Ugh, rad readers... I don't want to say it... but if I have to... I didn't like this book. Okay. There it is. It's out there. No going back now...
Alright reader dudes, so this is the second (and most recent) book in the Shaw Confessions which is the companion series to the Mara Dyer trilogy. If you haven't read The Becoming of Noah Shaw (the first book) then this book talk won't make sense to you and if you haven't read the Mara Dyer series then this definitely won't make sense to you. Do not fear however, THIS IS NOT A SPOILER-Y BOOK TALK! You are safe this time!
So, in this addition to the Shaw series we have basically just a slew of scenes where Noah and Goose are popping acid pills from essentially strangers, in hopes that it will magically answer the questions as to where Mara has disappeared to... Something that could have easily been answered if Noah didn't in fact tell Mara to go away and that he never wanted to see her again at the end of the last book. He also could have just asked her where she was going before she left... or asked Daniel... Basically what I'm trying to say is that I felt that the entire story line of this book was a little pointless and boring and forced to be honest. There was no Mara except for in the epilogue and it absolutely devastated me. Mara is the character that we fell in love with and I know that we aren't reading directly her notes or memoir anymore or whatever, but comeeee onnnn! Michelle Hodkin knowssss we love Mara, how could she write an entire book without Mara in it!!
We get a little more insight into Noah's background, similarly to the way we got flashbacks from Mara Dyer's series. We learn more about his father --who is the worst by the way-- and about how all of his father's experiments with Dr. Kells came to be. We learn more about what we already knew about the Professor, that he shouldn't be trusted and is manipulative and bad... We been knew... We been knew.
There was basically two redeeming qualities of this novel, that being the "Before" chapter where we get to see what goes on with Noah when Dr. Kells is experimenting on Mara at Horizon's and when Noah realizes that what he did to Mara was wrong. That's all. That is literally it. This entire nearly 400 page book could be summed up if you read two chapters... Maybe three if you want to know about the flashbacks too. You wouldn't be missing anything if you skipped the rest and I cannot tell you how much it pains me to say that.
I absolutely LOVED the Mara Dyer series and the first book in this series was great too! The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer has a spot (and will likely make permanent residency) on my list of Raddest Reads AKA my favorite books. I love the way Michelle Hodkin writes and I thought that the Mara Dyer trilogy was literal genius; that is why I am so so so sad that I didn't like this book. I kept on reading it and I was in straight up denial that I didn't like it. Nothing happens, Goose and Noah do drugs then nothing happens, Goose and Noah fall into one of M's super obvious traps then nothing happens but for some reason there is a flashback that isn't really important or relevant then nothing happens, Goose and Noah talk about Mara. Maybe this will all add up info for one big kaboom in the next book but I don't see how that could be the case because the information given wasn't really important... so... I guess I really can't give an excuse for this... ugh I don't know guysssss!!
As much as I totally love and adore these characters and their stories before, I was utterly confused the entire time and had and still have no idea where this book was going while I was reading it and after I finished it. Something was always happening but it never really seemed to matter. They were just going about M's wild goose chase (excuse the goose pun) for nothing in return. Sure, there was a little something something that happened in the last --no joke-- 10 pages, that was interesting, but really everything they did in this book --which was a lot-- was to no avail.
I am profoundly saddened that this happened to us readers, but that is just the way the cookie crumbles somethimes dudes. It's just the way it's got to be. :( I didn't like it and I am sad about that but I think that this is just a fluke. If I absolutely adored the first book in the series and the trilogy prior to this series, I have no doubt that the final book in the Shaw Confessions will be a banger. Nothing will stop me from being excited to read it, I don't even care that I didn't like this book.
Keep your heads up rad readers... we will get through our reading slumps :(
- C8 ;)