Hello Rad Readers!
... Here we go again, the twists and turns back, forth, forwards, backwards, counterclockwise, and upside down, Michelle Hodkin has done it again.
This is the first book in the companion series to the Mara Dyer series. If you haven't read the Mara Dyer series yet then read that before you read this! That being said, if you have not yet read this book and are wondering if you should, I would say (warily), yes. Allow me to explain. One of the reasons why I loved the Mara Dyer series was because it was not only heavily plot driven, but it was also heavily character driven. If you are not reading it for the plot at this point, read it for the characters because it is worth it. Honestly Hodkin could write about Mara Dyer going to Starbucks and I would probably still give it a five star review because of the immersive writing and the intrigue that surrounds the characters. That has kept up thus far in the series. These books just have a way of keeping me reading them, they certainly go by quickly.
Okay, so this book is really about Noah's journey. Of course we see Mara's journey through Noah's just the way we saw Noah's through Mara's in her trilogy, this is just clearly more centered around Noah. It is just how you would expect a book to be narrated by Noah if you have read the Mara Dyer series. It is funny, witty, quick, and sarcastic. It is extremely entertaining and it picks up right where Mara left off. Old skeletons are dug up, promises are broken, Mara is the only one Noah trusts with his secrets and his past. He shouldn't. They are scared that the truth they are searching for could bring more wrong than right, more harm than help. They are right. Not long after the ending of The Retribution, Noah gets a vision of a gifted kid dying, but instead of being on the other side of the world, he is within feet of Noah. It happens again, and again, and again. Daniel's back, Sophie's back, Jamie's back, the rest of the gang is back mostly and they are trying to basically find out why all these gifted kids, the kids like them, are killing themselves or being killed. Is there someone behind it? Basically, what is going on?
Now, a major draw back is the fact that as the action obviously falls from the ending of the last book, it seems a little forced an contrived to pick it back up in this one. Things (when you read it you will understand exactly what I mean by things... #spooky) literally, no joke, in the literature, pop out right in front of them so conveniently it is almost laughable. The first thing they find that leads to the "conflict" which I am yet to be convinced is totally a conflict, they literally just bump into it, stumble upon it. LAME is what I have to say to that. What happened to the journey of the last three books?! I want to work for the answers, not bump into them!!
Mara, understandably, is off her rocker. She went through a lot in the end of The Retribution that she was alone for, so the other characters don't understand. Also, she is just plain crazy to begin with which the other characters don't necessarily understand as well, so, with all that, being that I love Mara it is awfully bothersome when all the characters (including Noah) seem to be against her in this. The girl is just trying to get over the fact that she basically killed and brought back to life her brother, her boyfriend, and herself, like, last weekend. Give the girl a breakkkkk, homie has been through quite a bit.
Also, if we are going to go there... we might as well go there... characters were the only thing I cared about. Not that much really happened in the plot. It is the Mara Dyer series without the fun, weird things happening to clueless kids but this time the weird stuff isn't that weird and the kids aren't doing anything cool anymore. I felt like I kept on waiting for something to happen, for something to start, really for the book to be about something, but then before I knew I was in the last 20 pages and then believe it or not something did actually happen, but the problem is... you guessed it... THERE WERE ONLY 20 PAGES LEFT! No joke, the premise of the story could have been told in the first 30 pages and then the last 20. The rest of it was just fluff. It was simply less action packed and usually that shouldn't be the case with the first book in a series. It really lost a lot of it's sci-fi, paranormal vibes and turned into a mystery and, Michelle Hodkin, dawg, that is just not what I signed up for. Here we go again with my favorite word to describe this book, but it again felt contrived.
Okay, spoiler time.
So, when it starts off at Noah's father's funeral... We all knew Mara did it right, or was that just me? Like I really feel like the reveal that Mara killed Noah's dad wasn't too hype and I also don't really know why she would keep it so low-key. His dad tried to kill her and her brother. Also, Noah said all the time how much he hated his dad and wished he were dead. Mara helped him out so what is with the secrets. Homie said she wouldn't keep secrets from him and after all the other wayyyy crazier stuff that he knows about her and she knows about him from the last books, forgive me if I am wrong but this seems like farrrr from a big deal.
Above in my review when I reference the "things," I mean the boy that Noah and Mara basically just run into right as Noah is getting the visions of his death. It is far too convenient for my liking, I struggle to see the relevance of this in their lives. I get it they are trying to be good people and stop whatever these super wicked high up bad guys are doing, but at a certain point when are you just gonna live your own life. You don't have to try to save everyone and I think someone needs to tell them that. This is why I struggle to see if the conflict is actually a conflict or if they are simply just looking for a conflict because like I said... doesn't seem like that big of a deal.
Follow up on that, Noah doesn't want to use the documents that he has access to... that are now his... because his father left them for him... because it brings back bad vibes essentially... Homie! Noah! Do you want to figure it out or not dog? How can you say you want to know what is going on when you won't even look at what will literally tell you what is going on. Obviously this causes a rift in the squad and OBVIOUSLY it should. Noah is killing all the vibes.
SPOILERS DONE!!
Overall, this was an okay start to a series. A large part of it honestly wasn't exciting and objectively I know it wasn't the best book ever, yet, weirdly enough I still enjoyed it. I just love these characters so much and nothing will change that. They are funny and so intelligent and I just love all of it. Sorry not sorry ;). I enjoyed being in Noah's mind, I felt like Hodkin did a phenomenal job writing his voice, and I think she is a phenomenal writer, so even though the plot wasn't great the book itself was. It is extremely impressive the way she translated the Noah we knew from his dialogue in the Mara Dyer series to the Noah we now know inside his head. I obviously will continue to read the series out of curiosity and pure devotion to the characters. I have hope that things will pick up because of the sheer greatness of the Mara Dyer series.
Stay cool readers,
- C8 ;)
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