Saving Noah

Saving Noah (2017) is a dark psychological thriller by Lucinda Berry. Combining suspense with family drama, the novel examines how charges of child sexual abuse tear a family apart. Noah Coates, an honor roll high-school student and swimming champion, suddenly confesses to molesting children. Noah is sentenced to 18 months in a juvenile sexual rehabilitation center. Driven by her promise to love her children unconditionally, Noah’s mother, Adrianne, continues to support him, but her husband, Lucas, won’t allow Noah back into their home. It is later revealed that Lucas has a history of sexually abusing children, having received shock therapy at a mental healthcare facility as a teenager. The stigma of being a sexual offender haunts Noah to the point that he believes he should not live.

The novel—told from Adrianne’s point of view—features a complex, challenging portrayal of child abuse. Saving Noah explores themes like the complexities of mental health and the failures of the justice system. Berry, a former clinical psychologist and researcher in child trauma, examines the gamut of human nature and raises provocative questions about the limits of ethics and empathy. Berry’s novels often examine controversial aspects of human nature and the motif of impossible choices. Her other works include The Perfect Child (2019) and The Best of Friends (2020).

This guide refers to the Rise Press 2017 Kindle edition.

Content Warning: The source material and this guide discuss pedophilia, rape, child sexual abuse and violence, possible incest, suicide ideation, and death by suicide.

Plot Summary

Fifteen-year-old Noah Coates is an honor student, a local swimming legend, and an outwardly model son and brother. However, Noah’s reputation is turned upside down when he confesses to his mother, Adrianne, that he sexually molested two six-year-old girls. Adrianne, a former nurse, tries to mediate with the girls’ parents. Instead, Noah is arrested and charged as a Type 1 juvenile sex offender and sent to the Marsh rehabilitation facility for 18 months. Adrianne visits Noah regularly at Marsh, but Lucas—her husband and Noah’s father—resolutely stays away. Lucas distances himself from Noah, believing Noah is a threat to his younger sister Katie.

After Noah is released from Marsh, Adrianne moves with Noah at Lucas’s insistence. Noah grows depressed and is relentlessly bullied in school for being a sex offender. Adrianne tries her best to rehabilitate her son, but the Coates face social ostracism. The family’s crisis worsens when Noah is beaten up and admitted to the hospital, highlighting the challenges of his societal reintegration. Dr. Park, Noah’s psychiatrist, arranges for him to meet a former inmate from Marsh as a last-ditch measure to snap Noah out of his catatonic state. However, when Rick shows Noah pictures of his girlfriend, Noah feels he can never lead a socially acceptable life like Rick. Noah attempts death by suicide through overdose but survives.

Meanwhile, in a parallel past timeline, an unknown narrator is also in a rehabilitation facility for juvenile sex offenders. The narrator witnesses and experiences horrific abuse in the facility, where violent perpetrators prey on younger, first-time offenders. Afraid that reoffending will bring him back to such a facility, the narrator is determined to bury his attraction to children. He is released, with no record of his crime since the sex offender registry does not exist in his timeline.

Unable to get through to Noah after his overdose attempt, Adrianne asks Lucas to talk to Noah, hoping that his support will rejuvenate Noah. Instead, Noah again attempts death by suicide after the conversation with Lucas. He is airlifted to the children’s hospital, and after a slow physical recovery, is kept under psychiatric watch. Adrianne finds Noah’s intended suicide note at home, in which Noah apologizes to her and Katie for placing them in a difficult situation. Noah writes that he is a pedophile who is sexually attracted to children. The attraction will never go away, so Noah wants to die to protect his family and other people.

Adrianne discusses the note with Noah. Noah is happy Adrianne knows the complete truth, and he tells her he is determined to end his life. Adrianne tries to talk Noah out of his plan, but when he discloses that, during the school attack, the bullies raped him with a foreign object, Adrianne realizes that all outcomes for Noah are bleak: She decides to help him die.

The unknown narrator is revealed as Noah’s father, Lucas. At 17, Lucas repeatedly molested his cousins. Caught by his father, Lucas was sent to a reform home. Lucas is cold toward Noah because Noah reminds him of his own traumatic past. He also knows Noah will never get over his impulses because he never has: Lucas has just learned to bury them.

Adrianne uses her medical knowledge to plan a peaceful death for Noah. Noah and Adrianne have a final, fun day on the pier with Noah’s beloved sister Katie. Later, Noah gives Adrianne sealed letters for Katie and Lucas, to be given to them after his death. Telling Noah it is okay to let go, Adrianne administers him the meds, and Noah dies. One year later, Adrianne is back at home with Lucas, though their marriage is over. Katie is finally coming out of the extreme grief she experienced following Noah’s death. Lucas is relieved Noah is dead and admits that he feels no love for his son. Adrianne still has no idea about Lucas’s offenses. She prays to God that when she dies, she will be reunited with Noah in heaven.