Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesic

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac

By Gabrielle Zevin

Naomi is about to begin her junior year in high school as the editor-in-chief of the yearbook when she takes a tumble down the exterior stairs to the school, hitting her head but saving the yearbook camera.  She is rescued by a new boy, James, who takes her to the hospital.  When Naomi wakes up she has amnesia.  She doesn’t remember much of anything since 6^th grade, which was the year her parents got divorced.  She doesn’t remember that her mother is remarried and that she has a half-sister.  She doesn’t remember her best friend and co-editor-in-chief of the yearbook, Will.  She doesn’t remember her boyfriend, Ace.  And now there is a new boy in her life, James.  She does remember that she is mad at her mother, but she is unclear about the details.  Naomi reinvents herself during this year, until the memories come flooding back.  Then she must move on with her life.  She must decide whether she wants to have a relationship with her mother and which boy she wants to keep in her life.  As in all of Gabrielle Zevin’s books, the narrator, Naomi, is entertaining and likeable.  Readers will be pulled into her journey of rediscovery. 

Genre:  Realistic fiction, Romance

Reviewed by:  Lauren Sprouse, librarian