Today on my blog I’m delighted to bring you my review of a brand new YA novel, Narcosis Room by Lousie Cypress and published by one of my favourite publishers, Owl Hollow Press. Below you will find the book cover and blurb followed by my review. I think everyone is going to love this book.
Narcosis Room by Louise Cypress
“Well-defined characters in a zigzagging medical tale rife with surprises.” –Kirkus
Ellie Savage is accustomed to promises. Her dermatologist dad and psychiatrist mom run the Narcosis Clinic, a medical facility famous for ultimate makeovers, where clients’ disturbing issues and deepest wounds are resolved while they are beautified.
Ellie is her parents’ most ardent supporter–until her dreams become a nightmare. When Ellie becomes a patient and discovers her true self has been shredded by the scalpel, she finds that the only way for her to remember who she is is to forget everything she thinks she knows.
Narcosis Room – My Review
I absolutely loved this YA novel. The plot was original and unique, the characters well developed, and the writing was flawless.
We have three points of view in this book: Ellie (the main character), Dean (a famous pop star), and Cole (the boy Ellie fancies). Even though there are three points of view, this is not a love triangle. Ellie’s parents are the famous Savage Doctors who run the Narcosis Clinic where patients can come and go to sleep for three months to have their dreams realised. Ellie’s father is a dermatologist and her mother is a surgeon and psychotherapist working on reprogramming the brain. Ellie has undergone Narcosis to help regain her memories. She’s suffering from retrograde amnesia which her parents believe was caused by something that happened to her in boarding school.
Now if you’ve read the blurb for this book, you’ll already know that Ellie’s parents and Narcosis is not all that it seems and as the story unfolds and snippets of information are revealed, the whole thing takes a turn that you won’t see coming.
Ellie can’t remember anything in her life before ninth grade and her old friends Cole and his twin sister Marley can’t figure her out. They know she changed after she went to private school but they don’t know why. Cole has fancied Ellie since kindergarten but she has no memories of ever being friends with him or Marley.
Ellie is set to undergo Narcosis for the three months of the summer but before she does she attends Dean’s concert and this is where things start to change. I have to admit, I was hooked on this book from the very first page and couldn’t wait to find out what really happened to Ellie and why she lost her memories, and what her parents had been doing to her.
There are so many great elements to this book and each character point of view enhances the story. When Ellie wakes up after the latest round of Narcosis there are some big changes and she realizes things are not as they seem. This leads her to seek out answers and what happens next is something I wasn’t expecting. I devoured the second half of this book in one sitting because I had to see what was going to happen next.
I predict that this book is going to be a massive hit in the YA market in 2019 and I can’t wait to read more for this author. Her prose is wonderful and I found myself becoming the character of Ellie as I read. In fact, I think I’m going to miss Ellie, Cole, Marley and Dean. A definite 5 star read and one I highly recommend to anyone looking for a unique plot and storyline with great twists and turns.
Narcosis Room is available now in ebook and paperback from Amazon and all leading retailers.
Until next time,
Keep reading and writing,
Amanda
Amanda J Evans is an award-winning Irish author and writing coach. Amanda writes adult romance that often crosses into paranormal and fantasy. Growing up with heroes like Luke Skywalker and Indiana Jones, her stories centre on good versus evil with a splice of love and magic thrown in too. Her books have all won awards and her novella, Hear Me Cry, won the Book of the Year Award at the Dublin Writers Conference 2018. Amanda is also the author of Surviving Suicide: A Memoir from Those Death Left Behind, published in 2012.
