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Summary

Chase Ambrose fell off his roof and got amnesia. Chase wants to recover his past memories, and he asks family, friends, and his doctor for his experiences. While trying to recover some memories he goes to the place of the accident and finds a medal that he remembers he stole before the accident. Chase goes to court but is forgiven and is able to move on with his life as a new person.

Conflict

Throughout the entire book, Chase is fighting against himself. He can't remember anything about what happened before the accident. He will spend hours trying to remember one thing about himself or trying to remember where a small memory has come from. An example of this is on pages 20-21 of the book. “Mom’s trying to fill me in on my former life so I won't be caught by surprise, like when that psycho girl dumped frozen yogurt on my head. Funny- she was sympathetic when I told her about that but she didn't seem very surprised.” This is a great example of him trying to remember something about himself. He wonders about it but still cannot figure out what he could have done before that would make her do something like that. Another example of this is on page 5 “Once again, I peer back into the nothingness that’s where my memory is supposed to be. It’s like reaching into a pocket for something that should be there but isn’t. … It’s bewildering and frustrating and terrifying at the same time. … Try harder, I push myself. You didn't just whoosh into being when you came out of that coma you're in there somewhere.” This is the part he has just come out of a coma and is trying to remember any detail from his past. He does this multiple times throughout the book where he sits somewhere trying to dig deep in his mind to find some kind of anything but, once again finds nothing. You can see how much he struggles with looking in his mind; he knows his memories are there; he just can't reach them. These are great examples of man vs self experiences. He also gets frustrated at himself when he asks for a detail and even his own parents won’t tell him. He gets frustrated at this because he doesn't know what was so bad that they can’t tell him. During the book, he can get a few memories a few times, but it usually doesn't happen for a while after the last. After reading restart people can learn that it is possible to recover after awful experiences and to change when you’ve made mistakes.

Read/Don’t Read

Read this book if you like seeing changes in people that have made mistakes and have gone through trials and gotten through them. A kid named Chase gets amnesia and has to RESTART his life. It talks about his journey of getting through amnesia, learning about his past, and creating his present and future. Don’t read this book if you dislike switching points of view. In the book it will switch the point of view between the characters. It will tell you whose perspective it is but it can still be a little confusing. On the other hand, If you do like seeing different characters' perspectives then do read this book because it will switch with multiple characters not just one or two. Because of this you will get to know what everyone's thinking and feeling. This adds to helping you connect with each of the characters. Which will make the story a lot more interesting when you understand others and get to see what is going on in other's lives around Chase.

Author: Gordon Korman
Summary and Review by: Ryker Wood