Breathing Underwater

Some times you think people don’t understand, that your the only one going though this type of life but in reality your not

Nick Andreas has just been served a restraining order from the person he loves the most in the world. After beating his girlfriend, the sixteen-year-old offender finds himself attending group therapy and writing in a journal about the things he's done. He's the son of an abuser, and it looks like that abuse has surfaced within himself. The question is, can Nick recognize what he's done? More importantly, can he change?The premise is a complex one. Author Alex Flinn set out to write about an abusive relationship from the abuser's point of view. Now how do you go about doing that, exactly? How do you write a story in which the reader has to simultaneously empathize with and abhor the protagonist? The fact of the matter is, Flinn is so adept with her writing skills that she gets away with it. The result is phenomenal. The real strength of this story is the way in which the plot arcs and fools the reader. Nick is hardly a reliable narrator (a fact that becomes painfully clear by the end of the story). Yet when he writes in his journal, he feels unaccountably unable to lie about anything that happened. Flinn slowly brings the plot in the journal, and the story of how Nick lives in the aftermath of his own violence, together by the book's end. She does not compromise her position either. As a woman who served as a lawyer trying domestic violence cases and as a volunteer at the Inn Transition facility for battered women and their kids, she knows from whence she speaks. This isn't an author who is speculating on what violence does to families and friends. She knows. Better still, she can write about it. This isn't a perfect book, I suppose. Some jumps in the plot are implausible. Some characters inconsistent. But what flaws it has only serve to show how strong the story itself is. There is no book on how abusers feel that is as available and accessible to young adults as "Breathing Underwater". You will never regret having read it.

It's hard reading a book where the main character is unlikeable, and Nick is most definitely unlikeable. Although the first person narrative makes it a little easier to accept Nick. Flinn has done a good job of not only showing what an abusive relationship is and how it fuels itself (controlling behavior from insecurities preying on someone elses insecurities, reinforced by an I'll do anything if you don't hurt me again response -- to simplify it way too much). But more impressive, she has shown how someone can grow and start to move on -- convincingly. This isn't a "it's for teens so I have to find a silver lining" type ending. Nick has a long way to go at the end of the book. Everything isn't magically better, but there is a plan.Also Flinn's details, events, background stories of the characters clearly come from her experiences working with people in similar situations. Even her wildest story -- Leo becoming a puppet abuser (i.e. his father is pulling the strings) is very believable, at least to me, because I know someone whose father made him do horrible, abusive things to his sister. Painful, yet healing book to read, about something that both teens and adults need to be aware of.

Film and Broadway actor Jon Cryer gives compelling reading to this candid story of a teenager apparently fated to visit upon others the physical violence he has endured. The setting is sunny, affluent South Florida where to his classmates at Biscayne High School 16-tear-old Nick Andreas appears to have it all. His family is well to do; he's a top athlete and student. The person in his lucky-me armor is his father's hair trigger temper. Caitlin, Nick's girl, is everything he had hoped for - beautiful, gifted and wild about him. That is, until Nick hits her. She seeks a restraining order against him, and he must attend group counseling. He has lost his reputation, his friends, and his girl. Once in counseling Nick is forced to turn an objective eye on fellow abusers and observe not only the pain they have inflicted upon others but the harm they have done to themselves. He must stand alone to learn responsibility and the true meaning of manhood. Gratefully, the author is honest and doesn't make Nick's journey an easy one with a made in Hollywood ending. - Gail Cooke

This is an exceptionally compassionate, yet realistic story of one young man's unconscious choice to follow in his father's footsteps, and the consequences it has on his life. A series of physical outbursts against his girlfriend (not to mention ongoing verbal assault) land Nick in court, and he finds himself without the support of family or friends. With the help of a counseling program, and a journal assignment from the judge, Nick tries to figure out how he became a person he neither likes nor understands. Given its subject matter, any success Breathing Underwater achieves almost assures that controversy will follow. That said, it is my opinion that it should be mandatory reading at Junior High level, and stacks of copies should be donated to crisis centers, women's shelters, and child abuse prevention programs everywhere.

This is the best book on dating violence I've seen to date. Flinn has successfully gotten into the mind of the abuser and peels back the layers of his defense mechansims until he finally has to confront his own responsibility in the chaos his violence has caused. This is a book that both teen girls and boys should read. It never preaches, but the dramatic story speaks for itself and makes its points quite clearly. Every school library should have this one.