BOOK REVIEW: The Art Of Not Breathing by Sarah Alexander

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. The scheduled publication date for this book is April 26, 2016.

Since her twin brother, Eddie, drowned five years ago, sixteen-year-old Elsie Main has tried to remember what really happened that fateful day on the beach. One minute Eddie was there, and the next he was gone. Seventeen-year-old Tay McKenzie is a cute and mysterious boy that Elsie meets in her favorite boathouse hangout. When Tay introduces Elsie to the world of free diving, she vows to find the answers she seeks at the bottom of the sea.

I was kind of apathetic about this book. There were a few things I liked and a few things I didn't. Elsie is sixteen and her twin brother drowned on his eleventh birthday. That sucks. It was Elsie's birthday at the beginning of the book and of course, no one acknowledged it because they were so consumed with grief. It's awful that her birthday has to be associated with death every year. Elsie's brother Dillon is suffering from anorexia and the only person who can see how sick he is getting is Elsie. I loved that a BOY actually suffered from an eating disorder. I know that happens a lot in real life, but how often does it happen in books? Hardly ever. 

This story is all about free diving and how Elsie is doing it as a way to connect with her brother who died. She wants to remember what happened that day and she just wants to remember him. I didn't know free diving was a thing. It sounds scary and totally unsafe, but Elsie is just rebelling. Her parents won't even let her go near the water because of what happened to Eddie, which I think is kind of ridiculous. Speaking of parents, these are the most absent parents EVER. I mean, I know they are still grieving but they DO have two kids who are alive. You would think they would remember that occasionally. But Dillon starves himself until he's skin and bones and they don't notice and Elsie is doing this terrifying thing on a regular basis and they don't notice that either.

I felt absolutely nothing for Tay, the love interest. Their relationship was just blah. Tay himself wasn't blah. He was very socially awkward and maybe had a touch of ADHD and I loved that. I just didn't feel the chemistry between Tay and Elsie. They were together and then he disappeared and then he was back and Elsie had strong feelings for this, but I didn't. Maybe I just didn't feel the chemistry between the two of them because I didn't really have much emotional attachment to Elsie. She was annoying and immature and didn't have much of a personality. Something else that bugged me was that the author kept referencing some mental health issue that Eddie had, but she never mentioned what it was. That was just annoying. 

This book was an okay book, but not as good as it could have been.

Buy/Borrow/Skip: Borrow it.