Thank you NetGalley and Inkyard Press for allowing me to read a copy in exchange for an honest review. And a huge thank you to Jessica S. Olson for writing Sing Me Forgotten. This review might contain some spoilers read at your own risk.
If anyone loves The Phantom of the Opera you will love this book. I adored it because there are so many odes to The Phantom of the Opera while still making it its own. From the chandelier falling down to Isda living in the catacombs under the opera house. This book gave me so many feels especially any interaction between Isda and Emeric.
While I adored this book there are a few things that did not make it a five star book for me. One of the reasons is that it repeats a lot and it started to get annoying after a while and I wanted to shake or throttle Isda (the only thing that stopped me was that Emeric needs her). Another is that I wanted to know more about the Les Trois instead of being told the same thing like they were terrifying and their names. Also, I wanted to know more about Rose and her lover like were they like Emeric and Isda? What made Rose's lover decide to kill all three of them? I have so many questions and feel like maybe there should have been a prologue that was in Rose's or her lover's pov that could have built into the world more because as it stood I was confused on why people feared them so much. So they were disfigured and could pull memories out of people; why did that get the reaction it did from the people? Why do they drown the babies because they think they have magic? What happens if the baby was not magical but deformed? How did they become magical? Could nonmagical people gain this magic somehow? How big is this world? Is it everywhere in this world? What made the Les Trois decide to overrun the world? Is there another solution that did not involve killing people or draining people of their memories?
Most of the questions will never be answered because it is from Isda's POV and she is kind of trapped in the opera house, so getting the answers are hard to come by. Even when she gets things that should give her answers like Cyril's book or his journal. We do not really get any answers and it makes me sad because I want to know everything about this world. Yes, they have French words, but then the King's name is Charles which has me thinking of U.K. and beheadings. It also does not help that they say no and not non. Like it was strange for me that they would be like "No merci" I kind of wish there was more French in the book even though I am atrocious at French it would be more immersive of the world.
The ending broke me because of what happened between Emeric and Isda like I had to gulp down glasses of water to prevent myself from ugly crying. As much as I loved it the ending felt rushed and unfinished as it kind of ends with her leaving, but I wanted to know where she went and did Emeric find his sister? Do the monsters get a chance to be free and independent or did her stunt ensure that they will forever be cemented as monsters? Like it felt unsatisfactory in everything, but emotional suicide. It is a stabbed in the heart, dragged through hell, and swallowing broken glass and rusty nails with a healthy dose of arsenic hurt. I won't say what exactly happens, but there is no hea in this book. Although it kind of reminded me of the ending of The Phantom of the Opera (now that had me sobbing no matter how much water I gulped down because once again the people I wanted to get together did not). Although the title and cover made so much sense with the ending.
This book reminded me of Grim Lovelies by Megan Shepherd, Fairest by Gail Carson Levine, and of course, The Phantom of the Opera. If you love/like any of these books then you will love Sing Me Forgotten.
Highly recommend.
4.5* out of 5 stars.
*It is mostly due to the formatting of the book that it is at 4.5 and not 4. Because I am aware that this was an e-arc so the weird f ormatting and the random spaces between the f's which made it hard to interpret what was happening in the story. Plus, it would have two people talking in the same paragraph with no dialogue tags so I could not follow half of the conversations. I am hoping that the final copy has fixed all of that, so I gave the book an extra half star.
No comments:
Post a Comment