Forbidden

Title: Forbidden

Author: Tabitha Suzuma

Genre: Fiction/Contemporary Romance

Release Date: May 27, 2010

My Rating:
♥♥♥♥♥

Incest.  One of the many lifestyles society considers taboo.  People don't speak about it, they just pretend it doesn't occur in this modern age.  But what if you could experience the same emotions as someone considering incest?  Would you change your opinion on the subject or would you show obvious disdain?

Lochan, Maya, and their two younger siblings are the result of a broken marriage, a purposefully distant father, and an outrageously irresponsible mother.  Lochan and Maya are forced to take on the roles of mother and father to their younger siblings.  

Lochan is unequivocally exhausted; he suffers from extreme anxiety, while juggling the responsibilities of a parent with his studies.  He has to get into a University to escape the impoverishment that his parents have put him and his siblings in.  He is an amazingly sweet character who only wants to do right to the best of his abilities.

Maya is trying to live life as a normal girl, while constantly being exposed to her mother's capricious behavior.  She hasn't been in a relationship in all of her sixteen and a half years, so when she is asked out by a popular boy in school, everything in her world seems right.  But he's not who she really wants to be with.

A series of events tie Maya and Lochan closer together in a way they never expected.  They know their relationship is wrong, but why does being together feel so right?  

Lochan and Maya have to incessantly stay under the radar for fear of anyone finding them out.

Suzuma extracted emotions out of me I didn't even know a book could make me feel.  I bawled for hours on end after finishing this book.  It's definitely a heart breaker.  Forbidden actually made me lenient to something I never would have discussed before.

The background events in this book are so amazingly realistic; it puts a deeper element into Lochan and Maya's relationship and really makes you ponder the effects of their situation on their relationship.

The characters were peculiarly lovable, especially the younger ones.  I loved and felt for them.

I am giving Forbidden a 5/5 because this book deserves more popularity and it tapped into my emotions in a way not many books can.

★ This book is explicit, so I would not recommend it to anyone under sixteen.