In the Dark We Forget
a quick review of a good read
In the Dark We Forget 2022 Sandra SG Wong.
The protagonist wakes up on the side of a road in the wilderness of British Columbia, with indications she’s been assaulted, and with no memory. I enjoyed reading from the POV of a character who at first, literally knows nothing about herself, or her surroundings.
It meant in theory, the reader knew as much about the narrator, as she herself knew. We are with her, for example, when she learns that her name is Cleopatra Li, who prefers to go by Cleo.
It meant she had no idea of who she could trust, and we had no idea if we could trust her perceptions.
It also meant that everyone she met believed they understood her better than she did herself.
Cleo is forced by these circumstances, to claim a place for herself in a world in which essentially everyone she encounters has preconceptions about her, that she does not share, and which she finds she has to battle against.
It’s a great setup for a mystery. It was also a powerfully effective strategy for the author to say some things about the experience of Asian women in a society dominated by white heterosexual men.
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