Winners: What If - Rebecca Donovan

I have some winners to announce today with the help of Rafflecopter and you have all won a copy of What If by Rebecca Donovan!

Without further ado I'm happy to announce that the winners are:

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Congratulations to you all! I have sent you an email asking for your addresses and you now have 1 week to respond with your address or a new winner/s will be chosen. Your prize will be sent out directly by my contact Penguin so you'll need to give me permission to pass your details to her so she can send the prize.

Thanks so much to Pengin for sponsoring this giveaway & thanks to everyone who entered. I'm sorry if you didn't win but I'll have more giveaways coming up soon so make sure you check back for another chance to win prizes.

Review: What If - Rebecca Donovan

What if you had a second chance to meet someone for the first time?

Cal Logan is shocked to see Nicole Bentley sitting across from him at a coffee shop thousands of miles from their hometown. After all, no one has seen or heard from her since they graduated over a year ago.

Except this girl isn't Nicole.

She looks exactly like Cal's shy childhood crush, but her name is Nyelle Preston and she has no idea who he is. This girl is impulsive and daring, her passion for life is infectious. But Nyelle is also extremely secretive. And the closer Cal comes to finding out what she's hiding, the less he wants to know.

Visit Rebecca Donovan's website for more information

Review:
I loved Rebecca Donovan's breathing series so of course as soon as I heard about her new stand alone novel What If I knew I had to read it. She has created another emotional story with great characters and I'm sure her fans will love this novel.

This is actually a really hard book to review though, not because I didn't enjoy it but because I would hate to spoil it for anyone so I'm going to keep this deliberately vague. What If is a story about friendships, it introduces readers to four childhood friends who grew apart when one of them moved away and another started hanging out with a new group. The story is told from Cal's point of view in the present but we get to see flashbacks told from Nicole's, Richelle's and Rae's perspectives and it is through these flashbacks that we gradually learn what happened to them and why they started drifting apart.

The focus of the story is the friendships between the four main characters but it also has a lot of great themes about living life to the fullest and being the person you want to be rather than trying to live up to other people's expectations. It's about following your dreams and taking chances so that you're not looking back with regrets. It's also about how childhood friendships can shape you and the importance of being true to both yourself and the people you love.

I know this review is vague but if you like coming of age stories and you enjoy a good mystery then I'm sure you'll love What If. I was already a fan of Rebecca Donovan but I'll definitely be keeping an eye on her to see what she comes up with next.

Source: Received from Penguin in exchange for an honest review.

Other reviews of this book:
If you have reviewed this book on your blog please leave a link to your review in the comments & I'll add the link here.

Paperback / Kindle:

UK Giveaway: What If - Rebecca Donovan (win one of 5 copies!)

Thanks to the lovely people at Penguin I have a fabulous giveaway for my UK readers today for the chance to win one of five copies of What If by Rebecca Donovan. I had planned to post my review to go alongside this giveaway but I was wiped out for the last few days with a viscous migraine and haven't managed to do any reading. I'm half way through What If though and really enjoying it so watch out for my review which will be posted in the next couple of days.

In the meantime let me give you a bit more information about the book:

What if you had a second chance to meet someone for the first time?

Cal Logan is shocked to see Nicole Bentley sitting across from him at a coffee shop thousands of miles from their hometown. After all, no one has seen or heard from her since they graduated over a year ago.

Except this girl isn't Nicole.

She looks exactly like Cal's shy childhood crush, but her name is Nyelle Preston and she has no idea who he is. This girl is impulsive and daring, her passion for life is infectious. But Nyelle is also extremely secretive. And the closer Cal comes to finding out what she's hiding, the less he wants to know.

Visit Rebecca Donovan's website for more information



Giveaway Details:

Thanks to Penguin I have five copies of What If to give away to UK winners.

Giveaway terms & conditions:

• Giveaway is open to UK residents only and closes on the 8th of February at 12:01 GMT
• You can enter using the Rafflecopter form below, FIVE winners will be chosen at random and contacted soon after the giveaway ends for their contact information.
• The prizes will be sent out directly by Penguin so you must give me permission to share your address if you wish to receive your prize.
• You will have 48 hours to respond to my email or new winners will be chosen

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Review: Barely Breathing - Rebecca Donovan

Will the promise of a passionate love mend Emma's broken heart?

The scandalous secrets of Emma's past life have been revealed, but she still has so much to learn. Why did her mother leave her all those years ago?

What really happened the night Emma's father died - and were her memories of being happy just a dream?

The repercussions of one horrific night have affected everyone involved. Now Emma has the chance of a new love - but will she let the past haunt her for good?

Breathing Series:
Reason to Breathe
Barely Breathing
Out of Breath

Visit Rebecca Donovan's website for more information

Review:
Please note that this review will contain spoilers for the first book in the series so don't read any further if you haven't already read Reason to Breathe. This is a fabulous, heart-wrenching series though so it's definitely one I'd recommend giving a try.

Emma's life has changed beyond recognition in the six months since her aunt tried to kill her, she is now living with her best friend Sara which means she finally has a safe place to call home. Although she is struggling to cope with the aftermath of what happened to her she has a lot of support from her boyfriend Evan, Sara and Sara's family but she finds it hard to open up and completely let any of them in. Emma has so many unanswered questions about her past so when her mother gets back into contact with her claiming she has changed Emma wants to give her a second chance. She decides to move in with her mother so they can spend time getting to know each other again but has her mother really changed though or is Emma just opening herself up to a whole new world of trouble?

I really enjoyed Reason to Breathe and after the huge cliffhanger ending I was pleased that I didn't have to wait before I started Barely Breathing. I had absolutely no idea what to expect from this story but I was hoping that things would finally start to turn good for Emma. The abuse she had been through was bound to have had lasting effects on her both physically and emotionally though and I felt that Rebecca Donovan did a fantastic job of portraying that. Emma is embarrassed by the fact that the whole town now knows her darkest secrets and she hates the pitying stares and attention she now receives because of it. She just wants to fade back into the background and get on with her life. I felt so badly for Emma during the last book, I actually wanted to climb into the book and murder her aunt so I was so relieved to see that she was now staying with Sara and I was nervous when she decided to move in with her mother. I just wanted to see her happy and living in a stable environment and I had such bad feelings about her mother.

As it turns out living with her mother was almost as bad as living with her aunt had been just in a very different way. Her mother is incredibly needy emotionally and acts like a child herself most of the time, she also turns to alcohol as a coping mechanism and although she isn't violent like Emma's aunt she has a vicious mouth on her and she was very good at verbally attacking Emma. It was hard to watch how Emma puts up with everything her mother throws at her because she thinks she deserves it. There were times when I was practically begging her to talk to Sara and Evan about what was going on but I could understand her reticence to do so. She is so used to keeping secrets and she is so emotionally overwrought from everything that she has gone through that it was understandable that she was pushing away the people who care about her the most. I may not like that fact and I was hurt on behalf of her friends, Evan in particular, by the way she treated them at times but I could see that it was a self defence mechanism that Emma didn't really even understand she was using.

I don't want to go into any more detail about the story so I'll just tell you that Barely Breathing is just as hard hitting as Reason to Breathe was but in a different way. I'm pleased that Rebecca Donovan didn't take the easy way out and make things all sunshine and roses for Emma. As much as Emma deserves some peace and happiness it was never going to come easy for her after everything she's been through. She needs time to heal herself emotionally and as much as the ending gutted me in a lot of ways I think she is going to come out stronger because of it. I absolutely can't wait to see how things play out in Out of Breath. As it's the final book in the series I have high hopes that Emma will finally find her own happily ever after but I have a feeling she's got more to face before she gets there.

Source: Received from Penguin in exchange for an honest review.

Other reviews of this book:
If you have reviewed this book on your blog please leave a link to your review in the comments & I'll add the link here.

Paperback / Kindle:

Review: Reason to Breathe - Rebecca Donovan

All she wants is to hide away, but love has found her . . .

In a town where people worry about what they're seen in and who they're seen with, Emma Thomas doesn't want to be seen at all. She's more concerned with feigning perfection - which means pulling down her sleeves to conceal the bruises. Emma doesn't want anyone to know how far from perfect her life truly is.

But when Emma unexpectedly finds love it challenges her to recognise her own worth, at the risk of revealing the terrible secret she's desperate to hide.

Breathing Series:
Reason to Breathe
Barely Breathing
Out of Breath

Visit Rebecca Donovan's website for more information

Review:
All Emma wants is a quiet life and she is happy to live in the shadows, especially if it means she can stay out of her abusive aunt's way. She is counting down the days until she can leave her aunt and uncle's home and is working hard to secure a place at a college as far away from her them as possible. She keeps herself to herself and apart from her one friend Sara she tries to avoid social situations, it would just be too hard to explain the bruises otherwise and she since she isn't allowed out in the evenings unless its for something school related it hasn't been too hard to avoid going to the usual teen parties. Emma has never admitted how bad things really are to Sara but her friend has a good idea that Emma's home life isn't all that it should be. No matter how hard Sara tries to get Emma to open up she remains determined to just live through it until she can make her escape. When Evan moves to the area and starts at their school he quickly gets under Emma's skin but spending time with him is a huge risk and who knows what her aunt will do if she ever finds out about it.

I'm going to admit that I find books about domestic violence hard to read, most of the ones I've read have come across as unrealistic and felt like an inaccurate portrayal of the situation which has really annoyed me. Because of that I was a bit wary when it came to picking up Reason to Breathe but so many of my friends had given it positive reviews that I decided to take a chance and I'm glad that I did. Rebecca Donovan has created one of the most hateful fictional characters I have ever come across and I wanted to climb inside the book and give Emma's aunt a taste of her own medicine. If ever there was a character I could murder it is her and I'm really praying that karma is going to come round and bite her in the arse by the end of the series! The fact that I had such strong feelings about her just goes to show how invested I became in Emma and how much I wanted her to find a way out of her current situation.

I did struggle slightly with the fact that Emma refused to tell anyone what was happening to her because she didn't want her young cousins to lose their family. I would have preferred for her to have had a different reason but I've seen first hand how domestic violence victims can justify the craziest things because of the way they have been conditioned by their abusers so I don't think it was completely unbelievable. I did want to beg Emma to speak out though, not just for her own safely but also because it was such a horrific environment for her cousins to be raised in. Jack (6) and Leyla (4) were the cutest children and although their mother wasn't violent towards them they both saw how terribly she treated Emma and living like that is bound to have a long term emotional effect on them. I was almost as angry with Emma's uncle as I was with her aunt, as much as he wasn't Emma's main abuser and her aunt was careful to do things out of his sight there is just no way he didn't have a damn good idea of what was going on in his home and I was so livid that he didn't put a stop to it.

I want to mention how much I loved the fact that Emma had such a supportive friend in Sara and also in Evan once she got to know him. For once the rich, popular girl from school isn't portrayed as a complete bitch and Sara tried so hard to make things better for Emma, in fact I think without Sara's support Emma would have crumbled long ago. This story shows what a huge effect that domestic violence has not just on the victims but also on the people around them. Sara and Evan both had a good idea that Emma was in trouble but they didn't know how to help her. Emma kept things as quiet as she could and was too scared to tell either of her friends the full story which made it very hard for them to try and do anything for her. They both supported her as much as they could but there were times when they felt like they had to walk away from the situation for their own sanity. As much as I hated that Sara deserted Emma at one point I could completely understand why she felt that she had no other choice and my heart just broke for both of the girls.

Reason to Breathe is a fantastic start to this series and I'm relieved that the final two books are already available so I'm not going to have to wait to read them. Rebecca Donovan takes a really difficult subject but she tackles it with sensitivity. She doesn't downplay the things that Emma goes through, in fact the violence was quite hard to read about in places, but I never felt she added things for the shock factor. I think it is important for subjects like domestic violence to be discussed openly and books like this can only help make that happen so I'd like to thank the author for raising awareness on the topic.

Source: Received from Penguin in exchange for an honest review.

Other reviews of this book:
If you have reviewed this book on your blog please leave a link to your review in the comments & I'll add the link here.

Paperback / Kindle:

Winners: Love Hurts Blog Tour

With the help of Rafflecopter I am excited to announce the winners of the Love Hurts Blog Tour Giveaway, each winning a copy of Easy by Tammara Webber and Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan are:

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Congratulations to you all! You should have already received an email from me asking for your addresses so please make sure you look out for it. If I don't hear back from you within 48 hours then a new winners will be chosen. Your prize will be sent out by my contact at Penguin so you'll need to give permission for me to forward your address to them.

I'd like to say a massive thank you to Penguin for allowing me to host this giveaway for them.

Love Hurts Blog Tour: UK Giveaway of Easy by Tammara Webber & Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan

I'm thrilled to be taking part in the blog tour to celebrate the release of both Easy by Tammara Webber and Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan that are being published in the UK in January by Penguim. I've already read Easy which I loved (watch out for my review which will be posted later today) and I can't wait to get started on Reason to Breathe so I'm very excited to be hosting a fabulous giveaway so that 3 of my blog readers will be able to win a copies of both books!

Before we get to the giveaway I want to give you a little more information about the books:

Easy is a New York Times bestseller - a must-read in the New Adult genre for everyone who loves Slammed by Colleen Hoover or Breathe by Abbi Glines. Deeply romantic and utterly gripping, Tammara Webber's Easy is not to be missed.

When Jacqueline follows her long-term boyfriend to college, the last thing she expects is a breakup. After two weeks in shock she wakes up to her new reality: she's single, ignored by former friends, and failing a class for the first time in her life.

Leaving a party alone, she is assaulted. Rescued by a stranger in the right place at the right time, she just wants to forget that night. But when her attacker turns stalker she has to make a choice: crumple in defeat or learn to fight back. Her savior proves protective and intriguing, but he's hiding secrets of his own. Suddenly, knowing who to trust is anything but easy.

Visit Tammara Webber's website for more information.

Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan is a US bestselling phenomenon.

An utterly addictive and heartbreaking novel that will leave readers breathless and desperate for more. All fans of Jodi Picoult and new adult author fiction such Colleen Hoover's Slammed, Tammara Webber's Easy and Abbi Glines' Vincent Boys will love Rebecca Donovan's incredible writing. A must-read.

A passionate love. A brutal betrayal. Unwavering hope.

In a town where most people worry about what to be seen in and who to be seen with, Emma Thomas would rather not be seen at all. She's more concerned with feigning perfection, pulling down her sleeves to conceal the bruises. Emma doesn't want anyone to know how far from perfect her life truly is.

When Emma unexpectedly finds love, it challenges her to recognize her own worth - but at the risk of revealing the terrible secret she's desperate to hide.

Visit Rebecca Donovan's website for more information.

Giveaway Details:

Thanks to the lovely folks at Penguin I have a fabulous giveaway for my UK blog readers.

• Three lucky winners will win paperback copies of both Easy by Tammara Webber and Reason to Breathe by Rebecca Donovan.
• The winner's prize will be sent out directly by my contact at Penguin so the winner must give me permission to pass their address on.
• To enter please use the rafflecopter below to confirm that you are a UK resident, there are optional extra entries for following or tweeting about the giveaway but these are not required to enter.
• Duplicate and invalid entries will be deleted and the winners will be chosen at random from all remaining entries.
• The giveaway will close at Midnight GMT on the 12th of January 2013 and the winner will be contacted soon afterwards. You will have 48 hours to reply to me with your address or a new winner will be chosen.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Don't forget to follow the rest of the Love Hurts Blog Tour, you can easily find all of the tour stops by clicking the links on this cool interactive banner: