Reviewed by Dan

TITLE: Forsaken

AUTHOR: J.R. Gray

PUBLISHER: Gray Books

LENGTH: 297 Pages

RELEASE DATE:  February 25, 2018

BLURB:

Titus had lived and breathed religion his entire life, tucked away from the rest of the world in a compound in northern Wyoming. He’s destined to be the next leader of the church, deemed so by the Prophet.

God spoke and with His word He created. But God made a mistake. Titus isn’t worthy. He was born sick and it’s solidified when he rescues the most beautiful man he’s ever seen.

Torn between fidelity to his faith or his soul, Titus must reconcile the two parts of himself before he’s discovered hiding among the chosen.

REVIEW:

This was one of those stories that I read straight through. I was trapped in a country inn in New Hampshire in the middle of a blizzard and I read it cover to cover. I enjoyed it, but found myself constantly hoping for a little more. Let me explain.

The story revolves around two main characters.  The first is Titus, a young man who has been raised for most of his life in a remote religious compound in Wyoming. His grandfather is the founder of the compound, or more aptly named cult, and Titus is to be his heir.  Then Titus, while on a trip outside the compound for some undisclosed reason, finds a young man who looks like an angel lying in a roadside ditch. The man has been beaten and robbed.

The other main character is that beaten man, Angel. Right from the start I had questions. Who beat him and why? Why, if the compound had phones, was no report ever done? I got that Titus was kind of hiding Angel, but it left me confused.

Once the story moved on, I found myself invested in the story and wondering how the two men could work out their differences. I struggled a little bit with the unlikelyhood that someone in Titus’ position could have possibly gotten to twenty years old or thereabouts and never learned that there were gay people. If he were confined to the compound…maybe, but he traveled to the city regularly to sell the furniture he and his crew made in their wood shop on the grounds of the compound. But, for the sake of the story, I went along with it and suspended my disbelief. From there on the story developed as I expected, building steadily to the end.

For myself, I would have liked a little more angst and a little more cult drama. There was the surprising scene with Titus’ dad near the end, which I was totally not expecting, but I did expect more along those lines based on the blurb.

Overall, I would say that I liked the story. I would have to rate it as “Liked it/Above Average” on our Love Bytes rating scale.

RATING:

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