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A review by kaje_harper
Breathe by Sophia Soames
5.0
There's a quality to this author's writing I can't describe, but would almost call "kind" - even in this story of two young men under a lot of stresses, and with a history of questionable choices, I found myself empathizing with them even through the worst mistakes, and everyone in it felt very human.
This story unfolds slowly. We start by meeting Ryan, who as Joey Hole, let porn-stardom go to his head, and on the face of it, crashed a relationship with a good man for the glitter of awards and fame and likes and money. Ryan was dumped (deservedly?) and hit a wall emotionally, and has come home to England from New York, abandoning his career. Now he's living with his mum and trying to go to college, but he's still a mess inside. And as time goes on, we see that his self-judgements and his accounts of what happened aren't always to be trusted, because there are things he starts out trying not to look at or remember.
We also meet Luke, a college student who is trying to do it all, as guardian for two younger siblings and in cooperation with three older ones, while his parents went to prison for fraud. They're broke, scrambling to make everything work in a dilapidated rental house, and the youngest sister is small enough to need a lot of time and care. They get some support from the authorities, but they're always on edge, worrying about being split up, or having some kind of authority returned to their deadbeat parents when they're released. Luke has no time for a personal life, but he could use a friend, and of the people in his college class, Ryan seems the most solitary and interesting - a challenge and someone who also might need a friend.
I enjoyed the way my perceptions of these guys changed with new revelations and their own growth and maturity. The secondary characters were an interesting bunch, nicely nuanced, all with positive and negative qualities. The story itself is quiet, but echoes of the past shake both these guys, and they don't always react well. The ending is solid, sweet, and even fun. I expect I'll reread this one day.
This story unfolds slowly. We start by meeting Ryan, who as Joey Hole, let porn-stardom go to his head, and on the face of it, crashed a relationship with a good man for the glitter of awards and fame and likes and money. Ryan was dumped (deservedly?) and hit a wall emotionally, and has come home to England from New York, abandoning his career. Now he's living with his mum and trying to go to college, but he's still a mess inside. And as time goes on, we see that his self-judgements and his accounts of what happened aren't always to be trusted, because there are things he starts out trying not to look at or remember.
We also meet Luke, a college student who is trying to do it all, as guardian for two younger siblings and in cooperation with three older ones, while his parents went to prison for fraud. They're broke, scrambling to make everything work in a dilapidated rental house, and the youngest sister is small enough to need a lot of time and care. They get some support from the authorities, but they're always on edge, worrying about being split up, or having some kind of authority returned to their deadbeat parents when they're released. Luke has no time for a personal life, but he could use a friend, and of the people in his college class, Ryan seems the most solitary and interesting - a challenge and someone who also might need a friend.
I enjoyed the way my perceptions of these guys changed with new revelations and their own growth and maturity. The secondary characters were an interesting bunch, nicely nuanced, all with positive and negative qualities. The story itself is quiet, but echoes of the past shake both these guys, and they don't always react well. The ending is solid, sweet, and even fun. I expect I'll reread this one day.