Review: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin

Thursday, September 22, 2011


Book: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer
Author: Michelle Hodkin
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Release date: September 27, 2011
Source: ARC for review from Around the World Tours

Summary: (from Goodreads) Mara Dyer doesn't think life can get any stranger than waking up in a hospital with no memory of how she got there.
It can.

She believes there must be more to the accident she can't remember that killed her friends and left her mysteriously unharmed.

There is.

She doesn't believe that after everything she's been through, she can fall in love.

She's wrong.

First impressions: I tried really hard to avoid reading much on this book before I read it. It was majorly hyped at BEA this year, and everyone has been buzzing about it since. I wanted to keep this one fresh, so I had few expectations. That made the beginning a lot of fun to experience, with no idea where we were going. I loved the letter up front that tells us "Mara Dyer" is a made up name to protect her identity. Mystery for the win!

Lasting impressions: Without question, the best thing in this book is the romantic interest, Noah Shaw. He is my new book boyfriend.

Conflicting impressions: Our heroine has a big change in direction in the last part of the novel, and her motivations went against the character we'd followed for so long. It made her actions disappointing and let me down as a reader.

Overall impressions: There are two big reasons you should read this book: Noah Shaw and masterful intrigue.

The entire book is spent playing catch-up, as we follow Mara Dyer trying to remember the blacked out portions of her memory where she may or may not have killed her friends. As she slowly pieces the story back together, we learn more about her and that she has strange powers that can have devastating consequences.

When she arrives in a new school for a fresh start after her family moves to Florida, she meets the notorious Noah Shaw. He's a playboy who has worked his way through most of the female student body, but he's not just a pretty face. He's insanely intelligent, incredibly caring, and feisty to boot. The banter between Noah and Mara is TO DIE FOR. Noah's witty comebacks, coupled with smoldering looks, had me fanning myself as I sped through the pages.

I was not crazy about the plot of this book once all of the information came to light toward the end. There were a few moments that didn't make much sense to me. Noah arrives in the middle of the night and leads Mara on a crazy trek through alligator-filled water, yet she never questions him on what they're doing. Really? Later, she makes a life-changing decision that seemed to go against everything we thought we knew about her and her feelings for her family and Noah. I didn't understand the motivations behind that choice, beyond the obvious need for retribution.

And the ending! If you are not a fan of game-changing twists, do not read the last page. It sets up a strange new chapter that I'm not sure I want to see explored. I made the mistake of skimming the last sentence while doing a page count check, and sort of ruined it for myself, so I repeat: DO NOT read the last page of this book!

I liked the supernatural elements in this one, although I do wish we'd gotten some more information along the way. Still, the overall story was intriguing and fun to read, and I haven't been this into a romance since Bella and Edward in Twilight. Noah is majorly swoon-worthy, and his chemistry with Mara is white hot. No matter what the novel's other shortcomings, it is completely worth a read just to spend some time with Noah Shaw.

Rating: 4/5 stars

Click the stars for a description of my rating system





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5 comments:

Belle said...

Great review! I entered Hodkin's Mara comp and got an email back from "Noah" that made me way too excited lol. And I haven't even read it yet! I'm looking forward to it though.

Jenny said...

NOAH!!!! I'm completely in love with him as well Logan, he's just too delicious for words. I hear we're getting lots more with him in book 2. WIN!

Rubita said...

I've heard good and bad things about this one, so I'm glad to hear that you liked it. And thanks for the warning about not reading the last page of the book--though now I'm going to be completely paranoid about doing it on accident somehow.

Denise Z said...

Thank you for sharing today. I have been haunting this book or should I say it has been haunting me:)

Karen said...

I have heard MANY good things about this Noah character :-)

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