This is a beautifully written coming of age story, full of emotion and characters that you completely fall in love with. An engaging and powerful read dealing with some sensitive topics.

I read this shortly after Five Feet Apart, so I feel like there's some similarities . . . while being completely different stories. Both made me cry, okay?

We start Breathtaking with the main character's as very young children. Which initially confused me because I had thought it was a young adult title. However, it was the whole point to watch Cara and Adam grow up together as the best friends that they are. Watching their innocence turn into teenagers was actually pretty cute.

One fine day, Cara loses Adam -- her one constant in her life -- so she struggles with the loss, the depression, etc. Then she meets Reid. The connection between Cara and Reid is intense and immediate. What Cara uncovers is so heartwrenching and heartwarming at the same time.

It made me cry.

This is a coming of age story with a little bit of everything. You'll want to read this.

THOROUGHLY ENJOYED this amazing book! I enjoyed the romance and it reminded me a lot of midnight sun, great for lovers of five feet apart ect.

I wasn't sure what to expect when i started reading this book. It was a slow start then i fell head over heels for Adam and Cara. I haven't ugly cried to a book in a really long time.and this book got me TWICE!!! I didn't know it was inspired by true events...it was a great read!

An amazing debut!

It was such an emotional read! I struggled at some point due to the topics and issues which is brought up within the book but WOW! It was breathtaking.

It is way too late for me to be writing this review but I couldn’t help myself since I stayed up to finish it and has spent the last 2 hours crying.

I’ll have to be honest and say that there were some dragging moments (especially beginning was not to interesting that I almost wanted to give up but I wanted to leave a review and hope for the best)

It was at my 50% mark when I started to get really interested, Cara and Adam’s relationship starting out in HS really was an emotional roller coaster! I was sad to see that Adam starting distancing himself and would get triggers from Cara really begging for his attention. Especially when they were in the woods.
I was hoping for a great ending I kept wondering why it was so early and Adam finally asked Cara to homecoming 😭 I could’ve sworn he was going to ask her to marry him.
I guess I also didn’t expect him passing away. My eyes will be swollen tomorrow because of that.
I loved that Reid was introduced😭. I was longing so much for Adam and Cara to fall in love and for it to be taken away I was happy she got it somehow.

If I’d have to explain the vibes I got was HS romance and 7lbs. I’m glad I got threw this book because not sure how long has it been that a book has made me cry this much, I honestly felt like I was watching the movie.

....
Thank you Courtney Turcotte Bond, BooksGoSocial, and Netgalley for the ARC.

Wow, just… wow. I just don’t know what to say. There have only been a few books that have actually left me speechless on what to say.
There is no word or words to describe the feels that I went through reading this.
This book deals with some pretty heavy topics like alcoholism, neglect and illness but it didn’t feel like you were just reading this as a third person, you feel like you are right in there with them.
I don’t want to give anything away because I think this book is that special.

I received a copy of this book to review from Netgalley. Thank you for the opportunity.
An interesting and quirky read. I liked the sweet moments between Cara and Adam. The writing is good and the story is complex and sad but sweet.
At times the writing felt laboured like the author was trying to hurry to a different part of the book. It made it feel like the first half was almost like a really long prologue. I would have liked some more exploration of Cara.
On the whole, a good read

Very emotional book and was very interesting to read. Thank you to that NetGalley for letting me read this book .

When the book matches the title, because it was just breathtaking! Thankyou Netgalley and thankyou Courtney for this amazing heart wrenchingly beautiful book. Its rare that a book can make me cry. But this one had me in tears at the end, I loved it so much.
Cara and Adam grow up next door to each other, for Cara everything seems perfect from the outside but her fathers alcoholism is taking its toll. For Adam he has a loving family, and no matter where their school years take them, they'll always have the window. Life takes them in different directions but the connection is never broken and their love for each other is consistent and unbreakable. They've been friends for as long as they can remember, until one day Adam can't be there for her anymore, and Cara had to learn to navigate a world without Adam in it. I predicted some aspects of the book but when told right, and when told as beautifully as this story even the predictable parts really do hit some feelings. I am so glad I got to read this. Absolutely amazing debut novel from Courtney that I have already recommended to several people.

“The nightly ritual of reading stories through the window started when they were five. Even though they often played together after school, the daytime hours weren’t enough for these best friends—they needed the nighttime, too.”

Cara and Adam are next door neighbours, they have been the best of friends since anyone can remember, all of their best memories include each other. Cara doesn’t have the best home life, her father is an alcoholic and her mother would rather spend all day obsessively scrubbing the house clean than spend any time with her daughter. When things get too much or the arguments get too loud, Cara reads her stories to Adam through their facing bedroom windows.

Breathtaking is a beautiful coming of age story that follows the best friends through their childhood as they grow up and move through school together. We see them each branching out to follow their own dreams- Cara wanting to be a writer and editor of the school newspaper, Adam wanting to play football and make it on the varsity team- just when they’re finally getting what they wanted, tragedy strikes and changes everything.

I had such a hard time rating this book. It was very well written, I loved the characters and I adored the first two thirds of the book. In fact it actually made me cry, which is a rarity with books. Unfortunately the last third of the story really let it down. I didn’t like Reid at all or Cara and Reid together and it was too poetry heavy for me (I skipped most of them). In the end I decided the book more than deserved the 4 stars just for the parts I loved.

Thanks to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review

This book had me gripped. throughout I found it so powerful I found myself crying when Adam died. It was written with such love and description that I lost myself every time I settled down to read it!

This book is heart breaking and as the title suggests breath taking. Everyone thinks that Cara’s life is perfect. Her parents are loving, house is perfect and she does well in school but that isn’t true. Adam, her next door neighbour knows the truth. Cara escapes by writing and reading her stories to her best friend.

When everything seems to be going to plan and she finally tells Adam how she feels her life crumbles beneath her. How will life ever be the same and will she ever be able to write again.

Going to college she meets someone who teaches her that she should use her writing to explain how she feels, how she loves and to tell hers and Adams story. As she finally begins to love and heal, Cara finds out something that changes her world completely again. As she is finally ready to move forward tragedy strikes again in a world that is already so fragile.

This book was read in one sitting. I couldn’t put it down. The heart-breaking ending and to find out that it’s based on real people just broke my heart even more. It was amazing to read and it felt like I was living every moment. I cried big fat tears and cheered in places that I didn’t expect. For people who like John Green and Jennifer Niven this is a book that will have you turning the pages so fast.

Wonderful story wonderfully written took me a while to get into it but once i did i loved it.

It helped me lose myself for a few hours

It is just beautiful. I don't know what else to say the first book that has made me cry in a long time. I absolutely loved the first 2 parts I just wish we could have spent more time in part 3 and expand on that work a little. Despite that minor criticism I am giving it 5 stars it's just so lovely. It's the coming of age story about finding family and finding love. This is such a jumbled review but I stayed up way to late to finish this considering I have to be in class for 8 hours tomorrow.

I was given a copy from Netgalley in exchange for review.

Thank you to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for providing a digital copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I would give this book one hundred stars if I could. We follow Cara at different periods of her life: age eight, the high school years, college, and beyond. We also get glimpses of her life with an alcoholic father and an OCD mother. Bond writes these strong family dynamics flawlessly.

Adam is Cara’s constant. He is there for her through the good and bad. The two friends even make a pact to marry if they are both still single at age twenty-six and a half. Will he be able to help her move forward when Cara’s world shatters?

There was so much foreshadowing in this book, and it certainly made me excited to turn the pages and see how Cara’s story might end. Also, Cara jams out to Dave Matthews Band in the car, so you know I felt a connection to her. I ordered a print copy and might just read it again once it arrives. I can’t wait to pass this one along to my best friend!

Well, I don't know what I expected when I got an ARC of this book. It sounded really interesting and I'm in the medical profession so I was curious.

But I did not expect to be so utterly destroyed and heartbroken by this book (in the best way ever)!
This book was a roller coaster. A lot of times writing doesn't quite dig at my emotions the way a movie with sounds, visual settings, good acting, and real tears (I'm a sympathetic crier y'all) will. That was NOT the case with the writing in this book. It has been a long time since I've read a book that so deeply touched my emotions. I cried MULTIPLE times.

From beginning to end, I absolutely adored reading this book and connecting with the characters. It has a bit of a slow start but it picks up and takes you on the wildest roller coaster of emotions. The use of poetry in this book is so impactful, and that's coming from someone who knows nothing about poetry. I have never been able to appreciate poetry as much as I did while reading this.

I connected with these characters so much and my heart was broken, patched up and broken again. It shattered when I read the ending and learned that the author wrote this based on real-life people.

It did take me a while to read but that's only because I had some other galleys and buddy reads that I was working on and I'm in grad school so I got super busy. But I could have read this in a day if I had the time.

Overall, I loved this book. I am emotionally exhausted and heartbroken but I loved every minute of it. Such a good read!

This is a great coming of age story that shows that those that seem to have perfect lives probably do not. The relationship of Cara and Adam was beautifully written and her journey to dealing with the dark secrets in her house was written realistically.

"Lets not worry about each other's yesterdays or tomorrows. Lets get to know each others todays ."

Cara lives adjacent to her best friend Adam. They share stories every night through their windows.

Cara's house isn't the typical happy family it seems to look from outside. Her father is an alcoholic who passes out each night as soon as he reaches home. Her mother spends her complete life trying to make the family look perfect on the outside, so much that she forgets even the basic needs of her daughter like food.

Cara needs Adam for an escape from her family.They spend each moment of their life together until high school where Adam joins the football team and starts to hangout with the "cool" people.

But one fine day something happens which changes Adam and Cara's life completely. This was a pretty unexpected twist at-least for me. But then this is what made me much more interested in the otherwise pretty straight forward teenage story.

"If your life were a sentence this incident isn't a period. Its a dash or a comma. Make sure you finish the sentence."

A sincere thank you to the publisher, author and Netgalley for providing me with an ebook copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

This is not my usual genre,  however I wanted to take the opportunity to read something from outside my norm. And I am glad I did!! Thank you for  opening up my mind to something totally different. Characters were so well developed that I felt as though I knew them. I love when a book draws you into the story and it feels like you are living it with them.