Published: 8th December 2014
Publisher: MIRA Ink
Format: Kindle
Synopsis: “I wish life could be like this forever,” I say. “We’d be okay then. We’d forever be okay.”
For Echo Emerson, a road trip with her boyfriend is the perfect way to spend
the last summer between school and college. It’s a chance forget all the things
that make her so different at home. But most of all, it means almost three
months alone with gorgeous Noah Hutchins, the only boy who’s never judged her.Echo and Noah share everything.But as their pasts come crashing back into their lives, its harder to hide that
they come from two very different worlds. And as the summer fades, Echo faces
her toughest decision – struggle to face the future together or let her first
love go…
After finishing Pushing the Limits (review here) I needed
more of Echo and Noah! Breaking the rules picks up almost immediately after
Pushing the Limits. It's summer and Echo and Noah have graduated. This summer
trip is sort of a last chance of fun before the seriousness of college sets in.
Echo plans to visit Art Galleries to sell paintings, partly to make a name for
herself and partly to prove that she can make it by herself without her mother…
It doesn’t quite go to plan. Noah spends the majority of the time doubting if
he is good enough for Echo, he’s trying, trying so hard to be the person he
feels he should be for her coupled with finding out he still has living
relatives. Echo decides she’s too tame, she doesn’t take enough risks… coupled
with finding out that her mother had called ahead to the galleries she been
visiting.
Needless to say their carefree summer road trip crashes back down to earth quite rapidly. Noah’s insecurity over being good enough for Echo becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy culminating in Noah being arrested, at which point he does something that for a split second does make him not good enough, a fact Isaiah makes very clear to him if Echo hadn’t already got the message across. And Echo is too busy trying to please everyone else, prove something to everyone else. Katie McGarry approaches this book in the same way that she did Pushing the Limits… No fairy Godmothers, Echo and Noah work it all out for themselves, and this time they even do it without so much support from the other. I wouldn’t go as far as to say this book has a moral but it does seem to have a common theme. Echo has to realise that she doesn’t need to prove anything to anyone else and that she should make the right choices for herself. Noah also has to come to terms with the fact that being good enough for Echo has nothing to do with how people see him and is all about supporting her even if the outcome is not what he wanted. They mature even more in this book, it takes them until the end but they get there. You also see both Noah and Echo deal with their grief in Breaking the Rules, Echo finally opens up about Aries, and the fact that she is angry at him for leaving her. Similarly Noah finding out he has living relatives, after having been told by his mother as he was growing up that she had no living relatives makes him angry at her. Luckily Mrs Collins is there to tell them that it’s okay to be angry, just because they are dead doesn’t mean they can’t be angry.
Needless to say their carefree summer road trip crashes back down to earth quite rapidly. Noah’s insecurity over being good enough for Echo becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy culminating in Noah being arrested, at which point he does something that for a split second does make him not good enough, a fact Isaiah makes very clear to him if Echo hadn’t already got the message across. And Echo is too busy trying to please everyone else, prove something to everyone else. Katie McGarry approaches this book in the same way that she did Pushing the Limits… No fairy Godmothers, Echo and Noah work it all out for themselves, and this time they even do it without so much support from the other. I wouldn’t go as far as to say this book has a moral but it does seem to have a common theme. Echo has to realise that she doesn’t need to prove anything to anyone else and that she should make the right choices for herself. Noah also has to come to terms with the fact that being good enough for Echo has nothing to do with how people see him and is all about supporting her even if the outcome is not what he wanted. They mature even more in this book, it takes them until the end but they get there. You also see both Noah and Echo deal with their grief in Breaking the Rules, Echo finally opens up about Aries, and the fact that she is angry at him for leaving her. Similarly Noah finding out he has living relatives, after having been told by his mother as he was growing up that she had no living relatives makes him angry at her. Luckily Mrs Collins is there to tell them that it’s okay to be angry, just because they are dead doesn’t mean they can’t be angry.
Mrs Collins unfortunately got left out of my review for
Pushing the Limits, I didn’t mean to because I love her character, I love the
mind games that her and Noah play with each other. Talking of supporting
characters, Beth and Isaiah are back. This is a fact that I like and Beth and Echo
even get along for a couple of seconds.
I’ve seen a few people who have expressed disappointment at
Breaking the Rules especially with the fact that Echo and Noah seem to be in a
worse point in this book than when they were in Pushing the Limits, well I’m
sorry but that is life. It doesn’t get to a good point then stay good, there is
always another drama, even the smallest thing can become a big thing especially
with the backgrounds that Echo and Noah have. And I respect Kaite McGarry for
being true to reality, which isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, its compromise
and small victories which so far I think these books have shown rather well.
On to the next books :)
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