REVIEW: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer (The Unbecoming #1) by Michelle Hodkin
Publication Date: September 27, 2011
Publisher: Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing
Source: Book Purchased by Reviewer
Buy it at: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, IndieBound

My rating: 5 out of 5 stars

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.

This book was INTENSE!!! And I mean that in the best way possible. From the moment I started reading, it sucked me in and didn't spit me out until the very end. Leaving me breathless and yearning for more!!!

Without giving too much away, I’ll say that the main character, Mara Dyer, has A LOT of issues she needs to work through. In the beginning of the book Mara and her friends have a huge accident that leaves her suffering from PTSD with memory loss of the event. As the chapters roll by, Mara has “episodes” that give her a little bit more information about what happened that night. Along the way she makes friends with a two guys in her new school. One of them being a super steamy, extra yummy SWOONY boy!!! (read: I'm in LOVE)

Noah, the bad boy with a good heart, is all the things that encompass a “swoony boy” (and the perfect male specimen) and of course he falls madly in love with Mara, not to say that she doesn't feel the same towards him. They definitely have a deep connection, deeper than either of them realize until the “almost” end of the book. That kid of connection is rare and the author portrays it in such a way that the reader can feel EVERY SINGLE EMOTION that Mara feels toward Noah, including the love/lust effect…BIG TIME!!!

Throughout it all though, I kind of feel bad for Mara. Before we find out what happened during that accident, she seems to carry such a sadness with her and it makes you really wonder what went down before, during, and after. The author portrays her sorrow and curiosity as well as her fear of what is happening to her.

This awesome turnout definitely makes me wish I HADN'T left it sitting on my TBR shelf for so long (read: about a year). Lighters in the air for to Michelle Hodkin…Keep ‘em coming!