Customer Reviews

Forgotten: Seventeen and Homeless (Secrets)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I thought the premise of the book sounded good and for half of the book I was not disappointed. However the author leaves many questions unanswered. What happened to Cybil? What happened to her other friends? Where did she go next?

I think this book is more like a fairy tale where someone waves a wand and everyone lives happily ever after. It doesn't talk about real life. I would have liked to seen this girl work through and achieve her goals she was working towards, not have everything appear as a miracle. With everything just given to her at the end there were no lessons learned. She did not become a stronger person that could handle future disappointment. If anything she became more child-like.

All of her life seventeen-year-old Adele has had it pretty rough. When things start to turn around for her and her mom, she feels like she'll finally have a normal life. When she began to attend a new school, she quickly made new friends, and loved that they knew nothing about her life before them. Her life was changing. She had lots of friends, a much better place to live, and a little more money for better clothes. She even thought her mom was going to actually do good at her new job. It all seemed too good to be true, and unfortunately it was all about to end soon.

After her mom walks out on her, she gets a new job to have at least a little money available to her. She soon gets evicted from her apartment and ends up living in an old van she nicknames, "Darth Vader." She keeps her circumstance to herself and does everything possible, including a lot of lying, to keep her wealthy friends from finding out. When everyone finds out about her being homeless, how will she deal with the embarrassment, rejection, and loneliness?

Forgotten is the first book in the Secrets series by Melody Carlson. I think I expected a little more from this story, but it was still a good read. I began reading it before I went to bed and quickly realized that that was a big mistake. I couldn't put it down and I wanted to see what happened next so bad! Even though I felt glued to this book, I still have mixed feelings about it. The story was predictable at times, and I felt like it ended too quickly. I think that's the only disappointment I have, but it's a big factor in a story. This book is for teen readers and I really liked that it's a clean story with nothing inappropriate. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the books in the series.

This book was provided for review by Navpress. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have express are my own.

It never seems to stop amazing me at the childishness and selfishness of some parents. I think this story could be told by entirely too many teens. Although, I do think that Adele's story was very calm in comparison to what happens for many homeless people. This story only gives you a glimpse of what homelessness is like, although I've never been without a home and pray I never experience that hardship. This observation is purely from other books and documentaries. It was still heartbreaking to read Forgotten. It really teaches you to not be so judgemental of others. We should be more accepting of each other.
It made me thankful for my parents!! I'm so grateful to my parents that I never had to worry about if I would get a meal. I can't imagine what that is like.
The only issue I had was the ending. It was somewhat rushed and we never learn what happens with the parents. It's still a book I recommend, especially to teens. There's lots of great messages that can be taken away.

* I received this book free from NavPress Publishers as part of their Blogger Review Program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

I had no intention of reading this book yesterday. I purchased it because it was free and opened it only to look at it and file it away in my collections. I tried several times to put it down but just couldn't. My kindle kept telling me it needed charged and I kept saying-one more page, just one more page until I finished it. (My kindle battery did finally die when I reached the discussion questions in the back.)

It was NOT at all far-fetched as one reviewer had said. I am a christian and I felt the writer was very true to her religion without being preachy. I think non-christians would also enjoy the book but I can also understand how some might be like the character in the story and just not get it. I knew a guy when I was in high school who was in the same situation and I know a lot of what happened in the story was true for him and I didn't have any trouble believing any of the story.

It wasn't highly suspenseful or dramatic and it was for the most part pretty predictable but I genuinely cared about the main character and it was written very well. I gave it four stars because I really tried to put it down but just couldn't. (I still need to apologize to my husband for ignoring him all evening.)Such forceful page-turning power deserves an extra star to an otherwise good story.

I looks like this book is no longer a kindle freebie but I would still recommend you buy it because it really is a good read.

I won't give much info here at the risk of giving away any spoilers (which, sadly, I think the back of the book already does), but it's a teen fiction easy read about a girl named Adele who ends up homeless during her senior year of high school.

The plot is predictable and simplistic at times, but I cared about what happened to Adele, so it wasn't all bad. I read it in a couple hours, and I was sad when it ended (particularly because I feel like she hurried to the end and then copped out on the ending by wrapping it all up too quickly). While I didn't love it, I liked it enough that I'll probably check out some of her books in the future when I'm in the mood for an easy YA read.

Oh, and other than Adele, the names seem to be ripped off from headlines or other books. Bristol? Isabella? Two main male characters with names beginning with J and E? Hmm, all are familiar...

(NavPress did provide a copy of this for my review, but they didn't ask for or require a positive one.)

This novel shares a heartwrenching story about a teenager with a loser mom and a runaway dad. While most of us don't have to deal with the drama of deadbeat parents, we probably even less have thoughts of having to live on the street or out of our cars. I cannot imagine what it must be like to be totally alone and homeless, I really give Adele a lot of credit for sticking it out as long as she did before turning to the only One who would be able to change her life.

The biggest lesson that I took away from this book was that lies always find you out in the end. In Adele's case, one of her "so-called" friends discovered the truth on her own, leaving Adele to fess up to her lies and the consequences. And poor girl, just when she decided to start being honest, she got another realization of just how unfair life sometimes is.

The only thing I didn't like about this book was the ending. I didn't like that it ended up "several months later," and instead, would've liked some of the first portion of the book to have been shortened just a bit to allow for a more fleshed out conclusion.

Other than that, I thought this was another excellent book perfect for teenagers that's got a lot of lessons on honesty and genuineness. I'm anxious to see what the rest of the Secrets series has in store.

4 Stars

**Many thanks to NavPress for providing a copy for review in exchange for my honest opinion.

I read this book in one sitting. That said it is not without its problems. Overall the book is written okay. I did want to see what happened next to Adele. Some parts are a little hard to believe. The ending especially was hard to accept. It felt rushed and the beginning of the book was much more developed and time spent there. There were two main characters including her mother who just disappeared from the plot and we don't know what happened to them. It dealt with the hard topic of homelessness and especially among teenagers. I was touched after reading the story and my eyes opened a little more. The spiritual element was there but not overwhelming. So overall an okay Christian YA book. I am glad I read it. :)




Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from NavPress Publishers as part of their Blogger Review Program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

I started to read this book in the evening and complete it in a few hours. It's easy to read, but lack of horror, suspense, romance, etc... but, its okay. Flat line, I would say. There are parts which I think its quite fairy tale, because a nice pastor comes into the picture when she ran out of alternatives, not sure if it applied in the real world. Most people will be skeptical and afraid to be close to homeless people, and pastors are people too. This book ended with God loves you and he's the only one who can gives you peace. Hmm.. sound more like spiritual tracks to me.

Let first say I've enjoyed other books by Melody Carlson. I loved "A Mile in my Flip flops." I'm an adult so I don't usually read teen fiction, but I've also enjoyed the Carter House Girls series. This book just wasn't on par with those.

While I found the premise of the story heart wrenching and eye-opening, there was just too much to tell in the span of the short book. It also felt like the author may have been late for a deadline when she wrote the ending. Much of the book focused on a very short period of time and the week leading to the dance was given pages and pages of details. This is the style of writing I'm used to from Melody. There were a number of ways the author could have added details and developed characters, Genevieve, her friend at the nursing home could have been developed more, for example. The mother Character (Carlene) was so evil she felt one dimensional. And she's not even dealt with in the ending. It's like she never existed in the book at all.

But by far the most glaring example of this failure to develop plot lines was the ending. A few months of a huge transition is summed up in a couple of pages. I did not understand why the ending was given the bum's rush. There were so many questions I had when I finished reading this book, what happened to Cybil? Where is the mother? For that matter where is the father? Everything just seems to tie up in a neat little package and it seemed a bit unrealistic to me. I love the redemption story and learning to lean on others, but for everything to just work out perfectly seems a tad unreasonable. God is great and he can turn your life around, but to a non-Christian going through trouble and turning to God, they might expect everything will all of a sudden turn around and become sunshine and rainbows, and that's very misleading to put it mildly. God promised we would have troubles in this world; Jesus is to help us get through them, not to clear a wide smooth path.

I had mixed feelings on how to write this review. I want to start out by saying that I couldn't put this book down. The story is so touching that when you read how Adele's mom just abandons her your heart just breaks for her.
Adele had always had to be the parent in her family, her mom has always been unstable and usually Adele is the one that has to make sure everything is taken care of, so when Carlene (Adele's mom) get offered a job in another town Adele finally hopes things might turn around.
Its Adele's senior yr in high school and starting out in a new school seems to be working out. She has been accepted into a clique of rich kids and actually has a boyfriend. So when Carlene starts spiraling out of control and loses her job Adele is determined to keep the truth from her friends. She starts telling so many lies that she can barely keep them straight. But when her mom leaves her and she is kicked out of the condo and finds herself living in a van just how long can she keep up the lies before she is found out?
Will Adele be strong enough to survive and will she realize that their are people who will help her if she will only let them?
I loved this story actually read in in about an hour, I found it to be a real thought provoking story, the story of homelessness and how people actually become homeless is something we don't often think about.
As you read Adele's story you can feel her misery and suffering, but you also get a true sense of her strong spirit and her will to survive, and how finding faith and accepting Gods love ultimately saves her.
Overall this is a great book but I had a few problems with the ending. First Adele's mom isn't mentioned its like once she left she was really never a part of the story, also Adele's dad was barely touched on. But the biggest issue was that throughout the book the characters are totally believable but then the ending seems to good to be true, it also felt hurried with only a few pages to let us know how the story wrapped up.
Even with that said I would still reccomend this book because it a story that tugs at your heart strings