https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56269170

A tender and heartbreaking tale. Laure packs a lot in under 300 pages. Blue is a seventeen year old who has chosen to have her memories removed. Trying to uncover what she doesn’t know is what ensues. There is the sci-fi element of memory erasure, but there is heartbreak and trauma and a tender coming of age story laced with witty, modern humor. The supporting cast of characters in Blue’s friends and grandmother and even her dog are vibrant and well drawn. The love of Blue and Adam is sweet and what YA fans look for and love. There are content warnings to consider related to loss and trauma. Overall, such an enjoyable story for me.

Futuristic Fiction. Blue appears to be a typical teenager but suddenly realizes something is off....she has holes in her memory. Come to find out, she has had some of her memories permanently erased. Why would she have chosen to voluntarily give up the memories of her boyfriend among others?! So, Blue begins a personal journey to uncover what else is missing from her life. Overall, an interesting premise and story.

An interesting, near-future sci fi exploring what it might be like to live in a world where people can erase traumatic memories. Give to fans of Adam Silvera's More Happy Than Not.

Remember Me
by Estelle Laure
Pub Date: 22 Mar 2022
This novel explores the question of if you could erase all your bad memories, would you? That's exactly what Blue did. In the not so far future, this has become a common, yet still controversial practice. If a parent loses a child, they can simply go have all memories of that child erased and the pain is gone...but so is the joy that child brought, so is it worth it? Blue, of course, can't remember what or who she chose to forget. She doesn't even know she did it. That's how it works, but her friends are all acting strange. Then she finds a note in her pocket telling her to get on a certain bus at a certain time. The pull is too great and she does, running into the most intriguing guy she has ever met. Something about him is so familiar. This sets off a chain of events leading Blue to have to face the truth of what she has done. Forgetting isn't always the easiest way out.
#rememberme #estellelaure #netgalley

I enjoyed this book. I thought the beginning was a little slow getting started, but it did pick up. Blue had her bad memories erased and the book is her trying to get those memories back to figure out why she had them erased in the first place. It does have some deep/tough topics for teens, but it also explains how these tough times shape who we are and help us grow.

Remember Me by Estelle Laure is an interesting book about the role of memory. I am curious to read more from this author.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for sharing this book with me. All thoughts are my own.

A short, but difficult read to follow. I couldn't find myself drawn to the characters very much, and I wasn't too interested enough to read in earnest either.

Enjoyed this one. Really made me think about whether it's good to forget memories, even bad ones. I would definitely recommend this one to a friend.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley and Wednesday Books.

I really like the premise of this book but something about it just did not work for me.

This book wasn't quite my style. The magical realism combined with teen angst just didn't work for me personally. There is more of a specific reader that would enjoy this.

Genre: young adult
Pub date: Mar 22, 2022
In one sentence: Blue has paid to have her painful memories removed - but does losing that pain mean losing herself?

This book started out a little slow for me as Blue's family and friends tiptoed around mentioning her memory removal procedure. But as I got more into the novel, I loved seeing Blue fight for her memories and her past. Seeing the memories Blue had chosen to remove was very powerful - I could feel her emotions so clearly.

I think this book has an important message for the reader that with pain can come growth and healing, that the ignorance of one's problems does not solve them. I was going to rate this book a 3, but the ending bumped it up to a 3.5/4 for me, and I hope other readers also love seeing Blue come to terms with her past.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press/Wednesday Books for providing an ARC on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review!
Review published to Goodreads 11/21/21, to be posted to Instagram closer to pub date.

Thanks to #partner @netgalley, @wednesdaybooks and @stmartinspress for the digital ARC of Estelle Laure’s Remember Me in exchange for an honest review. The book will be published on March 22!

I was really intrigued by the premise of Estelle Laure’s Remember Me: I got total Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind vibes, and I absolutely love that movie.

The book starts when Blue Owens wakes up one day with the sense that her world doesn’t make sense. She goes through her normal morning routine and, in the course of getting ready for school, finds a note that says “Meet me on the Little Blue Bus, 7:45 5/19/32.” She has no idea what it means.

Everyone is acting weird—her grandmother, her best friend Turtle and her partner Jack, even her art teacher Mrs. Duran—and Blue becomes convinced that the reason will reveal itself on that bus. And she’s right.

Here’s where things get spoilery, so proceed with caution. (This part is in the synopsis, but I wish I hadn’t known.)

Blue gets on that bus and meets Adam Mendoza, and it quickly becomes clear that they know each other. Ultimately, Blue figures out that she’s had her memories erased, including her memories of Adam. Now, she just has to figure out why.

The book comes in at only 272 pages, and it’s ambitious, mixing romance and sci fi and mystery. For me, the mystery parts were the strongest. I was intrigued by just what caused Blue to have her memories erased. While I didn’t think the book quite lived up to its ambitions, I did enjoy it, and I was rooting for Blue the whole time. I just think it needed to be a bit longer to fully realize its potential.

This was a very heavy, but ultimately thought-provoking YA novel. A little too close to being ESOTSM for teenagers but I enjoyed it for what it was. I loved the message that our pain makes us who we are, that erasing memories would be like erasing pieces of ourselves.

Thanks to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This book explores mental health and trauma through the lens of a (slightly) futuristic romance.

Laure came up with a really interesting topic (read the book to find out!) but fell a bit short in execution. A bulk of the book is written as a flashback, and the ending is rushed—not necessarily my jam, but I can appreciate the purpose.

I did love the final message and the concept!

Estelle Laure’s Remember Me is a slightly dystopian universe that’s set in the near future, but reads mostly like a contemporary YA novel. We follow Blue’s story as she meets Adam. He mysteriously has a hard time with their interactions as it turns out he remembers everything but Blue’s memories are altered.

We journey with her as she figures out why she willing removed her memories, as she then discovers some devastating truth.

This book is all about feelings, whether it be about pain, love, sadness or friendships. Whilst the book is sad and even a bit messy at times, it definitely ends positively and compassionately, as ultimately at the core of this book, it’s all about love.

We’ve all probably thought about never remembering a painful memory again and with that feeling, we can all relate somewhat to the plot. Kudos to the author for adding a non binary secondary character so well into the story.

Overall, this was a moving and heartbreaking read that will linger with me for awhile.


Thank you to the publishers for the arc.


TW: grief and loss, trauma, depression, mental illness, suicide

I loved this story! At first, I was a little confused about what was happening, but then quickly realized that we were starting Blue’s post-memory removal journey with her. I like that we experienced a little of the confusion Blue felt, especially when meeting Adam on the bus. The fact that Blue had specific memories erased, yet retained most of the others was intriguing. Plus, the slow lead up to the twist when Blue found out what else she had lost kept me rapidly turning each page. Also, I felt that it was a satisfying ending. Well done. I’ve already talked about it with my 6th graders, and they can’t wait to read it when it’s published.

Yeah, so this just want my cup of tea. I couldn't really feel a connection with the characters and I felt the writing wasn't the greatest I'd read. The plot was alright, I just didn't like the execution i guess.

I think there was a lot of good intent put into this story but it missed the mark. It’s difficult to overlook a lot of the ethical issues presented in this book since it deals with such heavy topics. I wanted to enjoy it and I feel like there was a lot there that I could have enjoyed.

If you could rid yourself of painful memories, would you? What would we be without our pain? These were some questions explored in Remember Me.

I must confess, I had no idea what this book was about before I read it. I picked it up based on the author and cover without reading the synopsis. Early on, I realized it was NOT a contemporary since the story takes place in the near future. Then when all the memory stuff was introduced, I realized this was sci-fi. I don’t tend to read much sci-fi, however, aside from the mind manipulation, this read like a contemporary, and therefore, was successful for me. I have seen many compare this to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and that pretty much fits.

I was quite taken with the premise. What would we be without our pain? That was a very thought provoking idea for me, and I enjoyed exploring it via Blue’s experience. The story unfurled in such a way, that I was eager to get to know more, dig more. I felt as disorientated as Blue in the beginning, and obviously, I came up with my own explanations. I was 100% WRONG! and was quite surprised by what had happened, and after that surprise, there was an even bigger surprise (at least for me).

Laure did a fantastic job with the build of this story. There was confusion and tension. It was also emotional for me, and I appreciated the way it all came together at one point.

So, would we be better off with or without our pain? I don’t know, but I really enjoyed this interesting exploration of grief and loss. I found myself bawling a few times, and was quite moved by this tale of grief, loss, and moving forward.

Remember Me is a tale that starts the day before Blue’s birthday. She wakes up with bottles of orange juice in her backpack, feeling slightly off the whole day. She doesn’t understand why, but she does have a strange note that says to meet on a little blue bus tomorrow. When she does, she meets a boy, and the gaps in her memory unfold.

But why would she decide to give up her memories in the first place?

Plot wise, not much happens throughout the book. Half of it takes place in the past as she slowly remembers what happened. But just because this book doesn’t have a grand adventure, doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hit you like a truck with feelings. I figured out what happened before the book said it, and it still got to me.

The characters felt real. I loved that one of them is non-binary. Turtle, Jack, and Blue are great. But I also felt like there could've been more development in other characters. In the last chapter, a few characters' actions confused me because I thought they'd act a different way. I expected there to be something more going on to develop. I also felt that way with the flashbacks. There are *many* flashbacks back-to-back that present time doesn't move forward, and I wanted that to develop more.

Overall though, I did enjoy the story and its message.