The Forgetting

Cameron, Sharon. The Forgetting. 2016. 403p. 696 mins. ISBN 978-0-545-94521-9. Available as an audiobook on Overdrive.

The town of Canaan is surrounded on all sides by high walls, built in a strange material with construction techniques no one recognizes. For as far as the citizens of Canaan remember, they have always lived within the city, never wandering outside the walls in what is believed to be a hostile world. Of course, the memories of the citizens of Canaan don't stretch all that far. Every 12 years, as the city emerges from darkness, everyone forgets everything: their skills, their family, their own identity. All citizens carry books with them where they faithfully chronicle the events of the day, so that, when the forgetting comes, they can refer to their books and learn their truths. Everyone forgets ... except for Nadia, dyer's daughter.

Now seventeen, Nadia remembers the horrors of the last forgetting, when she was five. Her father wrote his entire family out of his book, so he could start a new life. Nadia remembers the deaths, the violence, the looting, and the panic that struck Canaan as the forgetting took place. Her sister barely acknowledges her and believes her to be adopted, or worse. Her younger sister loves her unconditionally, but is really worried for her since Nadia has the frustrating tendency to disappear during the resting period by going over the wall. And now, once again, the forgetting nears.

Determined to find a way to escape the forgetting and protecting her family, she is forced to help Gray, the glassblower's son, who not so subtly blackmails her. However, she soon discovers that Gray has reasons of his own to attempt to discover how to counteract the forgetting. As the two of them discover an underground complex built of the same material in a hillside next to a pool outside the walls, they stumble upon a conspiracy that will spell the death of most of Canaan's residents. The forgetting is part of a sinister plot that involve forgetting the truths written in people's books. With only days left before the forgetting, can they save their families and their own memories before it's too late?

A suspenseful dystopian story, the exploration of what is true and what is only deemed truth because it is perceived lay at the center of the plot that drives Nadia and Gray forward. Realistic characters put in impossible situations, the two teens can only count on each other to survive the forgetting. Fans of dystopia will appreciate how a society can forget everything and start anew every twelve years!