Title: Forgotten Burial
Author: Jodi Foster
Genre: Non-Fiction, True Haunting
Rating: 4 stars
Purchase: Amazon
Review copy provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
When Jodi Foster returned to her California hometown with her young daughter, she never could have imagined the terror and confusion she experienced in the nights that followed. On top of her terrifyingly real nightmares of abduction and murder, Jodi witnessed lights flashing on and off, clocks going haywire, and her daughter’s doll repeatedly screaming, “I feel great!”
Forgotten Burial tells Jodi’s true paranormal story unraveling the mystery behind the unsolved case of a missing young woman, Madeline Isabella Johnson. After moving into Madeline’s last known residence, Jodi and her daughter reveal clues about what happened to the disappeared girl through ghostly encounters, vivid dreams, and divine intervention. Join Jodi on her reality-bending adventure as she works with police to bring justice to this disturbing, yet ultimately uplifting story.
In Forgotten Burial, Jodi Foster – not the actress – rented an apartment in her California hometown, and lived there along with her young daughter. She never imagined that the apartment was haunted. When lights turn on and offo n their own, her daughter’s wind-up doll starts screaming and Jodi begins having terrifying nightmares about a missing young woman, Madeline Isabella Johnson (name was changed, probably for privacy reasons), she begins tot suspect Madeline is reaching out from beyond the grave.
Working along with the police, Jodi tries to figure out what happened to Madeline, and what her connection is to a notorious couple, and to “The Girl in the Box”, Colleen Stan.
From that synopsis, you’d think the book is fiction. It’s not. It’s as non-fiction as it gets, a true encounter of Jodi’s nightmares about Madeline, the strange occurences in her apartment, and Madeline’s efforts to reach out from the beyond and try to get the truth out.
This is one of the best true haunting books I’ve read simply because it feels so real. Jodi is in contacts with the police about this, there’s a tie to a real-life case, so it sounds almost impossible not to be true. The writing was all right. The reader realizes early on Jodi is no real author, but more like a person who desperately wants to get their story out into the world. And you know what? I didn’t mind. This story is so good I had to read it. And Madeline deserves her justice, one way or another.
However, some things irked me. Why did Jodi wait so long to connect the dots, and to go to the police with her suspicions? If I’d led a semi-normal life up to some point, then moved into an apartment and started having vivid dreams about a murdered girl, and could somehow connect them to an actual disappearance, I’d be standing on the police’s doorstep in no time. Also, if I had such dreams several times after moving, I’d start investigating, and not wait until things got nearly out of hand. I can barely grasp how frustrating it must be for a spirit to put all your energy into contacting one person, and then have them do almost nothing for several months.
Plus, Jodi kept having dreams about a sign along the road, even getting coordinates at some point, if I recall correctly. She barely does anything with this info, except maybe tell the police about it. Considering how much Madeline told her from beyond the grave already, I’d probably just head over and start digging. I mean, come on, if a ghost contacts you for months, even years, then you have to act, not sit around and wait for things to explode.
Apart from my frustration about this – and I always wonder why people, in real life as well as in movies, tend to take so long before they do anything – I truly enjoyed reading this. I hope police manages to find Madeline, and that she finally has some rest, after all this time.
she is a liar, ask around….