Amazon.com.au:Customer reviews: Don’t You Forget About Me

Top positive review

4 1/2 stars

Reviewed in Australia on 12 September 2019

I don’t think I’ve reviewed any of Mhairi McFarlane’s books before now, but I’ve read them all. And what’s more I’ve loved them all. I do get a little caught up in the “conversation” that would be the internal dialogue as well as the actual dialogue, I think it’s because I think and talk Australian and the author and characters are from the British Isles and speak British/Irish but it’s also the snark and wit that these fictional characters use to converse with each other. And they’re just so damn likeable! Fab story!

7 people found this helpful

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Gordon Ross

Yawn

Reviewed in Australia on 12 December 2021

Just could not connect with this one, although writing fluent. Maybe I am the wrong age group, gender or bored by relationships!

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From Australia

Gordon Ross

Yawn

Reviewed in Australia on 12 December 2021

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Just could not connect with this one, although writing fluent. Maybe I am the wrong age group, gender or bored by relationships!

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Emma

Reviewed in Australia on 23 August 2021

It was slow and boring. It could have done with a copy edit. It was generic. I skipped some of the middle.

It had a strong start though. Thumbs up for that.

One person found this helpful

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A. Linton

Promised so much but fails to deliver

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 13 March 2019

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The kindle sample for this book is really quite good and ends on somewhat of a cliff hanger. Pretty popular Georgina and geeky Lucas have a secret thing going when they are at school, but in the present time they have been estranged for years and I really wanted to find out what happened. Unfortunately the chapters set in the present are nowhere near as interesting - Lucas and Georgina meet again but pretend not to know each other and there is really very little interaction between them - there are a lot of scenes between Georgina and her trio of 'zany' friends who are all pretty much one-dimensional and forgettable - so much so that I've already forgotten their names. There is probably a good reason for this - if the two starcrossed lovers at the centre of the story had even one decent conversation about what happened in the past they would be able to clear up all the misunderstandings, but this is the sort of book where everything has to happen before a group of cheering friends. Author seems to have gotten quite a lot of inspiration from 'Friends' and 'Sex in the City'. Wasn't a bit surprised when I checked up on her and found out she was quite a bit older than the millennial readership she is aiming at. This reminds me strongly of many books I read about 20 years ago. The humour is a bit over the top and didn't really work for me. It also didn't help that I believed for much of the book that Georgina had simply ditched Lucas for a more popular boy (more of this in comments) which made it impossible to root for her to get back with him.
Wouldn't rush to read her other books unless I found one free on KU.

10 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

A little disappointed...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 26 January 2019

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I love Mhairi McFarlane’s books. This book is...good but notwithstanding the important issues tackled, I just couldn’t warm to Georgina, Lucas or their friends which I found surprising because I’ve devoured the other four books by MM. I felt the entire story was leading up to the worst day at school scene and there wasn’t much character development of Clem, Rav, Jo like there was with Rachel’s gang or Emma or Hannah and Nick. I just didn’t find it as funny as her previous which is a large part of why I love the author’s books. Maybe a little too...Wuthering Heights?! I’m a bit disappointed but I’m looking eagerly to her next one. I don’t think I’ll be rereading this one whereas her first four books are my staple go tos on a beach holiday! Still love you MM!

6 people found this helpful

Suad

Disappointing to say the least

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 31 July 2019

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Oh boy. This was such a chore to read.
I am so disappointing, I can't even begin to describe it.
I had purchased 3 of Mhairi McFarlaine's books at once purely based on the reviews. Reviews that were all predominantly consistent! 4-4.5-5 star reviews! Reviews that promised I would absolutely fall in love with McFarlane if I was a fan of Sophie Kinsella.

I picked this one up first, because I liked the idea of a first love walking back into someone's life. The plot sounded interesting, the characters sounded funny and cute, so I went for it.

The first part that tells the story of Georgina and Lucas secretly dating and falling in love in high school was my first warning. It was written in a way that came off as clumsy, rushed, and almost like a badly described version of an 80s chick-flick. I cringed a little reading their make out scenes together, and their 18-year-old thoughts. I didn't think much of it thought, because I figured writing YA is not exactly McFarlane's forte and she only added this small section to set the groundwork for the rest of the story.

Then the actual story started, present day, 30 year old Georgina working at a really horrible Italian café/restaurant. In a series of unfortunate events (which, we'll soon learn is basically Georgina's whole life), she ends up being fired in front of a restaurant critic, and leaves in a huff. She decides to go straight to her boyfriend's house instead of going home, and oh my God, he's in bed with another girl.

So far, I'm really just trying to get to that point where she meets Lucas again. And let me tell you, it doesn't happen for a while. But then, when it DOES happen, he doesn't remember her, and she's crestfallen, because in her mind that means what they had meant nothing to him.

She starts working for him and his brother, and they somehow begin to get to know each other all over again, even though there remains that barrier that neither one of them seems able to break past. Does he really not remember her, or is he only pretending? I'll leave that for you to guess, but it's pretty obvious from the get-go.

I guessed very early on, when she had that little breakdown with the male entertainer, what had happened back in high school. I felt really sad. And was looking forward to see how this would be revealed and tackled in the book.

Unfortunately, this isn't revealed until the last 3 or 4 chapters of the book (this is a big book!), and it is revealed on stage, in front of an audience, which I felt was...not appropriate. The way it was tackled? It wasn't. Not really.

There was a lot of wasted time in this book. A huge book, filled with so many side characters, subplots, secondary character backgrounds and so on. Things I really wasn't interested to know or read about. You really want to get into a secondary character's story, write a sequel! But let's just focus on Georgina and Lucas here. They barely had any scenes together. They were few and numbered, and when they did, they never lasted too long. There was no sizzling romance. There were no butterflies in my stomach. Nothing. I mean, I picked up this book because I wanted to read a feel-good chicklit, and instead I got landed with a 400+ page book of constant babbling that in no way moved the story of the two protagonists forward.

Not to mention that Lucas was actually not likable at all. Regardless of what happened in the past. There were so many different moments where he would lash out, and the things he would say were in no way OK or forgivable. They said a lot about his character and I would not have looked past them so quickly the way Georgina has.

Disappointing to say the least.

One person found this helpful

bookworm

Not as good as previous books

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 15 June 2019

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I was so looking forward to this book having enjoyed all previous books by the author. Unfortunately, I have to agree with some of the negatives from other readers. The book was poorly edited and there were words either missing or the wrong word used. The main character didn't gain my interest at all and the friends wouldn't have been missed if they'd been removed from the story. I liked Lucas but I'm afraid I couldn't finish the book as found it so dull. I can count on one hand the number of books I've given up on as I hate to do this and do give every story I read a fair go. I just couldn't plough on. It didn't hold my interest. I can't imagine having a boyfriend from school still affecting my life over a decade later or still being so into him. We change so much during each decade. I'm not a dinosaur but I did feel Georgina acted very young for her age. Are 30 year olds like that these days? It was hard to get into her character as she didn't really seem to have one. I like this author but can't give the story more than one star.

7 people found this helpful

Kindle Cat

‘Strong Language’ Alert

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 June 2021

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This would probably have been an enjoyable book but I was sickened by the constant and unnecessary use of that nasty and offensive ‘F’ word. So much so that I gave up after 20% of the book. I won’t be reading any more of this author’s work. Perhaps Amazon need to put warnings on their book descriptions and save me and countless others wasting money on such unpleasant books.

2 people found this helpful

Not up to scratch

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 September 2021

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I've enjoyed all the other books by Mhairi McFarlane but this one made tedious reading and I had thoughts of giving up on it. Some of the sentences didn't really make sense and some of the so-called humour was lost on me but there again modern day humour doesn't strike me as being funny - bring back Steptoe and Ken Dodd!
With such a promising synopsis, the middle of the book could have been cut out and begun again at page 290.

One person found this helpful

Shhh

Enjoyable at points, but overall it's a bit of a drag

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 29 March 2021

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I really enjoyed the opening and was interested to see where it would go. But when the story moved to the present day it took forever to get going! While marginally entertaining I found myself reading quickly to hope it would get to the point. I really think so much of the first few chapters were filler and not needed. And then when the couple finally meet again they have so little interaction. I was intrigued by the plot, but actually the whole premise meant that at times it was very boring waiting for them to admit they knew each other. It also took a long time for me to warm to the main character. I wasn't really behind her for most of the book and didn't understand some of her actions,l. Although this does become clearer and I can see why the author chose to write her this way, it meant the book was much less enjoyable for the majority. I did appreciate that it was not just about the love story, but her rediscovering who she is on her own. I'm glad I finished it, but sort of wish I didn't bother starting it.

Alma Matters

A decent read but doesn’t live up to the previous books

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 4 April 2019

Verified Purchase

I was looking forward to reading the latest offering from MM as I’d really enjoyed her previous books but unfortunately it just didn’t live up to the others. It lacked the humour of before which I was really surprised about as they were genuinely laugh out loud. This book however just dragged on and on until the last quarter when things finally started to happen. I liked Lucas’ character and it would’ve been good to get more from him. Similarly the sixth form flashbacks were good albeit fairly brief, but I found myself just frustrated with the main character. I really wanted that awful Geoffrey to get his comeuppance - I was willing her to *just do something* all the way through. Way too flaky a character for my liking! Also ridiculously unbelievable that he wouldn’t remember her (or that he could pretend not to) I mean come on! I’ll still read further books as I do like the author, hopefully this was just a minor blip.

2 people found this helpful

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