Breathe - M's Review

Breathe by Sarah Crossan

Breathe is the company who sells expensive oxygen to those who live inside the Pod. Outside the Pod, there is no longer any oxygen or life. Growing plants inside the Pod is not allowed. Residents in the Pod are either tattoo-lobed Premiums with enough money to afford lots of oxygen so that they can exercise and so on. On the otherhand, Auxiliaries have little money and aren’t allowed to exercise because they’ll consume too much oxygen. So while there’s life inside the Pod, it’s stratified and therefore a limited life for many. But there’s a Resistance movement in the Pod. Outside, well who really knows? In Breathe, the main characters are about to find out. 

Breathe by Sarah Crossan

The dystopian-eco concept for Breathe's plot intrigued me. The promising storyline also has similarities with Malorie Blackman’s Noughts and Crosses, Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and Lois Lowry’s The Giver.

In Breathe, the story is told from three characters' points of view: Bea the clever Auxiliary; Quinn the Premium who is her best friend (but she'd love him to be more); and green-eyed Resistance beauty, Alina. I’m a sucker for multiple narratives so this pleased me. Bea and Quinn were very likeable characters but ,for me, there was something missing with Alina.  Overall, I was disappointed because I felt the romance side of things overshadowed real depth in the plot. A lot of the plot just fits together too easily and there’s quite a bit that isn’t believable enough for me.

This is a novel that might appeal to readers who are romance fans  as there is a lot of unrequited teen love in this story.  Although there is violence in the novel, it is not graphic and there is less of it than in many other teen dystopian novels. The eco, consumerism and equalities messages in the novel might also appeal to some readers.  Just imagine having to pay for your oxygen.

This is also a quick read and there’s enough in the plot to keep many readers interested enough to keep turning the pages right through to the end. It might appeal to confident tween readers too.

Breathe is the first novel in a planned trilogy.

Publication details:

Bloomsbury, October 2012, London, paperback

This copy: uncorrected proof received for review from the publishers