Hundred Oaks #3
Release Date: March 1st, 2013 by Sourcebooks Fire (that's today!)
Details: 304 pages, paperback
Genre: Young Adult > Contemporary
Source: NetGalley (Thank you NetGalley & Sourcebooks Fire!)
Find it: Amazon || Goodreads
Summary:
Kate has always been the good girl. Too good, according to some people at school—although they have no idea the guilty secret she carries. But this summer, everything is different…
This summer she’s a counselor at Cumberland Creek summer camp, and she wants to put the past behind her. This summer Matt is back as a counselor too. He’s the first guy she ever kissed, and he’s gone from a geeky songwriter who loved The Hardy Boys to a buff lifeguard who loves to flirt…with her.
Kate used to think the world was black and white, right and wrong. Turns out, life isn’t that easy…
Things I Can't Forget is the third book in the Hundred Oaks series and I'll admit, I didn't read the first two (even though I have them) but it didn't negatively impact my experience. Things I Can't Forget is about Kate who's really big on the whole Christianity thing, she's volunteered at a camp she use to go to as a kid for the Arts and Crafts committee and she's trying to earn forgiveness from God for a sin that she's beating herself up over. She runs into another kid who use to go to camp with her, Matt. And things start to get hazy for Kate.
Let me be honest; I really really didn't like Kate. While I understand someone intensely believing in God (like a few of my friends and my parents...) I don't understand why someone would push their religion on someone else. Would consider unfriending someone because they question God. It irritates me when people think that their religion is the only right religion and that's the type of person Kate is. She thinks it's a sin to befriend someone who doesn't believe, a sin to date someone who isn't the "perfect" Christian. The way she treated her friend Emily after what happened was just wrong and she had the nerve to feel like the victim? GIRL PLEASE! Even when she started to realize that things aren't always black and white, she was still pissing me off! She's a Christian above all, including being human. Not befriending someone you know is going through a loss just because they sleep around and you think you'll catch the "sin germs" doesn't make you a good person. Just because she "sinned" doesn't mean you will too. Have you no control over your own actions Kate?! Goodness!!
I really liked Matt. He was a normal guy in college. A good person, great with kids, believed in God in his own way and was in a frat (which bothered Kate because it's not Christian-like, pffft). You could tell from the get-go that he and Kate had some serious history as kids for something that only lasted a week! But the impact she made on him was stronger than anything and that really showed. The way he cared about her and the way he was patient with her was really sweet, really not something you see much of and it's always good to see that in books.
I love the friendship formed between Parker and Kate. They didn't start off on the right foot but I'm glad they worked through it, it seems like Parker is exactly what Kate needed in order to expand her horizons and it was cute seeing Parker and Will together. Now I'm totally interested in knowing their story as well!
Overall, I did enjoy the book for what it was, it was just Kate's intensity with religion that irritated me. But beyond that, Things I Can't Forget is about making friends and not shutting yourself out from others, learning about other people and coming to terms with what you believe.
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