A review by kfriend
Not Meant to Be Broken by Cora Reilly

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.