In Roni Loren’s THE ONE YOU CAN’T FORGET, Rebecca’s relationship with Wes is a catalyst for trying new things, which for her, includes Indian food.
ARC provided by the publisher for review
Roni Loren’s The Ones Who Got Away series follows a group of friends 10 years after they survived a school shooting. Book 1 was largely about reconnecting the classmates, with Liv and Finn rekindling their high school attraction. In THE ONE YOU CAN’T FORGET out Tuesday, the series gets its footing. It’s the book I was hoping for in the series, the one that gets real about the ripples from the shooting.
Among the friends, Rebecca was the overachiever, the one who’s path was laid out from day one. Now, she’s a family law attorney on the partner track in her dad’s firm. She’s also the one carrying the most guilt, the one with lingering PTSD. Wes comes into the picture after Rebecca is mugged. She realizes she represented his ex-wife in a pretty ugly divorce that destroyed his dream of opening a restaurant. It sent him down a pretty dark path. He now teaches cooking in a community program for teens.
Although I’m giving THE ONE YOU CAN’T FORGET the same 4-star rating as I did book onein the series, Rebecca’s story is so much more emotional, so much more affecting than Liv and Finn’s. Loren has created two super relatable, well conceived characters and that’s the book’s main strength. I had a huge amount of empathy for Rebecca.
I found it hard to believe it took Wes so long to realize who Rebecca was, because her hair was different (seriously, dude?), but the rest rang true. Getting involved with Wes is a catalyst for Rebecca — for trying new things (Indian food), to stop living up to her father’s expectations, to start standing up for herself. In a funny way, it’s also a little bit of rebellion. On paper, Wes isn’t exactly the best choice. What I appreciated most was Rebecca’s NOT looking at this relationship as, “I’ll be a whole person again if I just find the right guy.” Not at all. And P.S. I cheered when she finally told her dad off.
THE ONE YOU CAN’T FORGET is a strong second installment in the series that actually rises above the first for me. It artfully balances romance with a broader story about transforming trauma into something positive. If you were just so-so on Liv and Finn’s story, I’d invite you back to see if you feel different about Rebecca and Wes.
Inspired by a meal Wes and Rebecca have at a food truck pod early in the book, I made tandoori chicken from Maya Kaimal’s Curried Favors. There’s a similar grilled Chicken Tikka that’s a summer staple for us with and it’s great in pasta salad, too.
Read an excerpt from The One You Can’t Forget.
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4 stars
