Sing me forgotten /

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

"Lush and lavish, Sing Me Forgotten hit all the right notes."

--Erin A. Craig, New York Times bestselling author of House of Salt and Sorrow



"A deliciously magical feminist twist on the beloved classic The Phantom of the Opera."

--Kester Grant, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Court of Miracles



Isda does not exist. At least not beyond the opulent walls of the opera house.



Cast into a well at birth for being one of the magical few who can manipulate memories when people sing, she was saved by Cyril, the opera house's owner. Since that day, he has given her sanctuary from the murderous world outside. All he asks in return is that she use her power to keep ticket sales high--and that she stay out of sight. For if anyone discovers she survived, Isda and Cyril would pay with their lives.



But Isda breaks Cyril's cardinal rule when she meets Emeric Rodin, a charming boy who throws her quiet, solitary life out of balance. His voice is unlike any she's ever heard, but the real shock comes when she finds in his memories hints of a way to finally break free of her gilded prison.



Haunted by this possibility, Isda spends more and more time with Emeric, searching for answers in his music and his past. But the price of freedom is steeper than Isda could ever know. For even as she struggles with her growing feelings for Emeric, she learns that in order to take charge of her own destiny, she must become the monster the world tried to drown in the first place.



"Enchanting, lush, and decadent."

--Adalyn Grace, author of All the Stars and Teeth



Also by Jessica S. Olson:

A Forgery of Roses

Reviews provided by Syndetics

School Library Journal Review

Gr 8 Up--This absorbing fantasy is a gender-swapped twist on The Phantom of the Opera. White, red-headed Isda, 17, has lived her whole life hiding in an opera house in Channe, Vaureille. She's a gravoir, born with gnarled cheeks, with the magical ability to manipulate other people's memories when they're singing. Gravoirs are so feared, they're killed at birth. Cyril Bardin, the white manager of the opera house, saved newborn Isda from drowning. Now Isda, masked and hidden, secretly manipulates the audience's minds to praise the opera's performances, ensuring its success. A talented composer, Isda is mesmerized by the singing voice of newly hired janitor Emeric, a handsome white man too untrained to perform in the opera. Isda offers to secretly coach him so she can access his memories. She sees he had a little sister who was a powerful gravoir and was captured. Unlike gravoirs, fendoirs, also facially scarred, are tolerated because they can siphon singing people's memories. The wealthy buy the elixir of people's memories to enhance their own ability to remember the past. As Cyril uses Isda's magic to advance his career, she discovers she's more powerful than she realizes and craves the freedom she's been denied. The story's leisurely beginning ramps up to a fast-paced, action-packed ending, with some fairly intense brutality. VERDICT Readers will empathize with Isda's desire to be treated like a human being and not a monster. The bittersweet but satisfying ending remains true to the characters and their story.--Sharon Rawlins, New Jersey State Lib., Trenton

Kirkus Book Review

Magic and music blend in this gender-flipped fantasy take on The Phantom of the Opera. Seventeen-year-old Isda lives and lurks in the shadows, catwalks, and crypts of the Channe Opera House of Vaureille. Discarded at birth and raised in secret by the calculating Cyril Bardin, Isda helps her adoptive father and the opera by manipulating audience members' memories through her forbidden gravoir magic. Unlike the indentured fendoirs who legally extract memories as an elixir--sometimes leaving the poor as Memoryless husks--all gravoirs are supposed to be executed at birth, a legacy of the bloody and brief revolution led by three much-mythologized gravoir women, Les Trois. Redheaded Isda has facial disfigurements like all gravoirs and fendoirs, hidden beneath masks that they are forced to wear in public; Isda has adorned hers with sparkling crystals and raven feathers. But the songs of Emeric Rodin, a newly arrived and lowly cleaning boy, stir Isda's magic and interest, and she begins to tutor him while also fearing addiction to the memories she takes from him. Singing, masquerades, organ music, and chandeliers ensue, elements as indebted to Andrew Lloyd Webber as Gaston Leroux. With Isda, debut author Olson offers a complex and nuanced character who both suffers persecution and commits monstrous acts, pitting typical teenage insecurities against mind-altering powers. Most characters read as White. A well-choreographed, updated take on a melodramatic classic. (Fantasy. 14-18) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.