Nova Reed used to have dreams-of becoming a famous drummer, of marrying her true love. But all of that was taken away in an instant. Now she's getting by as best she can, though sometimes that means doing things the old Nova would never do. Things that are slowly eating away at her spirit. Every day blends into the next . . . until she meets Quinton Carter. His intense, honey brown eyes instantly draw her in, and he looks just about as broken as she feels inside.
Quinton once got a second chance at life-but he doesn't want it. The tattoos on his chest are a constant reminder of what he's done, what he's lost. He's sworn to never allow happiness into his life . . . but then beautiful, sweet Nova makes him smile. He knows he's too damaged to get close to her, yet she's the only one who can make him feel alive again. Quinton will have to decide: does he deserve to start over? Or should he pay for his past forever?
"For anyone who’s ever felt lost and struggled to find their way back."
Nova Reed and Quinton Carter are two people going through the motions. Nova's life ended that morning when she found Landon, and everything has just been a blur since. And Quinton's ended the night he wasn't suppose to wake up from....But he did. They are both broken, and numb, lost, existing the past year without any sense of direction or purpose. But when their paths cross that summer in a dirty toke filled trailer neither will be who they think they are by the end...
"He looked how I felt inside, like I'd been broken apart and the pieces hadn't healed correctly"
Nova is amazing. I am usually not a fan of the broken and lost heroine and even though in a way Nova was just that, she was so much more to me. There was something about the way her character was written that I felt like I could see through her...even at times when she couldn't. She has witnessed so much death with her own eyes that it broke my heart reading about her inner torture. All she wanted was answers and maybe a little peace and quite and she found it that summer in a joint and Quinton. But the difference between Nova and Quinton is that she is desperately seeking a way out of her head and a way to free the lost soul trapped in her body for the one that she remembers once existed. And Quinton is a one man wrecking crew with only one mission in mind.
"If we allow it to, the numbness can drown out everything. Even the spark of life inside us. And eventually the person we once were is nothing but a vanishing memory"
Quinton is on a path of pure self destruction. He gave up caring, and hurting on the side of the highway and now just lives in a numb state of complete worthlessness. He once had dreams and ambition but those days are a mere memory of who he once was, and now his ultimate goal is to finish what he believes should have been his fate that tragic night. Getting kicked out of his house he makes his way to Maple Grove to stay with his cousin Tristan where his life is about to go down a spiral he couldn't even predict. It's also where he meets Nova a girl with eyes almost as sad as his and for the first time on over a year he feels...
"Suddenly, for a fleeing, guilty, irreversible moment, I am glad my heart decided to beat again."
Nova and Quinton are two characters that have completely broken my heart and I don't know how to recover. They have each gone through so much loss and tragedy that I wanted nothing more than for them to find solace and peace in each other. The connection they share is twisted yet real, their circumstances brought them together but their pain and understanding of sorrow forced them to connect. They both see what the other is trying to hide and bury but in the end only the one will strive to survive and make it out that dark tunnel of nothingness and the other will go down an even darker path.
"People say that time heals all wounds, and maybe they're right....But what if the wounds don't heal correctly, like when cuts leave behind nasty scars...Does it mean they're really healed?"Another thing that I wanted to mention is that Nova was named after the Chevrolet car, and when you read the book you'll get the back story on that. But to me while reading and getting to know Nova, I started thinking of her name not as the car but as the Latin word for New. The person that she started off as at the beginning of the book is nothing like the character we see by the end. She may make stupid decisions that don't benefit her in any way and she may be completely lost, but in the end we see a new Nova emerge, and that's why to me this character completely embodies the definition of new. This is only book one, I can't wait to see what becomes of her next.
"It takes strength to rise back up, strength in yourself and from those around you"Breaking Nova, is earth shattering, it's mind blowing, it's raw, gritty and extremely gungy, but it's so freaking real it's scary. If you're looking for sunshine and rainbows, something that will leave you content and happy at the end...well this isn't the book for you. Breaking Nova centers around death, suicide, anxiety, grief, and the dark ever evolving real world of drugs and their effects. But if you're looking for an emotionally powerful read that will shake you in more ways than I would highly recommend this book.
**Copy kindly provided by Forever (Grand Central Publishing) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review**