Brett’s book kept me up worrying about each and every member of this family catapulted into trauma. His resolution brings hope to damaged, resilient and good people, as well as to the reader.
Jane J.
Remember Me Like This by Bret Anthony Johnston is a heartbreaking and haunting portrait of a family after their kidnapped son is returned to them. Part thriller, part psychological study, each page had me braced for impact, waiting for the Campbell’s seemingly happy ending to fall apart and take them with it. Hopeful, poignant, and haunting, this book is far out of my comfort zone as a reader but stuck with me long after I’d finished it.
Mackenzie
The last book written by Diana Wynne Jones, The Islands of Chaldea brims with Jones's characteristic sense of wonder, wit, and whimsy. A fitting hurrah from the undisputed grandmaster of children's fantasy.
Rebecca
To read Remember Me Like This is to be riveted from beginning to end, thrust in to the very depths of a family's life in dramatic, emotional upheaval, and to come away from the story relieved and uplifted by proof of the strength of family bonds. It is a stunning and completely engrossing novel.Megan
This book riveted me from its first chapter. The writing is fluid and evocative, the subject is painful but compelling, and the characters are richly imagined and achingly real. By the time the book was over I felt I intimately knew not just the family but the town - which is almost another character in the book - and that they and I together had gone through an intense emotional experience.David
Sometimes you read a story in the newspaper and say “I cannot even begin to imagine what it must be like for that family.” Remember Me Like This is based on just such a story (though a fictional one), and yet Johnson’s deft writing makes you feel that you do, in fact, understand what the members of the family are going through. Each family member’s perspective is woven into the narrative and you feel that you have been let in on their five emotional journeys.
Dina
How the aftermath of a crime impacts the intricate workings of the nuclear family is the point of this story - the part that mystery novels often leave out; the victims and their friends and families left to deal as best they can while the detectives move on. This is a very sympathetic family which has all coped with the disappearance of their son/brother/grandson in different ways and when, after 4 years, he is returned home things will never be quite the same again. A page turner written with great empathy and insight.
Susannah
Some books I read as an observer, but Bret’s book pulled me in and made me feel like part of the story from the beginning – a family tragedy that any parent would find agonizing combined with moments of pure joy. This is an up-at-night-reading book of the most original kind.
Robin
It’s Texas, hot and steamy, and the quiet desperation is palpable. Justin Campbell has been missing for four years. His mother, father and older brother have been coping each in his/her own way. Suddenly one day, Justin is returned to his family and the story that unfolds reveals in perfect pitch and tempo the toll that has been taken. The moments of redemption are sweet, but the injustice weighs heavily. You will hope mightily for this family’s deliverance and you will be rewarded. Johnston has written a timeless masterpiece.
Ellen
Prepare yourself to be transported to Corpus Christi to join the Campbell family as each member relives their perceived participation in and reaction to one of their own being taken. Stay with them as they live through the impossible. You will not be able to turn away.
Carol
