How did my life get so broken? It’s a question Lacey St. James asks herself every day. Stuck raising her little brother in a trailer park while she works a dead end job at a grocery store, she has a stalker exboyfriend, a bad reputation, and no way out.

And then, she meets Everett, who changes her entire existence.

Everett is an outsider who’s housesitting his family’s mansion off the coast, and for reasons Lacey can’t understand, he’s completely transfixed by her. He seems determined to show her that life can offer more than she’d ever hoped for, if only she believes in herself. She desperately yearns to trust him, but what happens when she finds out that everything he’s told her is a lie?

MY REVIEW:

LOVED how intense this was! Sara Fawkes is another new to me author and she really has my attention now. BREATHE INTO ME is the story of a small town girl who once had a normal happy life with parents and family who loved and encouraged her. But at fifteen, when the stepfather who adopted her and raised her as his own since she was a baby dies, everything changes. Her mother falls apart and moves their little family across the country from Oregon to a rural town in Mississippi to live with Lacey’s abusive grandmother Diana. Everyone she should have been able to trust and rely on to keep her safe is either gone or refuses to do so. She is caught in a spiral of poverty, despair and victimization with seemingly no safe place to turn. Her situation broke my heart. I couldn’t help but want to be her champion and was thrilled when she meets Everett, a college boy in town for the summer to work for his friend’s dad’s construction company. The very first time he meets her he saves her from a dangerous situation and offers her friendship. Not having met anyone she could trust in a long time Lacey doesn’t know what to think of Everett. She isn’t used to having anyone, especially boys, be kind to her without expecting something in return. Everett doesn’t push her, yet always makes sure she knows he’s there if she needs anything. He patiently earns her trust and affection even though he fell for her right from the start.

My emotions pretty much ran the gamut with this book. One of the many things I loved about this book is that I never got comfortable in the story, meaning from one minute to the next I couldn’t predict what was going to happen. I’m trying not to give anything away, but I was continually surprised by twists I never saw coming and honestly that doesn’t happen all that often to me. I am impressed by Ms. Fawkes storytelling skills. I was completely enthralled with this book and could not put it down. There are a lot of sweet touching scenes in BREATHE INTO ME, and scenes where Lacey is verbally, emotionally, and sometimes physically brutalized that will piss you off and make you wish your could reach out and hug her tight, and later in the book when Everett finally wins her heart there are some hot sexy scenes! Aside from Lacey and Everett, there are some excellently written secondary characters. Villains, sidekicks, and those who show themselves as true friends to Lacey and Everett. Cherise wins my vote for best friend ever in the scene where she catches that a**hole Mason on her property and teaches him to do a little dance, lol. All I’m saying is girls, we could all use a friend like her. And we could all be so lucky as to have a man like Everett fall in love with us. Don’t miss out on this book, it’s a 5 star read!!

~Complimentary copy received in exchange for an honest review.

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