Reviewed by Carissa
TITLE: Unbreak My Heart
AUTHOR: K-lee Klein
PUBLISHER: Amber Allure
LENGTH: 284 pages
BLURB: Brett Taylor has been doing just fine living in his little world of grief and pain for the past three years—thank you very much. Losing someone special is life changing, and Brett doesn’t understand why everyone and their damn dog thinks they can get all up in his business about moving on. He’s accepted his job going from musician to rancher without relying on anyone else’s opinion, and he doesn’t need some city kid coming into his life to break the habits he’s been practicing—grief, isolation, and a whole lot of Jack Daniels.
JT Campbell was on a quest to escape his old life, and to figure out who he is and where he belonged as he moved from one meaningless job to the next. He wasn’t looking to save anyone, let alone a secretive, hotter-than-hell rancher who wore his heart on his sleeve. He likes working for Brett, but it’s been made perfectly clear that any relationship other than professional will never see the light of day.
But when JT’s lust turns to love, and he gives in to his desire to find out what makes Brett tick, will his patience and support result in Brett lowering the walls he’s built-up enough so JT can unbreak his heart?
REVIEW:
“The bed’s too big
And my heart’s too small
My mind’s gone south
Someone just let me fall
Ain’t no sense in denying
How little I’ve become.”
Brett just wanted Walt. And since he could no longer have him, he’s going to settle for some warm Jack and bittersweet words on an old yellow pad of paper. Three years wasn’t enough time to say goodbye, but everyone around him seemed to think that it was more than enough time to not bleed out every time he remembered just what he wanted. What he had. And what he lost.
“I had the world at my fingertips
The selfish wantings of all men
I thought myself immortal
Stupidly fearless and content
Unaware my body needed more
Than silly objects and praise.”
JT Campbell wanted a place to stop. To stop running from a past of pointless one-upmanship of money and status. To stop having meaningless flings with pretty, pampered rich-boys who pretended at being men. But when an unexpected roadside rescue from Brett’s mom ends with him getting a new job and a place to crash, JT had a new thing to stop. Stop looking at his new boss’s ass. Stop hoarding evening conversations that turn intimate even when all JT wanted to do was stop. Stop falling in love with a man who couldn’t stop loving his dead partner.
“And I left my heart behind
Thanklessly wasted in a starstruck haze
Now I’m reaping the benefits
Of all that I gave up
An empty house and lonely mind
And your old pick-up truck.”
But loving Walt couldn’t stop Brett from looking. And wanting to keep his heart safe wasn’t enough to prevent JT from falling. When Brett couldn’t stop, and JT fell into Brett’s arms and bed, there was every chance that they’d made the worse decision in the world. JT could lose his new home. Brett could lose his fragile hold on sanity–and sobriety. But sometimes when the heart wants, nothing you can do can stop the mad rush into love.
“This is the part where you scold me
Tell me to grow up and be a man
Take my face between your fingers
And show me who I really am.”
Unbreak My Heart, was in the simplest terms, lovely. Heartbreaking. Beautiful. Simply a pleasure to read. I was told it was chalked full of angst and that the interfering mother would put me off. And others are certainly free to feel however they want about the book–my attempts at world domination have yet to yield me the power to force everyone to see the world through my eyes, sadly. But to me there wasn’t angst, just heart twisting emotion. JT’s sweet humor kept the story from slipping into the morose, even when Brett was doing his best to slip into that bottle and out of the world. Ray kept the two reluctant lovers from chronic stupidity. And Millie? Well she made sure that Brett could see past the ache in his heart to the new heart being offered to him by JT. I loved how they all forced, if lovingly, Brett out of his self-set prison of liquor and broken words that never leave the page to fix the world that he wants to ignore. Sometimes even the most reluctant man needs a little push to help see the forest that all those tattered yellow pages came from.
“Maybe you were too good for me
Maybe you were too kind
Maybe I loved you too hard
Maybe our love was blind.”
The love story of Brett and JT was a crazy ride from whatever-you-do-don’t-look-at-his-ass to I-just-found-home. Neither man wanted to fall for the other, for their own reasons, but they couldn’t reason with their stupid hearts. Hearts seem to be the deafest parts of us sometimes. But when they broke free of their good intentions, the chemistry between them didn’t simmer–it boiled over. And they got burned. Several times. Once to Brett’s past. Another to JT’s stupidity. But even after the fights are over, and the dust settles, they can’t leave each other alone. Even if part of me believes that maybe JT should have kept walking after that last fight and the “incident.” While I believe Brett meant it when he apologized, I have a hard time forgiving that. And I think Brett is going have to work his way back into JT’s trust. Or, at least I think he should. I can’t help being glad that that they choose what they did though. Romance and reason are just going to have to duke it out in my head for a while on that one.
“But this is where I want you to hold me
Tell me to grow up and be a man
Take my face between your fingers
And tell me you love me as I am.”
Not everything was perfect about this book. I did have a trouble getting used to the southern dialect and slang. The southern accent has never been one of my favorites–but, like JT, I know I should probably not associate everyone in the south with redneck tendencies. I’m not a liberal, sushi-eating hippie that spends half of my life on a surfboard (except I’m kind of a liberal, sushi-eating geek, who has watched Jaws one too many times, so…) so I should probably avoid stereotyping a great swath of America just because I dislike the weather and some of the politics. But after a few chapters I got used to the language and it began to grow on me. It is not often that I come across characters that read as more than generic-white-dude-in-generic-location so the differences began to become a great plus as I went along. Brett became more real. And I love that he still sticks out to me in my head. Even when I’m still trying to figure out if I forgive him for that whole fight thing.
“This is the part
The part where I bleed
The part where I miss you
The part where I need.”
I wish I could truly encapsulate how much I enjoyed this book. The letters that Brett wrote Walt made me want to cry, as well as go out and buy some songs by Brett Black (and I don’t even like Country music). The families surrounding Brett and JT reminded me just how much I love mine, and how sometimes family drives you crazy and you just have to hold on till the urge to kill passes. Love here was neither simple nor light. And it was worth watching them fight their way to the end. For all my misgivings, I loved this book. I recommend you pick up a copy–and not just because the cover is simply perfect. Read when you need a love that doesn’t come easy, or when you find yourself at the bottom of the barrel, or bottle, and all you can think is:
“I need you to be here
So you can give me a start
To show me just how
To unbreak my heart.”
Carissa rates it – 
BUY LINKS: Amber Allure :: Amazon
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Carissa is one of the official reviewers on The Blog of Sid Love.
To read all her reviews, click the link: CARISSA’S REVIEWS
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