Broken Beautiful Hearts by Kami Garcia

I almost didn't have a review for you guys today, but I picked up this book and couldn't put it down the other day. Broken Beautiful Hearts was a quick read, despite the daunting 407 pages. It tells the story of Peyton Rios, a senior at her high school with her heart set on being a professional soccer player. She gets early acceptance into the program she wants at her number one school pick and sees her life on track until she discovers her boyfriends secret and a tumble down the stairs puts her entire future into question.

***SPOILERS AHEAD***

I really liked this book for a few reasons.

The first reason is because it shows the amount of pressure that teens put on themselves to succeed. Peyton puts all of her time and effort into soccer because she wants to go pro. Her boyfriend Reed starts doing drugs in order to enhance his performance and win MMA matches to go pro. When Peyton's knee gets blown on her tumble down stairs, she begins to wonder if her dream is accessible and pushes herself to do whatever she can to get it One Hundred Percent! so she can play for her dream team in college.

After Peyton leaves her mother and moves in with her uncle and twin cousins, she still keeps getting calls and voicemails from her ex boyfriend Reed, who pushed her down the stairs and ended her soccer career. Throughout the book she runs into him over and over again in places that he shouldn't be. He turns into a jealous maniac because Peyton is seeing another guy and Reed can't handle that. Although, his emotional craziness is probably mostly because of the drugs he's taking, but either way, Stalking is never okay. Along those notes, the author adds in her notes at the end of the book that this is something that she had dealt with when she was younger. She also includes references and places to contact in the event that someone is stalking you.

So, Owen's character was probably my favorite. He's a pretty chill guy throughout the whole book and you don't really find out why he is the way he is until later on in the book. He has a rare heart defect that could cause his heart to stop at any moment. He could live to be a ripe old age, or he could live for five more days before his heart stops, and the only way to restart it is with the use of a defibrillator. His attitude toward his condition is to still live life to it's fullest. He participates in the MMA matches he's grown to love. He parties with his friends. He tries to date Peyton. He's the character that shows that you can't let one thing, whether it's something life threatening or something small, keep you from doing something you love.

By the end of the book, Peyton's attitude toward soccer, while still pretty intense, is not as die hard as it was at the beginning. She learns through her family and through her new friends, that sometimes you have to let things go. This book, while full of sucky circumstances, actually turns out to be pretty inspiring and uplifting.

If you've read this book, let me know what you thought in the comments below!

See you again soon!!