Out of Breath by Rebecca Donovan

About the book

Out of Breath is the third book in (new adult) The Breathing Series by Rebecca Donovan. The book was published by Penguin on 2^nd July and it is 496 pages long. Thanks to the publisher for providing me with a review copy.

Plot Synopsis

Emma has been through a lot. Because of her past, she trusts no one and lets no one in… apart from Evan. Apart from her best friend Sara, he’s the one who has been there for Emma through everything, no matter how bad it may have gotten. But, she broke his heart and no she’s on her own in a quite sad and miserable state.

Emma has secrets and refuses to let anyone in to know about them, they’re just too dark and scary. Evan, however, can’t seem to get over Emma and desperately needs to know the truth and he won’t stop until he knows exactly what happened to Emma. Will Emma risk sharing everything with the love of her life or will she end up losing him forever?

What I thought

The Breathing Series has been one of my favourites from the new adult genre and I couldn’t wait to read the final book in the trilogy. Main characters Emma and Evan have been through a hell of a lot together up until this point and I desperately wanted to know how it all ended for them. As this is the last book in the trilogy, there may be spoilers for the previous two books.

In the second book, Emma’s life spiralled out of control again and she realised that she just couldn’t stay in Weslyn anymore. She needed to get away and has now headed off to Stanford University, like she had always planned to. But now, she doesn’t have the support and love of Evan to get her through the days and ends up being miserable and depressed. The secrets of the not so distance past are haunting her and without the forgiveness of the one person that matters, she doesn’t know how to cope.

I really enjoyed the change of scenery in this book. Now that Emma has gone off to university, she has made new friends (her roommates) and has a whole load of other things to contend with. Although in a new place and living a completely different life, she still keeps up the close friendship with Sara from back home which I was glad to see. It was also nice to see Emma with a whole new group of people with personalities and with people who didn’t know about her broken past. Donovan had also come up with a way of including Sara with Emma’s roommates which was a nice touch. It really did bring out a different side to Emma, even if that wasn’t always a good thing.

Emma becomes a bit of a hermit while away at university. She has struggle concentrating, she doesn’t go out to parties like her friends do and she doesn’t meet guys, not until her friends force her to have a little fun anyway. During this time, Emma meets Cole, a friend of a friend and eventually the two start seeing each other. Emma is adamant that they’re not dating though and they end up with a strange kind of relationship. I absolutely adored Cole which is hard to say because of how much I love Evan. Cole is in the dark about Emma and her past but he knows there is something bugging her. He doesn’t ever pressure her to talk about things she isn’t comfortable with though and he really is the sweetest guy. Even though I really liked him, I couldn’t help but hope for things to work out with Evan still without having Cole’s heart broken in the process.

Plot wise, there are so many twists and turns. This isn’t a book that just follows the new kind of relationship between Emma and Cole. It also delves into the past and the secrets that Emma is keeping hidden, it has some bits about Emma’s family and the mess that it is. It also has Evan back and a fight for what he thinks is right. With everything going on, Emma goes through some really rough times but I didn’t always like the way that this was dealt with. Emma is a certain kind of person who doesn’t do certain things but in this book, it seems that all of that has been forgotten. Because of such sudden changes, I ended up a bit confused about who Emma was as a character at times.  

While I enjoyed the plot for the most part, I did feel as though it was drawn out a bit longer than it probably needed to be. But, with all of the twists and turns, the new characters and a new romance, this really was a good book. Out of Breath also really ties up the series extremely well and I think fans will be pretty happy with the outcome. I know I was. Now that this series is over, I will definitely be looking out for Rebecca Donovan’s next book. She has the ability to write fantastic stories with great characters that really draw you in. This series is highly recommended by me!