Reviews

Not Meant to Be Broken by Cora Reilly

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tansybritches's review against another edition

5.0

Holy hell what a book! This book hit me in my soul! Cora really captures you in this one!!
So the premise of the story of how Amber is a survivor of sexual assault & is trying to learn to let go of her fears after it really hit home for me!
She moves in with her brother & his best friend, mostly to appease her father who’s worried about her. But Amber and Zach have a connection pretty quickly!
As a survivor of rape myself this is such a powerful book!!
Learning to love yourself & let someone close to you after that happening is so hard! But with the right people in your life, like Amber’s support system she discovered by moving it’s possible! Her friendship with Reagan is beautiful! And the bond between Zach & Amber is beautiful!
I loved everything about this book!! I’d love another book following up on Zach & Amber!

amymichhelle's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

kfriend's review

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4.0

I’m a huge fan of Cora’s, so when she revised and republished this book, I was excited to get my hands on it.

This one was so emotional, and at times painful to read. Our story centers on our deeply traumatized heroine, Amber- a young survivor of a brutal sexual assault and who is is living daily with the intense emotional trauma and pyschological damage from her attack. When we first meet her, she can’t bear to be touched, even by her brother and father. In order to try to start somewhere fresh (and as only we know from Amber, to give her father some reprieve), she moves in with her college-aged brother and his roommate Zach.

While Zach is cautious around her, Amber soon notices that he doesn’t treat her with the same kitten gloves as everyone else, that their connection doesn’t feel as painful as the ghost of her relationship with her brother, and she finds herself being drawn to him. As they start to connect, we see a tender and fragile bond forming between them- both not really sure how to manage it with Zach’s own relationship issues and Amber’s painful past, not to mention the forbidden “brother’s best friend issue.”

I loved and hurt for Amber a lot in this book- her story is painful, and she’s so brave to keep fighting on just living day to day with all of that hurt inside her. And, her beautiful soul is constantly trying to heal, and is also constantly feeling pain for the way her life has changed that of those around her, especially her brother and her father. Zach, on the other hand, was frustrating. I loved him at first- saw his kind spirit, the way he cared for Amber by just treating her as a PERSON and not a victim, and found him magnetic. He’s so sweet with her, so understanding. But, then he does and does stupid crap, multiple times, because he’s immature and can’t handle his feelings. Twice, not once but TWICE he does things that can be considered cheating...with the same girl, and at one point in the same freaking house as Amber. I get that in real life people use sex to get over real feelings, but this isn’t real life- this is my fictional world and in my fictional world I hate it when the dudes sleep around when they already love the girl. And, in this case, it really bothered me because it was with the same “other” girl both times. That makes it worse, and it also makes it worse that this he’s doing it to not just any girl, but a girl whose life has been deeply and painfully impacted by sex crimes.

Ultimately, it ended happily, but I’m still a bit frustrated by it ruining what overall was touching and sweet romance for me. 3.5 stars, I’ll round up because I was happy in the end and because I love Cora and Amber.

smithrachaelynn's review against another edition

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4.0

I just loved this story. Such a good story about healing and starting your life again.

rileybrouillard's review against another edition

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4.0

This book has some serious TW!

This book was very hard to read only because it was so emotional with everything she had been through.

The FMC is a SA survivor who was brutally SA by multiple men and then beaten and left for dead. This left her with severe PTSD and she even attempted suicide twice. She also couldn't stand to be touched by anyone. She moves in with her brother and his best friend to find some normalcy and prove to her dad she is not as fragile as everyone thinks.

Eventually she starts to develop feelings for Zach, her brother's best friend. He did not treat her like she was broken and fragile which she liked. He saw her. Zach grew up with the expectation the he is exactly like his cheating, man-whore father. So he always went from woman to woman. This is why when Zach and her started hanging out and dating, her brother was not pleased.

I did like this book because of the emotion it evoked. Yes, there were issues with cheating which bugged me but the emotion and backstory behind the FMC was so strong for me to rate it any lower than a 4

inked_orca's review

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4.0

The story was so good, what happened to Amber really broke my heart and the way her dad and brother treated her like she was fragile and broken (she kinda was but not like the way they made her seem to be) made me feel like that played a part in her not being able to normal.

That is why I love Zach.

To be real Amber kinda pissed me off at the end. She should have talked to Zach first then took the discussion. Communication and sharing your thoughts makes relationships work. But the book still was good.