False Memory

This book exceeded all my expectations.

I started this book prepared to put it down because it focused too much on the adventure side and not enough of the sentimental side. Call me sexist, but I have read books by male authors that have miniscule focuses on how the team crashed into the building whilst the sentimental side jumps from the two being worst enemies to bosom buddies in a heartbeat because the story required them to have perfect teamwork.

This book didn’t do that. It focused equally – or even, more on the sentimental side of things than it did the action side. I could feel Miranda’s confusion, her anger, her pain along with her, and that, to me, happens once in a blue moon.


The characters were endearing.

The last few YA show more novels I read had very hateable/confusing/problematic protagonist(s), so needless to say I started this book desperately hoping for lovable characters. Be careful what you wish for, because my wish came true.

Miranda was so realistically portrayed – any teenage girl in her position would have done similar things, would have made similar decisions. This really surprised me (and I’m going to be sexist again) because the author is a guy – some authors (no names mentioned) will try, unsuccessfully, to capture the essence of a thirteen year-old girl at the age of forty five.

Peter was, if not the most realistic of the character, the most lovable of the lot. I found it unrealistic that, of all people, Peter would be the one to hide his feelings towards Miranda the most. I mean, come on, he’s the leader – one would’ve thought (and God knows the though entered my mind) that he’d just blurt it out and get it over with.

Noah was my least favourite character. I actually thought he would turn out to be the ultimate villain, to be honest, because something about him just seems off. Yes, I get that he was trying to protect Miranda, but why not just leave her out of the loop the whole way and then tell her after his mission meets with success? Yes, I get that he was suspicious of Peter because he was the closest to their instructions, but why not give him subtle hints that something was wrong and see how he’d react?

Olive was an unnecessary character, in my opinion. I get that she’s there to add to the tension, but the plot didn’t really change because of her. Noah would still have run off, they would still have been caught, and the dry run would still have been stopped. Sure she was a nice addition to the team, but she was, in my opinion, an excessive addition that the whole team could still function perfectly without.


So, to sum it up…
1.It is well-written and has a thoroughly thought out plot
2. The plot twist is unexpected (in a good way)
3. The characters are three dimensional, as opposed to the characters in books like [b:Embrace The Violet Eden Chapters 1|8635145|Embrace (The Violet Eden Chapters, #1)|Jessica Shirvington|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1284130161s/8635145.jpg|13505950]
4. The author’s creativity has not overloaded the book and needlessly complicated the plot


I strongly recommend you read this book if you’re looking for a story that sucks you in, that enthrals you, that keeps you on the edge until the final page. show less

Wow! False Memory totally took me by surprise! I first read the blurb and was kind of iffy about it. I have no idea why because it sounds SO AWESOME! Elite force of genetically-altered teens? Uhh, totally cool! But for some reason the blurb wasn’t clicking with me, so I almost passed up this book. But I’m so glad I didn’t! Because holy crap it is awesome! False Memory is like.. a young adult Bourne Identity!

The story is told from Miranda’s point of view, but really it’s about her and her three friends. I have to say, it was so refreshing to read a book about a group of friends. Almost all the books I read these days are about one girl and one guy, or one girl and her one best friend, or maybe one main character with a few side show more characters who don’t show up that much. But False Memory is about Miranda and her three closest friends, and they all support themselves brilliantly throughout the entire book! They’re not just small side characters; they all play huge roles and I loved that!

This book is one of the most action-packed books I’ve read lately. It is such a page turner! It is over 300 pages but I whipped through it so quickly (almost in one sitting) because I couldn’t get enough! Every page is so intense and full of action, disaster, plan-forming, or deliciously complicated romance! I was amazed at my inability to put this book down! I didn’t expect this book to be so addicting!

The romance is really, really interesting. Basically, before Miranda’s memory got wiped she was dating Noah. We catch glimpses of their old relationship through flashbacks and it seems totally cute! But then Noah wipes her memory “to protect her” and she has no idea who he is.. and she starts falling for Peter! Oh my god! So yeah, there’s kind of a love triangle. Or even a really weird love square, actually.. but it’s awesome! It totally made me think: if you were in love with someone and then your memory got wiped, would you fall in love with that same person again? I felt like I was Miranda because I felt the same way she did about the two different guys. Noah is the guy she feels like she’s supposed to fall in love with, because they technically are (or were) dating. But she feels herself actually falling for Peter, but she feels guilty about it and really unsure. As for me, I loved Noah in the flashbacks, but I liked him less in current time. Probably because he wiped Miranda’s memory “to protect her” and I hate it when guys do something like that without letting the girl have a say! But Peter on the other hand, is the white knight who comes in to rescue Miranda! Swoon!

False Memory had me completely on edge. I was ripping through the pages, I fell in love with the characters, I was biting my nails anxiously during the fight scenes (bad habit, I know), and had the hardest time deciding which guy I should root for! There are so many twists and turns! As soon as you think you’ve figured it all out, Krokos catches you off guard with an insane new plot twist.

I don’t know why I didn’t expect to love this book, but I did! It’s definitely one of the most intense and interesting books I’ve read so far this year. I definitely recommend False Memory to anyone who likes kickass teenagers, military experimental fighting squads, conspiracy, and a complicated but swoon-a-licious romance! show less

Last night I was on a date with my husband and he brought up the subject of men writing from the perspective of a first-person narrator who is female. He had just read a short story (by
[a:Hampton Fancher|75806|Hampton Fancher|https://www.goodreads.com/assets/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66-251a730d696018971ef4a443cdeaae05.jpg] maybe?) in which he wasn’t initially sure whether the narrator was a man or a woman. David (my husband), who is a brilliant and prolific writer, is unusually good, for a straight man, at writing female characters with a female voice—some of his best-loved characters are female—but as he writes for television, this has never really come up for him before. He was confused as to what it is about the feminine show more experience (particularly that of teenagers) that men have a hard time capturing.

And this is why I so admire what Dan Krokos has done with False Memory. Miranda North is a complex, strong, genuinely female character. Beyond that, the novel’s supporting characters are a pretty even split of strong men and women with distinctive personalities. I know. Crazy.

The novel opens with Miranda wandering through a mall, with no specific memories of anything but her name. Things deteriorate pretty quickly, and after the mall clears out, with five people having plunged over the railing to their deaths, our heroine is left alone with one teenage boy—Peter—in the food court. And Peter is unaffected by whatever terrified everyone else.

I was initially annoyed by the protagonist’s memory loss, and it seemed to kind of function as an exposition machine in a way that is very convenient for the author, but I got over that pretty quickly as I became immersed in this world where Miranda, Peter, Noah, and Olive have a condition that requires them to take a shot every morning to prevent them from developing crazy amnesia. This is also the point where I began to suspect the book’s title of being a massive fucking spoiler.

He skids to a stop and I almost crash into him. I steady myself with a palm on his back. Instantly I want to take my hand away, but he pretends not to notice, and I don’t want to be awkward.

Miranda’s voice, and the feel we get for the other characters through her, is strong and distinctive enough to have kept me going when the first third of the book began to have that awful teenagers-on-a-scavenger-hunt feel, and I’m glad I did, because it really blossoms into a rich, well-drawn story.

The action is really well done, too--fully half of this book is people fighting each other (with swords, sticks, rocks, guns, etc.) or climbing/jumping off buildings, and it's all described just beautifully. In fact, the author's descriptive language throughout the novel is fantastic--he shows admirable restraint with adverbs while managing not to sketch things out in too spare a manner.

Even the love triangle didn’t bother me, in part because by the end of the novel it ‘s essentially a love pyramid, which feels like how relationships function in real life, but also because the protagonist is essentially two people—the girl she was before the amnesia set in, and the girl who wakes up and accidentally kills a bunch of people in a mall. She can remember bits of her relationship with Noah, but they don’t connect to any emotions within her because romantic feelings have to grow organically.

I could write about this book all day. It's really good Science Fiction, and it should appeal to an audience outside the YA world. I highly recommend it. show less

Originally reviewed on A Reader of Fictions.

As is often the case, I had no clue whatsoever what False Memory was actually about when I started. Other than possibly, if the tag line was any indication, Mufasa.



My only real expectation was lots of action, because of the male author. Honestly, I probably didn't expect there to be much more than that, but, actually False Memory deals with identity, individuality and how our memories affect our personalities. Krokos' new series brims over with action scenes, badass characters and clever world building.

For the first few chapters of False Memory, I was pretty bored. Miranda's in this mall without a memory, and weird things are happening. Enter mysterious hottie to say enigmatic things and tell show more her to follow him. Sigh, I thought, another one of these?, but, thankfully, Miranda, despite her initial behavior, is NOT the kind of girl to take someone else's word just because they say so. If you struggle with the opening section, do push on, because once some of the questions were answered, I got all kinds of sucked into this book.

Miranda learns that she is a member of a group of four teens, The Roses, imbued with mind control powers. Two of the others escaped at the same time as she disappeared, memory gone. The team leader, Peter, found her and brought her back to their home. The Doctor in charge sends them to find the other two. When they do, they discover that their might be more to their powers (they can make people feel fear with their brains) than they ever expected. The world building was so cool, and I really hope to learn more about the scope of their power in the next book. Also, I would like to know why their power smells like roses...

There seems to be a new trend in dystopian fiction: male authors writing powerful heroines. I am seriously loving this; False Memory is at least the fifth book that fits that description I've read so far this month. Miranda really appealed to me. I love the logical way she focuses on what's important and practical, rather than letting the eerieness of her situation keep her from doing anything. Plus, she has crazy awesome fighting skills.

Oh yeah, those of you who love action scenes in your books will definitely want be all over False Memory. It is readily apparent that Krokos loves him some fight scenes. Honestly, I'm not that huge of a fight scene person, but his were really well done. I pretty much always had a very clear image in my head of what was going on at any given time, though not so detailed as to bore me. He kept up a quick pace throughout.

Love triangles are totally played out and awful, right? Well, not really, no. They can be THE WORST, when done incorrectly, but the reason people keep writing them is that they can be realistic and powerful. Krokos' love triangle (errr...square? pentagon? hexagon?...I can't keep track by the end) totally worked for me. Miranda, before her memory loss episode, was dating Noah, but, now, she feels much more pull towards Peter. Olive, the fourth member of the group also has a really obvious (to me from the first scene she was in) crush on Noah. What made the hackneyed and predictable relationships more interesting was the fact that Miranda was new. She was in a love triangle without any intention to be. As she is now, she would choose Peter without any difficulty, but flashes of memory and the knowledge of the others push her towards Noah. Without her memories, is she the same person? Will she recall everything and fall for Noah again? These dynamics kept me rapt.

After a skeptical start, Dan Krokos held me in his thrall. False Memory is a fast-moving book that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Also, if you like twists, get excited. show less

Review originally posted on my blog http://hobbitsies.net/2012/08/false-memory-by-dan-krokos/

False Memory by Dan Krokos is an extremely well done, intense, and entertaining sci-fi that I seriously could not put down.

I was hooked by False Memory from the get-go. The opening scene is intense and kind of brutal and I was immediately curious as to who the heck Miranda is and what she can do. Dan Krokos definitely knows how to hook readers, that’s for sure!

I loved the way Dan Krokos portrayed all the sci-fi stuff in False Memory. Usually it can really go over my head, but I felt like False Memory had some legit sci-fi (like altering DNA and brainwaves and shots and improved athletic ability) but it was done at a level that still felt show more really out there and cool, but also at a level that was easy to understand.

I also loved Miranda and the way Dan Krokos portrayed her. Sometimes I get stuck on the character when a male is writing a female’s point of view, just because I automatically overanalyze everything – but I hate that and I try to block it out as much as possible while I’m reading. But with False Memory, Miranda felt legit and I didn’t overanalyze anything, honestly. Miranda felt like a typical teenage girl, albeit one who is like a science experiment with no memory.

The romance was superbly done. I’m a big fan of romance not being a main focus but still being quite prominent and I thought Dan Krokos did an excellent job with that in False Memory.

Basically, I’m absolutely hooked on this series. I thought False Memory by Dan Krokos was a fantastic debut and an awesome start to a new series. False Memory is an intense sci-fi thriller that kept me fixated with every single sentence. Do not miss this debut! show less

I'm not a big fan of science fiction so I was a little hesitate about reading the book, but once I started I found myself hooked in the plot and quite enjoying it.

It started off with the main character, Miranda North, finding herself in a shopping mall with no memory of how she made it there. Upon her fear of the unknown she panicks and releases a wave of fear that sends everyone running away from unseen monsters- all but the mysterious Peter who convince Miranda that he can help her. And so, they set off in an adventure that will have you reading as fast as you can to reveal the mysteriousness of the situation.

As I mentioned before I'm not a big fan of sci-fi as it confuses me and I often find myself rereading some sentences to show more understand what's going on, but False Memory wasn't as confusing. There were a few things that I had a bit of a hard time wrapping my head around, but overall it was well written. It flowed with an easy, even pace that was filled with enough action to keep you coming back for more.

If you're a fan of action, weapons and adventure then you will love this book. If I was a man I would've probably liked this book more, but since I'm a female and a sucker for romance False Memory didn't do it for me. It had interesting questions that kept me intrigued to finish the book and I will read book two once it published. show less

Full review on Reader's Dialogue: http://readersdialogue.blogspot.com/2012/10/false-memory.html

There's something about Miranda's voice that just draws you into the story and doesn't let you go. She has such a matter-of-fact way of presenting things, even when everything is going to pieces, and even a bit of humor. Though Noah provides more of the dark humor than Miranda does. I immediately cared about Miranda, but at the same time, I cared about Peter even when she wasn't sure she trusted him. I think she did, too. And that's the thing - I responded to each of her teammates the way Miranda responded to them, I saw them through her eyes. I love that it happened that way, that I experienced the whole story the way she experienced show more it.

Miranda's confusion is an important part of the story, of course, but what I love is that Miranda is such a strong, kick-ass character, not just in action, but in her personality as well. She exhibits such strength in dealing with every new situation, keeping her cool, assessing and deciding. All the characters have very distinctive personalities, especially Peter and Noah - which makes things very interesting as things develop. But because Miranda's voice is so strong throughout, I connected to every character and was emotionally connected. Even though the main part of the book is the thriller, the emotion is really strong, too.

The cadence of the way the story is told is perfect, the pacing spot-on, with just enough lulls between the action, and lots and lots of action. I found it interesting that each character seems to have a preferred method of killing - one pushes people off roofs, one snaps necks... But at the same time, they're versatile, and they adapt to each situation. I especially like the way the big fight Miranda fights at the end uses the surroundings to aid and hinder the action. It adds another dimension to the scene.

The way the plot unfolds, with the team uncovering bits and pieces of what's going on and what's in store for them, fits in with the action so that the two work together. It gets confusing, with all the details, but in a way, it's fun trying to keep it all straight. It has to be confusing, that's the point, and it's confusing for Miranda and her team as well. And little clues are dropped so that it builds up until the end when the final bombshell is dropped, setting things up for a much larger and more terrible war for the Roses in the next book... show less