The Becoming of Noah Shaw – Michelle Hodkin

Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books

In the first book of the Shaw Confessions, the companion series to the New York Times bestselling Mara Dyer novels, old skeletons are laid bare and new promises prove deadly. This is what happens after happily ever after.

Everyone thinks seventeen-year-old Noah Shaw has the world on a string.

They’re wrong.

Mara Dyer is the only one he trusts with his secrets and his future.

He shouldn’t.

And both are scared that uncovering the truth about themselves will force them apart.

They’re right.

I’m just going to come out and say it: The Becoming of Noah Shaw was disappointing. I have to be honest and as much as it pains me to say, this book was boring. It’s 360 pages of nothing as things happen around and to the characters as they repeat that they have to do something, but never do anything.

I think the problem with this book boils down to its necessity. The Mara Dyer trilogy is a contained story with no loose ends or unanswered questions. The trilogy ends with readers wanting to spend more time with the characters, namely Noah Shaw since he’s absent for most of The Retribution of Mara Dyer. Hodkin then decided to write a trilogy from Noah’s perspective since he’s one of the best parts about the original trilogy. The problem with this decision is that the Mara Dyer trilogy is such a contained story that any spinoff or addition will automatically feel out of place.

Hodkin’s writing in The Becoming of Noah Shaw is flawless. Noah’s perspective, attitude, and thoughts read like a continuation from the previous books. The dialogue between characters and their interactions are genuine and signals to readers that these are the same characters they grew to love all those years ago making it feel as if no time has passed between novels.

Unfortunately, there isn’t much going on throughout the whole book. The synopsis is incredibly vague so I will be as well. Things, for lack of a better word, happen in this book, but they happen to the characters and they do nothing about it. They sit around talking about it until they’re forced to act. Quite frankly, it was boring.

Overall, The Becoming of Noah Shaw is an absolute disappointed, especially compared to the original trilogy. The only good aspect of the Mara Dyer trilogy this book retains is Noah Shaw himself. That may be enough for some readers, but it wasn’t for me. I probably should have rated this novel two stars instead of three, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it since I enjoy Hodkin’s writing immensely.