Imagine a world made up of four separate realms. A Coastal Realm where art, singing, writing and imagination are celebrated and taught. A Woodland Realm where Science, Maths and History are revered and practiced. There is a Desert Realm which is this land’s military base, a brutal place of fists and fights, miners and criminals. The last realm is the largest – the Stone Realm.

This realm holds a trading post and has the most unskilled workers who work to supply the other realms. The Stone Realm has the most powerful ruler, named simply Madame.

Within these Allied Realms, the currency is memories. They are bought and sold, used to torture or treat people and pay for your rent or food. Criminals are put up for auction for their memories – which are then taken until there is nothing left of them, and they die.

This auction is run by none other than Madame. She rules by force and fear since her father died. She trusts no-one and is not to be trusted either.

Etta (Julietta) is 17 and knows Madame all too well. Four years before she was forced to betray someone she loved in order to save her own mother. It all went terribly wrong leaving Etta consumed with guilt ever since. Etta is one of the gifted who can take others memories but can stop anyone trying to take hers.

Now Madame is threatening her with her mother’s life again, and Etta must return to a life she left behind four years before to save her.

This dystopian fantasy novel has the amazing concept of memories as currency and control. There is a lot to take in with many characters to get to know as Etta navigates this world she’d been hiding from. If you want to learn to fight in this world, you buy, or take with force, a hunter’s memory. You will instantly have his skills. If you want to punish someone, you pour terrible memories into their mind.

It is a brutal place to begin with, but as Etta learns the truth about her past as she tries to save her future, she realises she has the power to make things better for everyone. This was not the plan, but as each twist and turn in this busy plot is handled, Etta’s life transforms.

This is not a novel to be rushed as the plot is a complicated web of betrayals, truth and lies with guilt and desperation driving two main characters forward. They begin with a mission in mind which morphs into something much bigger.

Imaginative premise.

Author – Lauren Mansy

Age – 12+

(2023, Fantasy, Dystopian, Love, Friendship, Betrayal, Lies, Asylum, Secrets, Mind Control, Memories, Barter, Theft, Realms, Control, Violence, Fear, Battle, Freedom, Poverty, Prisoners, Maze, Action)