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The Forsaken is about an orphan girl who has to pass a test like everyone at her age that determines if she is prone to crime. If she fails, she will be shipped off to a prison island. In reading this book, I noticed little elements that brought to mind other science fiction novels (in an interesting but not copycat way). The start of the book really reminded of the movie Minority Report with Tom Cruise. There are machines that remind me a little of War of the Worlds. And there was just a little dash of Divergent and The Maze Runner.
This is one of those books that takes a while to get into. It felt oddly slow at first even though lots of things are happening. I didn’t like the main character, Alenna, at first, but she gets more personality as the story goes on. There are a few plot elements that don’t get explained completely; for example, two opposing gangs from the island decide to work together for reasons that made no sense to me. I noticed that questions frequently are presented as if the book is trying to make readers wonder about certain things. I really like to come to those kinds of questions on my own; these seem a bit too obvious. The ending really picked up and caught my interest. The story closes in a satisfying way with no big cliffhanger, but there are missions left to be accomplished.
Overall, The Forsaken is a good dystopian book that kept me entertained, especially toward the end, but I found too many things spelled out for me and some plot points not explained all the way.
Rating: Moderate, for crude sexual references and brutal violence. There is also a cult that uses religious terms in a negative way that could be offensive to some.
