Thursday, September 10, 2015

BOOK REVIEW: Breakaway by Kat Spears

I received the ARC for Breakaway by Kat Spears from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. The scheduled publication date for this book is September 15, 2015.

This is kind of a hard review to write because I didn't actually feel any emotion for the main character until the last ten percent of the book. Up until that point, I was more apathetic about it than anything.

The book opens with the funeral of Jason's sister. With the book being told from a male POV, I can almost forgive the fact that he didn't really show that much grief. When people brought it up, he would either ignore it or pass it off as a joke. Listening to his internal monologue, I was able to tell that he was grieving. I just couldn't connect with him enough to feel it. It also bothered me that no one ever tells how his sister died. They did kind of allude to it. But when Jason's mom blamed herself for her death, I really wanted more of an explanation. 

I thought this was a book about friendship and the fact that his friends drifted away from him. But that was actually a subplot. The main part of the story was about the romance, which kind of bored me a little. First of all, there were a lot of issues his other friends were dealing with and Jason wasn't helpful with any of them. I would like to think it was a reaction to grief, but he didn't actually stop having anything to do with his friends until he started going out with Raine. I don't get why he was friends with those guys at all. He had been friends with Mario forever and Mario had always dabbled in drugs, but when his drug use gets out of control, there is no explanation and Jason just starts ignoring it. Jordie was someone with more money and he started distancing himself from his "poor" friends when he started going out with a girl. Then there's Chick. He was always just . . .  there. I felt sorry for him because he thought so highly of all those guys (for some crazy reason) and yet, none of them seemed to care about him. 

Let's talk about the love interest, Raine. I didn't like her and didn't connect with her at all. She kept getting mad at Jason for every little thing. It drove me crazy the way they would snark at each other for nothing. And they kept arguing about money. Her family had it and his didn't. How many times did he make a snarky comment about her money? And how many times did she get defensive about it? The answer to both of those questions is: too many. She did state at one point that just because her family had money didn't mean she didn't have problems. I do agree with that, but the problem is that she never, ever said what those problems were. Throughout the entire book she would make these random and vague statements about her life or issues that she had, but nothing ever came of it. The author didn't allow us to get to know Raine.

Here was the problem with this book: there were a lot of issues and very few resolutions to them at the end. There was the death of Jason's sister, poverty, a grief-stricken mother, an absentee father, a friend struggling with drug addiction, depression and another issue that I don't want to say because it would give too much away. So there were all these issues that the author incorporated into the story, but all of those issues either had a) a too quick and too neat resolution or b) no resolution at all.

As I stated, I did have some connection with Jason at the end of the book but it just wasn't enough. I wanted so much more from this book. 

Buy/Borrow/Skip: Skip this one.

10 comments :

  1. Frustrating, to say the least. And also, too bad. So much squandered potential... Thanks for the heads-up, Cynthia.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Ramona. Man, I am in desperate need of a five star book! Too many mediocre ARCs.

      Delete
  2. I just finished this one this morning and I have to say I kind of didn't mind the unanswered questions. I think she does that on purpose but, we can't all enjoy the same books the same way.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jazmen, oh yes you have a point about that. I don't mind unanswered questions of it is done well. I can see why some people would enjoy this one. I am glad you liked it. :)

      Delete
  3. This one sounds likes a hard book because I hate when I can't connect to any of the characters. And if the snark becomes too much then it isn't fun or a useful tool anymore. Great review!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Grace. Yeah, if the emotional connection isn't there, then it just doesn't work for me.

      Delete
  4. I enjoyed Sway by Kat Spears, but it sounds like this one's not great. I hate it when I can't relate to the characters in a book and I'm also not too fond of lots of issues with no resolution. Seems like I should skip this one.

    Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh yes, Nicole, skip this one. Maybe I will check out her other one, Sway. I have heard from several people that she did a great job on that one. I am willing to give the author a second chance. :)

      Delete
  5. It sucks when you can't really connect with the character :/
    Thanks for the review!

    ReplyDelete