This is a very touching book co-written by Caroline Laner Breure and Bradley Trevor Greive, based on Caroline’s own tragic yet ultimately uplifting story. Caroline woke up from a coma induced by Traumatic Brain Injury, with large parts of her memory missing. Broken Girl is the story of her joyful life before her tragic accident, how it seemed to unravel in the aftermath, and how she got back her memories and put her broken life together after betrayal and grave illness.

Born in Campo Grande, in Brazil, Caroline moved to Porto Alegre for her higher education. A graduate of civil engineering and business management, she moved to Sydney in Australia, in the hope of a better life. Along the way, she started her own business, making and selling cruelty-free shoes—Brand No Saints.

In Sydney, she met Byron, an immigrant to Australia from South Africa. A romance blossomed between the two, with Caroline eventually moving in with Byron. Her new life with Byron was a heady one, with Caroline not only being befriended by Byron’s friends, but also getting swept along on a new lifestyle, travelling to foreign countries, and holidaying abroad.

On one such trip to Portugal and Span, Byron and Caroline met her mother Jucelia and stepfather Qelbes in Lisbon, where Byron admitted to wanting to marry her and start a family together. But then in Spain, tragedy struck. Caroline was hit by a police car driving at top speed, and suffered traumatic brain injury, lapsing into a coma.

Through the painful hospital stay and the process of rehabilitation, with the added challenge of being stuck in a foreign country with minimal support from the authorities, the challenges imposed by Covid, and betrayal by the man she loved the most, Caroline’s mother stands by her side.



As readers, we are swept along on the budding romance. The first hint of trouble comes at the 18 percent mark when we have brought into the young love story.



The writing is mostly accessible and easy, but also scintillating at places.

Here’s the authors’ description of coma:

A coma has two rooms.

The first is a padded cell in the belly of oblivion.

A dungeon of eternal night for the mind’s eye…



The second room is far stranger.

A place of hunger and shadows.

The walls are porous, and every perforation is a tiny mouth, feeding on fragments of light and noise, sensitive to scent and touch.

Your ancient animal self is chained here, snarling, weeping, vomiting incoherent commands to your body.

Shrieking with pain.



I also enjoyed the observations about cities, people and feelings:

Porto Alegre: home to epic book fairs, rebellions and ghost stories

Sydney is a city of white teeth and suntanned legs.

Australian egalitarianism is found in a frosted glass.

Caroline herself as A ravenous young woman of the world ordering one of everything on the menu.

The holiday season in Australia is A little like Carnaval in Brazil but slightly less public nudity, and almost no one has rhythm.



The cover, depicting a woman’s profile displayed in multiple shards of broken glass, gives us a hint of a life shattered, but also a life painstakingly being put together again.

The writing style takes some getting used to, but the content of this book is extraordinary. Caroline suffers a life-altering traumatic brain injury that creates a world of torment and horror for her and also those around her. It's an awful path no one should have to endure, yet one person's example of so many awful paths we all endure through life. Another interesting element here is Caroline is Brazilian, but living in Australia which creates more difficulty navigating the international processes for travel, healthcare, and emergencies.

Going into this book I wasn’t sure about the format: poetic bursts, rather than full paragraphs and complete pages. I almost decided it wasn’t for me but checked Goodreads reviews and saw the book had been well received. I decided to persevere and past the 10% mark is when I began to settle in and appreciation the style of storytelling.

This is a very unique, heartfelt and important story written by a young woman who suffered a traumatic brain injury. She lays her soul bare and doesn’t spare herself any detail. I found the author’s storytelling to be courageous and honest. Not only was her story completely shocking but the aftermath was nuanced, difficult and fraught with heartbreak and pain.

Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to review this arc.

A story of transformation. A narrative in poetic form. How does one rebuild or come to renew one's life? Thank you to NetGalley for the Arc!

I cried, this book was heartbreaking, but also uplifting. I didn't want to believe that this was a true story that had to be endured, but it made me grateful and thankful for my blessing and was also super inspirational.

BROKEN GIRL by Bradley Taylor Greive and Caroline Laner Bruere
US Pub Date: May 6, 2025 from @andrewsmcmeel Publishing

I’m not typically an ARC reader but decided to start dipping my toes in recently and picked up this memoir that was available to read now on NetGalley, and man am I glad I did!

Broken Girl is a memoir of Caroline Laner Bruere, a twenty-something Brazilian woman who is building her life in Australia. She takes a trip to Europe with her boyfriend in the fall of 2019 and is hit by a police car in Barcelona, crushing her skull and resulting in a traumatic brain injury. The memoir follows her story to regain her strength and memory, relearning how to do everything and navigating medical care and rehabilitation during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This story is an absolutely wild ride, from how Caroline and her family must navigate visas and travel availability during a global pandemic, balancing legal processes with Caroline’s safety and traveling around the globe amidst brain surgeries and rehab. It navigates Caroline’s relationships with her boyfriend, family, and friends - who sticks around for her and supports her recovery, and who she realizes may not be a true friend.

This is a super interesting perspective of an unreliable narrator, which I don’t think as much about in nonfiction/memoirs. As Caroline has to rebuild her memories, we’re stuck as a reader navigating what she knows vs. what she hasn’t yet remembered.

The writing style of this memoir is also very interesting as it’s almost written in fragments, mirroring Caroline’s broken memories. Because of this, combined with her wild story, it’s a very quick read. There were plenty of moments where I wanted to dive in more deeply to the thoughts and feelings of her friends and family, but that would make this a different book… and while I’d gladly read that one too, I think this one still stands really well on its own.

I highly recommend checking this one out! It is already out in Australia and releases in the US on 5/6/25. A solid 4⭐️ from me!