Forever

Molly #1

by Theresa Weir

THEY SAID HE WAS A LOST CAUSE

But from the moment Dr. Rachel Collins first saw her newest patient, she knew her colleagues were wrong. For beneath the pain and defiance in Sammy Thoreau's stormy black eyes she sensed a vulnerability that tore at her heart--and an amazing inner strength that made her all the more determined to help this bad-boy journalist learn to live again.

THEY DIDN'T KNOW WHAT LOVE COULD DO

She couldn't know that Sammy, with his sexy smile and biting humor, would reverse their roles with a vengeance... exposing the secret pain she'd tried so hard to hide... igniting emotions no doctor should ever feel for a patient. All she knew was that she had to win this man's trust, to heal his hurts. Only then could they face the promise of their love, forever.

Genres: Romance, Contemporary, Contemporary Romance, Fiction, Drama

272 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Theresa Weir (a.k.a. Anne Frasier) is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of novels and numerous short stories that have spanned the genres of suspense, mystery, thriller, romantic suspense, paranormal, fantasy, and memoir. During her award-winning career, she's written for Penguin Putnam, Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins Publishers, Bantam Books/Random House, Silhouette Books, Grand Central Publishing/Hachette, and Amazon's Thomas & Mercer. Her titles have been printed in both hardcover and paperback and translated into twenty languages.

Her first memoir, THE ORCHARD, was a 2011 Oprah Magazine Fall Pick, Number Two on the Indie Next list, a featured B+ review in Entertainment Weekly, and a Librarians’ Best Books of 2011. Her second memoir, THE MAN WHO LEFT, was a New York Times Bestseller. Going back to 1988, Weir’s debut title was the cult phenomenon AMAZON LILY, initially published by Pocket Books and later reissued by Bantam Books. Writing as Theresa Weir, she won a RITA for romantic suspense (COOL SHADE), and a year later the Daphne du Maurier for paranormal romance (BAD KARMA). In her more recent Anne Frasier career, her thriller and suspense titles hit the USA Today list (HUSH, SLEEP TIGHT, PLAY DEAD) and were featured in Mystery Guild, Literary Guild, and Book of the Month Club. HUSH was both a RITA and Daphne du Maurier finalist.

THE ORCHARD

An Oprah Magazine Fall Pick
Featured B+ Review in Entertainment Weekly
Number Two on October Indie Next List
BJ's Book Club Spotlight
LIbrarians' Best Books of 2011
Maclean's Top Books of 2011
On Point (NPR) Best Books of 2011
Abrams Best of 2011
Publishers Lunch (Publishers Weekly) Favorite Books of 2011
Eighth Annual One Book, One Community 2012, Excelsior, Minnesota
Target Book Club Pick, September 2012

www.theresaweir.com


Title List

Writing as ANNE FRASIER
Hush, USA Today bestseller, RITA finalist, Daphne du Maurier finalist (2002)
Sleep Tight, USA Today bestseller (2003)
Play Dead, USA Today bestseller (2004)
Before I Wake (2005)
Pale Immortal (2006)
Garden of Darkness, RITA finalist (2007)
Once Upon a Crime anthology, Santa’s Little Helper (2009)
The Lineup, Poems on Crime, Home (2010)
Discount Noir anthology, Crack House (2010)
Deadly Treats Halloween anthology, editor and contributor, The Replacement (September 2011)
Once Upon a Crime anthology, Red Cadillac (April 2012)
Woman in a Black Veil (July 2012)
Dark: Volume 1 (short stories, July 2012)
Dark: Volume 2 (short stories, July 2012)
Black Tupelo (short-story collection July 2012)
Girls from the North Country (short story, August 2012)
Made of Stars (short story, August 2012)
Stars (short story collection, August 2012)
Zero Plus Seven (anthology, 2013)
Stay Dead (April 2014)

Writing as THERESA WEIR
The Forever Man (1988)
Amazon Lily, RITA finalist, Best New Adventure Writer award, Romantic Times (1988)
Loving Jenny (1989)
Pictures of Emily (1990)
Iguana Bay (1990)
Forever (1991)
Last Summer (1992)
One Fine Day (1994)
Long Night Moon, Reviewer’s Choice Award, Romantic Times (1995)
American Dreamer (1997)
Some Kind of Magic (1998)
Cool Shade RITA winner, romantic suspense (1998)
Bad Karma, Daphne du Maurier award, paranormal (1999)
Max Under the Stars, short story (2010)
The Orchard, a memoir (September 2011)
The Man Who Left , a memoir and New York Times bestseller (April 2012)
The Girl with the Cat Tattoo (June 2012)
Made of Stars (August 2012)
Come As You Are (October 2013)
The Geek with the Cat Tattoo (December 2013)

Reviews

[Debbie DiFiore · Rating 3 out of 5]

I hate unanswered questions

This book was packed full of plots. A young man has brain damage and amnesia and he is very troubled. His Doctor, the heroine, tried to help him and falls in love with him on the way to recovery. Then one day he leaves and goes to his old girlfriend from high school and stays with her for over six months or more and then decides what he wants.

This book was good but I hate when you have questions or concerns that are not answered. Did he sleep with Mary Dawn while he took his break??? Why did he stay away so long if he felt empty without Rachel? I just hate when things are left hanging. I need closure and confirmation. Just needed more. An epilogue at the very least. I have the next book too but this one just was so different I am not sure I will read it. Especially if it leaves unanswered questions.

[Crista · Rating 5 out of 5]

Theresa Weir is romance's "best kept secret". I have no idea why she isn't more well known and more importantly why she stopped writing romance novels. She is incredible and unforgettable.

Forever is another example of her complexity and writing skill. Imagine a Psych Ward as the backdrop for a love story...At first I was skeptical, but I should have trusted Weir to seamlessly and effortlessly make even the most "unbelieveable" become "believable"!

Sammy was a popular reporter....a war reporter and very gifted with the written word. After a horrible car crash he is rendered incapacitated and put into a horrible veterans hospital....drugged and mistreated. His loving sister has him transferred to a University Hospital, not wanting to believe that he is a lost cause.

Dr. Rachel Collins is the Psychiatrist assigned to his case. She BELIEVES in him and his ability to get well. She soon learns that he has permanent memory loss and helps him to come to terms with the difficult "space" in his memory.

Both of these people have painful pasts. Sammy can't remember much of his, but Rachel isn't so lucky. She lives with her pain everyday. What begins as Rachel helping Sammy heal eventually morphs into Sammy returning the favor and saving Rachel.

There's is a sweet, touching, and at times painful courtship. Both realize the "wrongness" of their being together, but love sometimes crosses forbidden lines.

I will say that there is a part of the ending that I didn't care for...Rachel had been through so much, and I hated Sammy causing her any kind of pain. However, I did realize why Weir writes what she does.

There is another storyline involving Molly, Sammy's sister, which is also very emotional and turbulent as she comes to terms with how her life has ended up. For all these reasons, I recommend this book and really everything that Weir has written. Her characters depth is truly unique to anything I've ever read.

[Mela · Rating 4 out of 5]

The reality of the memory loss because of brain damage probably wasn't perfect.

I haven't found the love story as interesting and engaging as some other readers have. Although I liked it. (For some time, I wasn't even aware it was a romance.)

Some threads seemed not used, developed as they could have.

But I was thrilled by Sammy's story, or even more by the questions and answers it gave (and didn't give). Who we are? What is a past/memory? And the point that the truth is that most of us are constantly going back to the times of youth, sometimes living them more than the present time - this thought was poignant.

4 stars, because, to me, a romance a bit spoiled the potential of the novel.

It was my first by the author, for sure not the last.

[Linda (NOT RECEIVING NOTIFICATIONS) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sammy Thoreau is in pain, both physically and mentally. Torn between the confusing present and distant past, he can't remember much of the time in between. His teen years are fresh in his mind yet he looks like a much older man.

Dr. Rachel Collins helps others. Her life is far from perfect but when she meets Sammy for the first time she sees a spark of life. He has been given up by her peers but she thinks she can help him.

Theresa Weir does a fantastic job of taking a wounded man and allowing a strong female to mend him. Most of the time the hero in her books is fractured: mentally, physically and/or spiritually. He needs to find a connection.

Like real life, relationships have their ups and downs. Sammy starts out as the weaker soul and Rachel is the determined one. Slowly, with her help, he becomes better. He learns to deal with the many memories that are lost.

Ethics could have come into play but by then Sammy is on his own. Eventually Rachel starts to break. She has secrets from her past that she has a hard time letting go. With Sammy's help she starts to heal. Their roles are reversed and this is their story. The first of two books about the Thoreau siblings, FOREVER tugs at your heart. Take note and have ONE FINE DAY ready so you can read about Molly's story when you finish this one.

[Ruthie Knox · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is classic Weir, with the addition of a women's-fic-style subplot about the hero's sister, Molly, who becomes the heroine of the companion book, ONE FINE DAY.

This is a pretty gripping read in a way that ONE FINE DAY isn't. I don't know if it's because this one's a romance (as opposed to the women's fic vibe of ONE FINE DAY) or if it's because the hook is so good, but I found it hard to put down. The set up is this: at the beginning of the book, the hero is virtually a vegetable. He sustained a major head injury in a car accident, he's being heavily sedated because he acts violently when he's coherent enough to move or think, and he lost all memory of everything that's happened to him since Vietnam. In his own head, he's approximately 19 years old. The heroine is his deeply troubled psychiatrist. As they fall in love, he gets better. She gets worse. They take turns rescuing each other.

Weir mentioned online recently that she now finds this setup -- the mentally young hero in a 38-year-old's body, falling for his doctor -- troubling and kind of squicky. I was prepared for that, but in fact it didn't bother me. Sammy's mental age never felt like an issue, and I started wondering, is memory all that makes us mature? If we lose the part of our brain that holds our memory, that doesn't make us young. It only makes us different. I liked that aspect of the plot, the way Sammy had to grapple to come to terms with who he was and who he would be going forward. There's no pretense that he's going to get his memories back. His arc is all about figuring out how to live without them.

Anyway, there were a few things I didn't like here, and Rachel isn't as sympathetic a heroine as she might be (we see her grieving her daughter but never see her thinking about her daughter -- I think we needed more insight into her as a character, separate from her feelings for Sammy and from her pain), but overall I liked the book a lot and found it hard to stop reading. Always a good sign.

[Tatiana Stefan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a 3 stars for me bordering on 3 for the first half of the book and going down to 2.5 for the rest.

The plot is that the h who is a doctor, has to help the H heal mentally and emotionally after recovering from a tragic accident.

I don’t know how I came upon this book and why I decided to read it.

I feel like this story is one of those Hallmark/Lifetime movie (not that I watch a lot of them and not that there is anything wrong with that!) This book is contemporary and we are not dealing with a alpha billionaire H from some of those Harlequin romances. There isn’t that much sniping back and forth or OMG his kisses is making me crumble to my knees (ok maybe there is a sprinkle of that here and there) This storyline is a little interesting because it just occurred to me that we have an 38 year old H who initially thinks he is 18. (The accident causes him to lose his memory after 18 and sadly, no he does not recover his memories) The story is a little heavy and full of angst about various issues the H/h encounter/have to solve/have to get over. I only gave it a 3 star not because it was lousy writing/story or anything like that but more to do with the “enjoyment/pleasure” I got from reading the novel. I understand why the H had to do what he had to do in the last 25% into the book but it doesn’t mean I welcome and was happy about that choice. My pleasure diminished when that happened and I felt they were separated for a *long* time to me. (6+months was it? I’ll have to re-read that) I had to read the 2nd book in the series just to get an update/my epilogue with this H/h. this is a good book with a good story and I feel it does pull on your heartstrings a bit with all the issues both H/h had. You also got to see the H’s sister Molly who is the h in the next book “One Fine Day”. I don’t know the author and her books but I think I might check some of her other books out when I feel in the mood for some “realism”.

[Jo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book grabbed me from the very first page and didn't put me down until the end!

Sammy is an accident victim with no memory of his past from the age of 19, Rachel is a pychiatrist with a background of her own. Molly is Sammy's sister in a marriage to Austin that is far from "happy".
The journey they both travel is a bumpy road with twists and turns, as Sammy tries to fill the whole in his life with memories and Rachel desperately tries to shut her emotions away despite her feelings for Sammy.

Now reading One Fine Day which picks up where Forever finishes and I care deeply about the characters in these books

[Lyuda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a beautiful and powerful story of two damaged people healed by love. Sam, the hero, ended up in a hospital after a car accident. He survived the accident but ended up losing his long term memory. His attending doctor, Rachel, the heroine, was on a surface a very competent , put together psychiatrist but underneath loomed a very damaged woman unable to cope with a tragedy- death of her daughter. The author did such a good job of telling a touching, compelling story of H/h straggles, despairs, hilling and finally triumphing by the power of their love for each other. Great story!

[MBR · Rating 4 out of 5]

In order to heal people, we must sometimes take their pain into ourselves.

Forever by Theresa Weir is an intensely poignant exploration of love, loss, and identity by an author whose captivating voice is one that is compelling. First published in January of 1990, the novel brings to us the troubled and yet irresistible hero, Samuel “Sammy” Harden Thoreau, a 38-year-old man grappling with the aftermath of a devastating brain injury and the loss of his memories. Dr. Rachel Danielle Collins, a 32-year-old psychiatrist whose own past is marred by personal tragedy and emotional scars is the main female protagonist of the story.

When Sammy wakes up at the hospital, disoriented and in pain and faces the reality of his memory loss, it is devastating news to a man who is renowned in his field as a freelance writer. This sets the stage in which Sammy struggles to accept his new reality and associated vulnerabilities in his desperate quest for identity.

Rachel takes on Sammy’s case believing that she would be able to make a difference with Sammy, the at times reticent patient who her peers seek to treat in a manner that is abhorrent for Rachel. Her professional demeanor masks deep-seated guilt and unresolved grief over the death of her daughter, Jennifer, and a failed marriage for which she blames herself.

As Rachel works with Sammy, it is a journey of healing not just for Sammy, a relationship that is fraught with challenges in more ways than one, it is not just Sammy who embarks on a journey of healing but Rachel as well. With Sammy, for the first time in her professional career, Rachel is tempted to crash through the boundaries that defines the ethics between doctor and patient. As such, Sammy’s pursuit of Rachel through his days of hospitalization is a tumultuous journey underpinned by the tender moments between the two.

While both Sammy and Rachel try to find validation in each other and ease their loneliness, their relationship which starts out on an uneven footing at best, requires more sacrifice than either of them thought possible. Sammy’s journey to find himself and Rachel’s quest to forgive herself are the very aspects of the novel which stands out, making this happily ever after one that is relatable on many levels.

As mentioned at the beginning of the review, Ms. Weir is an exceptional writer in her prose and ability to extract emotion from the reader, and needless to say, I found what I was looking for when I picked this up – a gripping read that held me enthralled from start to finish, making me want to read the sequel right after. Oh the devastation I felt when I thought that the second installment remained unpublished was all too real until I was proven wrong, to my absolute and utter delight.

One of the aspects that stood out is how Ms. Weir’s writing vividly captures Sammy’s internal battles, from his intense self-reflection to the traumatic flashbacks of his past life. His emotional breakdowns on the path towards recovery are gut-wrenching, showcasing his profound vulnerability. Somethings in life are meant to be left in the past and perhaps it is that very acceptance that proves to be the healing that Sammy needed before he could fully embrace a life with Rachel.

Rachel’s emotional vulnerabilities are also well portrayed, highlighting the burdens that women often carry due to societal norms and expectations, as a consequence of which women often carry more guilt for failed relationships. The self-recrimination is a huge part of Rachel’s inability in moving forward with her life, stuck in a constant cycle where she uses work as a shield in which she hides her pain and loneliness.

The secondary characters, like Molly (Sammy’s sister), adds further layers to the story which proved to be just as fascinating. It is the intriguing tidbits of Molly’s life that Ms. Their leaves as breadcrumbs leading us to the second and final installment in this duology which proved to be the icing on the cake.

Recommended for readers who wish for an emotionally captivating read to sink their teeth into. I loved every nuance and facet of this novel!

Final Verdict: Forever is a novel that masterfully explores the complexities of human emotions through deeply flawed and yet relatable characters, delving into the intensity of one’s journey towards healing, making this unputdownable!

Rating = 4.25/5

For more reviews and quotes, please visit A Maldivian's Passion for Romance

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

This novel could have been really, really good if Weir had continued to use Sammy (the male lead) as her first person POV, and further explored the effects that serving in Vietnam had on him. Instead, she turns the already short novel into an awkward romance between Sammy and his psychiatrist. Then there's the barely explored side story of Sammy's sister, Molly which was thrown in as a lure to the next novel. Given 0.5 stars or a rating of "Very Bad". Not recommended :(

[Juliajudith · Rating 1 out of 5]

Unreadable.

[Tanya Breakiron]

Since I have gotten so many freebies from Theresa Weir I decided to actually read one of the books. This story is about a man who ends up in the hospital after getting in an accident and being near in a near catatonic kind of state. When he does wake up he thinks he is quite a bit younger then he actually is. While in reality he is 38 years old his memories make him believe he is around 18-20 years old. There is a good reason why the man believes he is much younger as his memories end at about the time that he received his draft notice in the mail that he was being sent to Vietnam.
Throughout his case file and through his sister Molly and brother-in-law Austin we find out the man was a brilliant writer who occassionally wrote from time to time in order to try and support himself. The rest of the time he drown himself in alcohol. Throughout the course of the story we find out there is a real good reason why he was drinking and it was to cover up his guilt over something that happened in Vietnam.
After finishing the book it did remind me a little bit of Flowers for Algernon except this one ended a little less sadly. If you really liked Flowers For Algernon I would suggest you read this book as this was similar in tone.

[Michele Reise · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to give this book 4 stars but the numerous typos and the misplaced romance lowered it to a 3. I enjoyed the book but I would have enjoyed it more if it had stayed focused on Sammy's journey/recovery and not turned into a romance/love fixes all book. The true depth of the book was Sammy's struggle with the lost parts of his life. Maybe if the author had researched Vietnam vets better she would have been able to flesh up the story instead of turning it into a romance at the end.

[Sweet · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wasn't as crazy about Forever as I am some of Theresa Weir's other books, especially Cool Shade and Long Night Moon. The story's pretty interesting, and the characters, too but she hadn't yet developed the unique voice that makes her later books so outstanding.

[Quinn]

Prequel to One Fine Day

[Deanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book. Sammy has a special place in my heart.