Jennifer Niven is a master at writing really emotional, heartwrench stories. Breathless was a story that really moved me. Claude and Miah were both characters that swept me away, as did this story. I finished it with tears in my eyes.

A lovely young adult read with a lot of depth within the storyline. A beautiful read as always from Jennifer, would highly recommend.

A coming of age Young adult contemporary. This deals with many themes such as divorce, family and relationships. Great characterisation and I liked the descriptions of the setting. A good read overall, would like a sequel!

I’ve since read something else by this author and was not a fan of the writing and no longer have an interest in this book.

Have put this as a 3 star as that’s an ‘in the middle’ rating

Please note that this book is not for me - I have read the book, However I had to DNF and because i do not like to give negative reviews I will not review this book fully - there is no specific reason for not liking this book. I found it a struggle to read and did not enjoy trying to force myself to read this book.

Apologies for any inconvenience caused and thank you for the opportunity to read this book

Holding up the universe and all the bright places are two of my favourite books so I had such high hops for breathless but honestly I’m actually really disappointed. I found the book to be very uneventful and quite boring. Claude really annoyed me as a character. I felt she was very selfish and caught up in her own life and her own drama without thinking about those around her. Maybe it’s because my parents separated when I was a baby and I was brought up by just my mum, but I found Claude’s reaction to her parents separating way too dramatic and quite childish. I didn’t like the way she treated miah or her best friend saz. She just felt very spoiled to me. I did enjoy the writing style and the imagery of the island was beautiful. I also loved miah and really rooted for him. Overall I really didn’t like the book and wouldn’t read it again.

I absolutely loved this book - the storyline was fantastic and addictive, and I couldn’t stop reading. I don’t think I’ll ever love a book as much as I loved All The Bright Places - but this one was very close. If I gave half ratings then this would be a 4.5 stars, however I’ve had to go with 4 stars as it wasn’t quite a 5 for me. I think that’s because I didn’t always love Claudine. Whilst I really liked her most of the time, a few times she annoyed me or I disagreed with something she said or did. However I loved everything about Jeremiah. His character was written very well, and he was very easy to love. I really liked the storyline, and it made me emotional several times. It made me laugh but it also made me very sad. I’d love to see a book two, as I feel like this just isn’t the end! I’d love to read more about these characters, and I’m really looking forward to reading any future books from Jennifer Niven.

Apologies to the author, publisher and netgalley for letting this title linger on my digital review shelf for far too long. When I finally got around to reading it I found it wasn’t for me and I had to DNF it. I think, maybe, it just doesn’t appeal to adults with it being YA. I loved this author’s other titles which is why I requested this but I couldn’t get on with this one.

A beautiful YA tale about first love that feels realistic. It will certainly capture the hearts of its target audience and pull on the heartstrings.

This is one of my best friends favourite authors so ofcourse I had to read it. YA/romance. Emotional reading in parts. Claudine is an amazing main character, after her parents split she finds herself with her mother on a remote island with no phone signal. What will she do? Surely she won’t fall in love will she? That is exactly what she does. A story all about first love. Overcoming her parents break up, learning about herself & her family past. A beautiful story. Does contain sex scenes.

Devoured the majority of this in one day. Absolutely loved it. The ending annoying me. Well a certain part. No spoilers but highly recommend. A well deserved four stars from me. Stunning. A read that stays with you and reminds you all about your first love. Cute.

I have always loved Jennifer Niven's work and this book was just another wonderful piece of writing by her. A heartwarming story of first love, friendship and getting to know each other.

I absolutely adored Jennifer Niven’s All the Bright Places and was eager to read another book from the author. Although Breathless had the potential to be another gripping read, it didn’t work for me in the way I had hoped.

I’ll be honest and say this book was a two-star rating for a while. I could not connect with the main character and there was little about the story that I found interesting. Things did get better once the story was moving, but I never came to care about the main character. Plus, there were plot points I was interested in that were never fully resolved. Thus, while it was interesting enough for me to give a three-star rating, it wasn’t quite a full three-star rating.

All in all, I can see the appeal, but this one didn’t work for me in the way I had hoped.

I really enjoyed this. Captured that first love brilliantly. Full of heartache and emotion which is exactly what I expect from a Jennifer Niven novel

This book was very middle of the road for me. I thought it was a good YA but nothing original or mind blowing.

was given an advanced ebook of this book to review.

I enjoyed this book but have to admit that I have preferred this authors past work (particularly All The Bright Places).

I knew that this book had a fairly large sex theme to it, but as an adult reader it didn’t bother me.

At times I was reminded of The Last Song just because of the basic plot (going to a beach town, meeting a boy, sea turtles) so if you’re a fan of that then you’ll probably enjoy this story.

I didn’t know that this book was loosely based on the authors life until after I finished it, which is probably a good thing because I would have found it harder to review knowing that it was partially a true story.

The ending of this book did feel a bit lacking to me. I wanted to find out more about the aftermath with the side characters (like the best friend and the father). I would have loved an extra chapter to really close out the book. This is probably the thing I found most annoying about this book.

Love Jennifer niven I have never been disappointed with her books and this one was no different.
A good teenage romance and family life read.

I have read the author’s previous novels so was excited to read this one. I think it is always hard to top an amazing debut, maybe my expectations were too high. I found this challenging to read, the main character was hard to relate to and, dare I say it, rather bland. It was well written but I just couldn’t connect to the storyline. Maybe if I was younger it would be easier. Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for an egalley

A very well written story about Claude, a girl who has her life all mapped out. She's about to graduate from high school, she has the summer planned and then from out of nowhere it all changes. Her parents are divorcing and instead of spending the summer with her friends, she finds herself on an island off the coast of Georgia with her mother and no internet!

This is where Claude meets Jeremiah. He has a past that he doesn't want to talk about.

Claude knows that she doesn't have time to fall in love, she's off to college in the autumn but since when have plans ever been straight forward.

A nice coming of age story with what I felt was a rather hasty ending.

Breathless was my first Jennifer Niven read, and it didn’t live up to the hype. Following a girl called Claude as her parents decide to get divorced and she goes away with her mother for the summer, this novel should have had a very strong emotional impact but left me feeling disappointed.

The main issue that I had with Breathless is that Claude doesn’t sound like a contemporary teenager. She speaks as though she’s older than her years, wiser than her peers, and it’s wholly unrealistic. I’m not a fan of YA novels trying to be literary fiction. It’s one of the reasons I struggle to enjoy John Green’s writing, so if you’re a fan of him I’d definitely recommend you give Jennifer Niven a try.

It also felt as though the book was set in the past, rather than in the 21st Century. Putting your character on a remote island with bad signal to interrupt their communication with their best friend (and to give the love interest an excuse to refuse to hand over his number) is a bit of a lackluster plot device. It would have made more sense if the novel had been set before smartphones were readily available. That would have also gone some way towards explaining why Claude didn’t feel like a modern teenager. If this had been a historical YA I would have enjoyed it more.

Those two issues combined kept throwing me out of the story, and I found it hard to emotionally connect with Breathless. While talking about this book in my January wrap up I couldn’t even remember Claude or Miah’s names, which shows how impactful I found them!

That being said, I did like Miah’s character. He has a bit of a damaged past so he has a lot of layers, and the reason I kept coming back to this book (rather than DNF’ing it, which Sean ended up doing) was because I was interested to learn more about his character. His relationship with Claude developed in an interesting way – it starts off as a summer fling but quickly becomes apparent to both of them that they’re feeling more than just lust for each other – but the ending left me feeling frustrated.

My favourite things about Breathless were the island setting, and the discussion of female sexuality.

The island setting is written in such a gorgeous way. You can tell that Jennifer Niven has either researched this location very deeply or has been on holiday there a few times herself, as the entire island was perfectly crafted. The turtles burying their eggs on the moonlit beach is a scene which is certainly going to stick in my mind for a long time.

Meanwhile, the discussion of female sexuality and pleasure is everything I wanted from YA books when I was younger. Whereas male YA authors never seem ashamed of either featuring masturbation scenes or having male self-pleasure innuendos throughout their stories, female YA authors traditionally seem to shy away from these subjects. Featuring scenes of Claude masturbating, discussions of virginity and how important it should/shouldn’t be (to both society and the individuals concerned) and discussions of female pleasure during intercourse, Breathless is a breath of fresh air in these respects. I particularly loved Claude berating Miah after their first time, telling him that it’s not over when he comes and that he should treat every time like the first time. Seeing characters having these discussions will empower female readers to assert themselves in regards to their pleasure, which is a hugely sex positive inclusion.

All in all, Breathless just wasn’t the book for me. It was too slow and introspective, and Claude came across as a little bit patronising at points so I didn’t like her all that much. However, I will definitely be recommending this book to readers who are looking for sex positive YA.

This is a nicely paced summer read, one you can enjoy one afternoon learning of Claudine/Claude's summer after her senior year on a remote island in Georgia. Falling in love was the last thing on her mind but this wouldnt be a love story without it would it? Its much more than that though and i thoroughly enjoyed it.

My thanks to netgalley for an arc of this book in return for my honest opinion.