Review: Ten Tiny Breaths by K.A. Tucker

Book: Ten Tiny Breaths
Author: K.A. Tucker
Publication Date: December 11th, 2012
Publisher: Papoti Books
Rating: 3 Stars

Kacey Cleary’s whole life imploded four years ago in a drunk-driving accident. Now she’s working hard to bury the pieces left behind—all but one. Her little sister, Livie. Kacey can swallow the constant disapproval from her born-again aunt Darla over her self-destructive lifestyle; she can stop herself from going kick-boxer crazy on Uncle Raymond when he loses the girls’ college funds at a blackjack table. She just needs to keep it together until Livie is no longer a minor, and then they can get the hell out of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

But when Uncle Raymond slides into bed next to Livie one night, Kacey decides it’s time to run. Armed with two bus tickets and dreams of living near the coast, Kacey and Livie start their new lives in a Miami apartment complex, complete with a grumpy landlord, a pervert upstairs, and a neighbor with a stage name perfectly matched to her chosen “profession.” But Kacey’s not worried. She can handle all of them. What she can’t handle is Trent Emerson in apartment 1D.

Kacey doesn’t want to feel. She doesn’t. It’s safer that way. For everyone. But sexy Trent finds a way into her numb heart, reigniting her ability to love again. She starts to believe that maybe she can leave the past where it belongs and start over. Maybe she’s not beyond repair.

But Kacey isn’t the only one who’s broken. Seemingly perfect Trent has an unforgivable past of his own; one that, when discovered, will shatter Kacey’s newly constructed life and send her back into suffocating darkness.

“I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. Give me your heart, Kacey. I’ll take everything that comes with it.”

For all the times this Uncle Raymond dude is mentioned in the summary, he sure never appears in the book. At all. Really, you get what this book is about if you just read the last two paragraphs of the blurb.

I thought this book was interesting. It kept me reading, and I was curious to see what would happen. I got a little caught up in Trent's hotness too, but then again I always do that. I liked Tucker's writing style; it didn't drag, and it definitely could have. Why? Because nothing happens in the first half of the book. Kacey settles down in Miami with her sister, Livie, starts working at a strip club as a bartender with little experience, and avoids her hot neighbor, Trent.

A lot of things that happened in this story made me wonder if this was all possible. Running off to Miami without being found by your legal guardians, miraculously finding people who are that good with tons of cash to spare, getting a job at a club where the bouncers and the owners are complete gentlemen... I don't know, seems a little too perfect for me. Maybe I've been reading too many my-life-is-shit novels or something.

After the initial wow-that-guy-is-sexy phase, I started getting really annoyed of Trent and Kasey's reaction to him. Fine, he's really hot. But do you have to mention how you can't speak and your legs turn to jello every single time you meet eyes? Also, I'm sorry, but he's a stalker. There is no way to get around it. It's mentioned later that he has followed Kasey's life for months before he actually met her, and that is just creepy. Somehow, people think it's okay when the hot guy does the stalking, but stalking is still stalking. It's still the act of creeping on another person without his/her knowledge.

Here's the run-down of this novel:
30% Trent staring at Kasey
40% Kasey thinking about Trent
20% Kasey and Trent sexy times
10% actual substance

To conclude, 90% is about Trent. And he's pretty important, but come on. I thought the book was about Kasey healing herself, not her depending on some guy to do it for her. The unveiling at the end definitely gave me a good shock, though I feel pretty stupid for not foreseeing it earlier. I actually got more interested because of it. The book would've been pretty boring and less fucked up if Tucker had left the twist out, although it might still have worked. I thought everything was too easily solved with the epilogue and last chapter. I don't know if therapy is that miraculous. Maybe it is. But the way everyone seemed to come together again... Like the rest of the book and its characters, it seemed a bit too perfect. I didn't think Tucker spent enough time exploring the other characters for the conclusion to make sense; if she'd laid off a little on Trent and Kasey, there might have been some real, believable development in relationships. As it is, this book is interesting if you like runaway snakes and sexual tension.
View all my reviews