I read a lot of books. Like, between 100-200 books per year for the last 3 years kind of a lot. So mediocre books get quickly forgotten. This review post is about a book that is the opposite of forgettable.
In January I read Through a Glass, Darkly by Nenia Campbell and it has lived rent free in my head ever since. Thought it pains me to use the word retro to describe the setting (because seriously, how am I old enough that my teen years fall into the retro category??), the 90's vibes Nenia infuses into the story are IMPECCABLE.
The story begins in 1997 with the protagonist, Bethany, and her BFF/friend-with-benefits Dory meeting a couple of gorgeous, older men at a record store. This meeting leads to a series of events that turn Bethany's life upside down and causes her to spend several subsequent years of her life being plagued by memory loss and fugue states.
10 years later Bethany bumps into the unreasonably attractive James, and the mysteries of her missing memories begin to unravel. Because it turns out, James is a vampire and he's the cause of her missing memories. And because he keeps erasing himself from her memories, she doesn't realize that the last decade of her life has been a long cat and mouse game between her and a vampire that she keeps falling for, and then forgetting.
Through a Glass Darkly, while being a true dark romance, is also so much more than a dark romance. It's a study on the ripple effects of religious trauma, depression and addiction. And that's why it still lives on in my head almost a year after initially reading it.
No comments:
Post a Comment