Loud Awake and Lost YA Book Review

Hi everyone! I’m going to do a little book review on this book called Loud Awake and Lost by Adele Griffin. I have a horrible habit of buying books that seem interesting everywhere I go and letting them pile up. So I bought this book from the Dollar Tree a few months ago (YES, I really got it for a dollar!) and completely forgot I even had it until recently. It is a young adult novel and to be completely honest, at first I was about to abandon it. After reading the first chapter or so, I thought it was going to be just like every other young adult novel. Thank goodness I decided to keep on reading because as I got to know the characters more, I got hooked in and the ending was really surprising to me for the most part.

The protagonist’s name is Ember, she is 17 years old, and just leaving to go home from the hospital after 8 months. She was the driver in a car accident that left her with a spine injury, scars, and brain trauma. Ember lost about six weeks of her memory before the accident. Her doctor says that it’s normal for people to forget some traumatic memories as her body is healing and she may or may not get it back. There are items in her room that she doesn’t remember putting there, like a poster of a band that she doesn’t recognize. Her parents and friends are happy to see that she’s back to the Ember that they know. She finds out that her parents and friends thought she was acting strangely and withdrawing from them a few weeks leading up to the accident. Ember also finds out that there was a passenger in the vehicle with her who did not make it. Who was Ember before the accident? Who was with her and where was she going the night of the accident?

While you’re reading this book, you’ll be looking for clues and wondering what really happened. I recommend it it you’re looking for a quick and easy mystery to read. One WARNING though: I ended up crying a big bowl of crybaby tears. So there’s that but I enjoyed reading this a lot and I actually have some questions for the author. There were some parts that did not make a lot of sense while I was reading it and some parts that were really cheesy but I swear the ending ties it all together. Thanks for reading!

xo Jill