Reviewed by Carissa

 

TITLE:  The Art of Breathing

SERIES:  Bear, Otter, and the Kid #3

AUTHOR:  TJ Klune

PUBLISHER:  Dreamspinner Press

LENGTH:  350 pages

BLURB:  

Tyson Thompson graduated high school at sixteen and left the town of Seafare, Oregon, bound for what he assumed would be bigger and better things. He soon found out the real world has teeth, and he returns to the coast with four years of failure, addiction, and a diagnosis of panic disorder trailing behind him. His brother, Bear, and his brother’s husband, Otter, believe coming home is exactly what Tyson needs to find himself again. Surrounded by family in the Green Monstrosity, Tyson attempts to put the pieces of his broken life back together.

But shortly after he arrives home, Tyson comes face to face with inevitability in the form of his childhood friend and first love, Dominic Miller, who he hasn’t seen since the day he left Seafare. As their paths cross, old wounds reopen, new secrets are revealed, and Tyson discovers there is more to his own story than he was told all those years ago.

In a sea of familiar faces, new friends, and the memories of a mother’s devastating choice, Tyson will learn that in order to have any hope for a future, he must fight the ghosts of his past.

REVIEW:  

One of the benefits of reading this series the way I did, was that I didn’t have to wait several years in between books two and three.  Knowing that I could get my hands on this third book, soon after finishing Who We Are, meant I didn’t have to spend a lot of time wandering around book-purgatory, waiting and wondering what would happen next.  But (and there always is a but, isn’t there?) I was still worried.  A lot had happened in the author’s life in the last year (some good, some bad) and well…I worried that the book would not measure up to my hopes or expectations.  I might have also been a tad hesitant to return to the land of Wookiee tears–as any slightly emotionally-unstable person might.

In the end, though, there was nothing for it.  I would just have to hold my breath and hope.

GBOATKA Part Three

Wherein Our Reviewer Holds Her Breath

Tyson Thompson (formerly Tyson McKenna (formerly the Kid)) was going to take over the world.  No one who ever knew him, doubted it for a second.  He was going on to brighter, grander things.  He had his brother Bear, his brother-father Otter, and a whole bunch of pseudo aunts, uncles, nephews, and whosit-whatsits to back him up.  And he had Dominic Miller–Dom–Ty’s best friend, secret crush, and just about everything in between.  Tyson Thompson–also known as the ‘Kid’–was going to take over the world, and do it at the ripe ol’ age of 16.

Until he realized that he was in love with his best friend.  Until he lost himself amidst the earthquakes.  Until he chased a high and lost focus of everything he wanted–landing himself back in Seafare with a bunch of shattered dreams, and a panic disorder that made his childhood anxieties seem mild in comparison.

After four years of highs (not all of them legal) and lows, a summer back ‘home’ could be everything he needs to find himself again.  But the seaside isn’t exactly known for its lack of waves, and Ty might just find himself drowning right when he was starting to see solid ground.

I find it strange how at home I am with these characters.  How every time I pick up their stories I find myself sinking into them like an old chair.  Not shiny-new, and a little rough around the edges, but it fits you so perfectly that when you look up, five hours later, you barely noticed the world moving around you.  They are like a cup of tea on a rainy day.  They are comfortable.  Which is odd since tea doesn’t usually require me to lug around a pack of tissues so that my glasses don’t get mucked up with tear stains.  (But, then again, I usually buy the cheap stuff.  Maybe if I went all out, I’d end up crying great tea tears every time I had a cuppa.)

After spending two books palling around in Bear’s head, I didn’t know what to expect out of our Kid (who really isn’t a kid anymore).  I was comfortable with Bear, with his own special brand of neurosis, so even though I had adored Ty in both of the previous books, the switch of MCs was a little daunting.  But I wanted Ty’s story–I needed it–so there really wasn’t much I could do but trust that Klune could sell me Ty, as he did with Bear.

And boy did he.

Tyson is written so very well in this book. I was shocked how easily it transitioned from Kid as a child to young teen, and from there to Ty, the semi-grown-up mess that we spend a majority of the book with.  Each portion of his story felt so unique to that age, that when it moved from one to the other I had no problem imaging the changes in the character. I can’t pinpoint how Klune did it, but the change was subtle enough that it wasn’t obvious, but you knew it happened nonetheless.  Kid become Ty before your eyes, and you don’t even blink.  Not that Ty was ever a normal kid, but I loved how easily the shifts happened, how in the story you were, that it simply was and you didn’t need it explained to you.

And if I loved Kid as a kid, then I adored him as the mess of an adult that he became here.  It hurt, I will not deny it (I think the hallway scene shall be permanently affixed in my brain as ‘the saddest most heartbreaking shit that ever happened in the history of the world’).  You come out of Who We Are so convinced that everything is going to be happily-ever-after.  You are practically demanding it.  But as with all things Klune, life is never that easy.  And every struggle needs to be a fucking struggle because real life sometimes really enjoys kicking you in the balls.  With steel-toed boots.  And Klune, life, love, and the kitchen sink have it out for our Ty, in this book.  Not on purpose (well…you never know with TJ Klune), but simply because you don’t get to change the world without making a little mess along the way.

So Ty loses the plot for a bit, finds it again, accidently walks off a cliff (or two), and generally makes a mess of his (and Dom’s) life.  And if you are wondering what that wiggling feeling is, against the inside of your ribs…that is your heart trying to hide.  Because it hurts.  It fucking hurts watching the crazy, brilliant, sarcastic Kid lose himself so completely.

But (see, always a but)…he is still the Kid you loved.  He is still funny.  You still laugh so much you think you have been infected with some type of mutant hyena virus (is that a thing? ‘cause if that is a thing then I am going freak the shit out).  You are still so proud of what he accomplishes (which is odd because A) you don’t know him and B) he is a fictional character)–even though you sometimes (a lot of the times) want to shake him.  Because he is like Bear: The Sequel.  In all the good, bad, and complicated ways.

Ok, he kinda skipped over the whole ‘Oh, God, I’m gay! I can’t be gay! I don’t want to be gay! But I really want to kiss the fuck out of Otter (not that Ty wants to kiss Otter–cause ewwww) so fuck I must be gay.’ crisis.  Thanks be to the gay gods.  But if a penchant for drowning in their own thoughts runs in the family, so does apparently falling for older studs.  Not that I blame them.  You don’t want to know what I’d do to be the filling in a Dom/Otter sandwich…which come to think of it, was waaayyy too much information for you guys to know so we can just forget that I ever said that, ok? (You guys are the best!)

While I am not going to spoil the (very many) surprises in this book, I will say that I didn’t see most of them coming.  And boy do they pack a punch.  Be they good or bad, they all grip you by your gut and pull till you want to cry mercy.  And then you go and flip the page and it happens all over again. And because this book is so well written you don’t really get how tightly the story is winding you, till you find yourself ten pages from the end of the book, crying (while smiling, I might add) over something that should not, in all common sense, make you cry.  But you feel everything so much, too much, and even on that last page, in those last few words, you are gripping tightly to your chair because you just don’t know how they will go on.  How you will go on, without them.

But you have to.  You have to turn that final page.  You have to breathe out.  You have to say goodbye–just for now, just once more.  And it is ok, because you’ll be back.  You’ll see them again.  You’ll laugh with them and cry with them again.  You’ll find your way back home.

It’s inevitable.

RATING:  

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