm that surrounded her emergence into the modern world has left her shy of other people in general and of strangers in particular. So when a friendly extrovert moves in on her floor, Linda's first instinct is to avoid her.

But Anvi Hendrickson is determined to make friends, and with the help of her dog Nibbler, soon works her way into Linda's life. One day, she introduces Linda to the latest in Virtual Reality technology, getting her to try out a game called Fury And Honor. While immersed, Linda finally feels free of the strange-to-her expectations society has of a girl reared by an unwell mother, closed off from normal human contact for over a decade. Her interactions with other people in the game are straightforward: complete a quest for someone and they'll reward you, without any subtext or ulterior motives (or not any that will irreversibly break her heart, anyway.) Linda finds herself playing for hours, until news filters through to her that her childhood home has burnt down under suspicious circumstances. Empowered by the agency she's been able to display in VR, she decides to finally revisit the place that still haunts her dreams, setting in motion a chain of events that could threaten what little independence she has left, if not her very life.

Alexandra Oliva does a mind-bending job with this, her second novel, asking readers not only to question the very nature of reality but also to consider the ways our lives can be broken down into processes and routines -- the very stuff of computer programming. As an avid augmented reality gamer, I'm unceasingly fascinated by the gamification of our everyday lives, including how relationships, as in The Sims, grow with nourishment or fade away from neglect. I love how Ms Oliva explores these topics while writing a really terrific, twisty lost-girl thriller that also touches on bioethics and privacy concerns, even as the near-future setting allows us a glimpse of hope into a post-pandemic world that feels refreshingly normal, if still occasionally messy.

This was a deeply satisfying novel with unusual but well-thought-out characters. Linda herself is a tour de force of imagination, a completely lived-in portrayal of a shy young woman with few social skills, struggling to survive in a society that demands connection. Of the supporting characters, it would have been easy to make her father either wholly a jerk or wholly a martyr, but the blend Ms Oliva comes up with strikes the perfect balance, depicting a flawed human being doing the best he can despite the handicap of a large streak of narcissism. In fact, Ms Oliva's overall approach to characterization here is exceptionally compassionate: people make bad choices out of fear, or love, or selfishness but no one chooses to be malicious for its own sake, and that's honestly quite nice to read. People are, by and large, rational creatures, and seeing that reflected in these pages really grounds the heady, lofty ideas in a realism that makes them not only easier to understand but also to relate to.

Forget Me Not by Alexandra Oliva was published March 2, 2021 by Ballantine Books and is available from all good booksellers, including <a href="https://bookshop.org/a/15382/9781101966846">Bookshop!</a> Want it now? For the Kindle version, <a href="https://amzn.to/3ebURTq">click here</a>.

Forget Me Not is a captivating story. My heart went out to Linda. She’s been through a traumatic number of events and I just wanted to see things get better for her. What ensues is danger, many emotions, and hope.

I enjoyed the writing and the suspense. This story has a unique plot and holds you captive to the end. Very enjoyable!

Forget Me Not is one of those books that grabbed my attention and had me thinking about the main character Linda Russell, even when I wasn’t reading. I pretty much read this in two sittings. I loved that it was part futuristic, part thriller, and part VR gaming. All three parts equaled to a really good story. As Linda puts the pieces together of her childhood she puts together the pieces for her future. Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine Books for the ARC!!

What if your past wasn’t what you thought?’

FORGET ME NOT opens with Linda Russell, a twenty-four-year-old woman who, at first glance, appears to be a recluse or an agoraphobic—however, as you venture into the book, there’s more to her story.

A lot more. The reader is given each reveal in pieces of Linda’s life, parsed by Oliva in puzzling tidbits that add to the mystery of who this young woman is, how she lives her life today, and what happened in the preceding years that defines who she is now.

Linda lives alone in an apartment in Seattle, Washington. She has no friends until she meets her new neighbor, Anvi Hendrickson, who’s just moving in, later introducing Linda into the world of virtual reality, which provides a much-needed escape to a safe world but one that isn’t real.

If you like psychological thrillers, I recommend reading FORGET ME NOT—a slow burn that evolves into a heartbreaking narrative about love, loss, family, friendship, and painful, gut-wrenching truth about the past that starts to resurface.

Thank you, NetGalley and Ballantine Books (Penguin Random House LLC.), for loaning me an eGalley of FORGET ME NOT in the request of an honest review.

Released – March 2, 2021

Whew, where to begin with Forget Me Not? I'll start with Linda herself. Linda is our main character, and when we begin her story, it's not completely clear what has been happening with her. We just know that something is... not right. Linda lives a very isolated life, and aside from some seemingly obligatory contact with her father, is pretty much alone in the world. I felt for her, because it didn't seem that she wanted to be so alone, and as the story unraveled, it's clear that Linda asked for exactly none of this.

It's a fascinating story, albeit a bit slow paced at times, about how Linda got to this point in her life. How she ended up living alone, but quite comfortably, in her apartment. Why she's been so sheltered from the world, what her father's role is, how Linda came to be are all discovered throughout the book. I'll keep the details to a minimum, because finding the answers alongside Linda is the fun part.

But at its core, Forget Me Not is Linda's journey into personhood. Into finding her own life, her own way. She must reclaim the agency that was taken from her for so many years. Helping her along the way will be new neighbor and friend Anvi, whose character I really grew to love. Anvi helps Linda see that there can be more for her, that people will like Linda for Linda, not because of some bizarre set of expectations thrust upon her before birth.

Bottom Line: I could not help but root for Linda, who deserves so much more than the world gave her. I enjoyed taking this journey with her.

DNF @ 25%

So I went on with this book for longer than I should have - especially since the introduction of an important secondary character (in the first chapter) was accompanied by a really unnecessary and racist passage. Now, this is an ARC so it's possible that the offending passage was changed or remove before publication, but I don't know for sure. We know right away that Linda is timid around other people, has weird urges that aren't socially acceptable, and is supremely isolated. When she runs into Anvi, Linda mentions Anvi's brown skin and then says something to the effect of "I have trouble determining the ethnicity of darker skinned people"... Ooookay... Not entirely necessary and definitely a little racist. And then she goes on to say that darker skinned people make her uncomfortable - because she has "limited exposure" to non-white people. Yeah, no, that's not cool. This is in the first chapter. We later find out that, while not exactly well socialized, Linda is active on social media and has been "in society" for a majority of her life, even if her upbringing was extremely sheltered.

There are a few other weird moments re: race in the first 25%, too. When Anvi invites MC Linda to play VR games with her, Linda is creating a character for a fantasy RPG and freaks out at the mention of "race" as a part of character design. (Because Linda is white and Anvi is not)

There's also a brief thing where "it's sexist to assume G.H. is a man" and yet Linda continues to refer to G.H. with he/him pronouns.

Like... It sounds like the author was trying to be woke or whatever but totally missed the mark and instead made everything worse.