Breathing Underwater

I taught this book during a 14-week student teaching placement in a 12th grade English classroom. It is written at an approachable reading level and opens up numerous opportunities to discuss relationship dynamics and red flags in dating, friendships and family relationships. [SPOILER AHEAD] I continue to appreciate that by the end of the book, the protagonist has begun to 1) not only acknowledge how he abused his girlfriend and how he learned violent behavior from his father 2) but also taken some emotional distance from his father's insults, and ALSO that with all this work, the protagonist does not get his girlfriend back. He grows and learns and she is not obligated to reward that by re-entering a toxic relationship.

I first read this when it first came out. I remember so clearly ranting on LiveJournal about a "Breathing Underwater" fanfiction I'd read a day after finishing the book. The fanfiction was well-written but utterly missed the point. Other people commented on my LJ entry and I felt validated. I'm not sure what it says about my teenage self that I remember my LiveJournal entry more clearly than I do the book. I felt the need to point it out, anyway.
Recently, I re-read the book. Two and a half stars. The writing is vivid and engaging. The teen friendships are believable for the most part. The relationships Nick slowly builds with other men in his program are ones I was grateful took place, even though I remembered clearly how the book would show more end. I kept wanting to set the book down and not finish it, but I bought the book, so I did. It took awhile. I didn't want to have sympathy for an abuser. And I don't. I was annoyed with him a -lot- to say the least. The book was blatantly unrealistic in some parts--he performed certain actions -so- many times after being told he couldn't anymore, and -no one- called the cops. He got thrown out of a bar with only getting yelled at? Unrealistic. He felt sorry for himself a -ton-, where I was encouraging Caitlin to stick to her decisions. He and I share a particular background, though, and -that's- when I felt sympathy for him. My heart downright ached in some parts for a few seconds.
There are two minor character deaths that infuriated me. They happen twenty pages from the end, there's buildup and foreshadowing, yes, but something so shocking needs more page time. I wanted to see Nick grieve. He turned it around to himself, which, whatever sympathy I had? Gone in that moment. -And these are poignant deaths in a YA novel.- They needed to be handled so, so differently than they were. Every time Liana was on the page, I winced at what a horrible stereotype she was. There are others, but she stood out the most in terms of being portrayed horribly. Elsa annoyed me as well, but less and for different reasons. On another note, there is also 'blink and you miss it' disability rep--one of Nick's teachers uses a motorized wheelchair. Nick gets a friendship back that he originally lost, in the last few pages of the book, and this upset me. Sadly, it's very realistic. I'm glad the author did write this book, but it's still two and a half stars for me. show less

I was surprised by how compelling I found this book. Usually the reader is lead through the girl's experiences and whether she gets up the courage to leave or not. But it's rare to find a book about the abuser. What he was thinking, how he justified it, how he can say "I love you" and then hurl abuse at his loved one. I was captivated and moved by Nick's story. While it is hard to give sympathy to him, he doesn't ask for it. He only has to come to terms with what he has done and so does the reader.

full review The Little Bookworm

Reviewed by Me for TeensReadToo.com

I'm going to say this once, and then we'll all forget it--I spent 90% of this book despising the main character, Nick Andreas. Now that it's out of the way, I can go on to say that I loved BREATHING UNDERWATER and even came, in some small way, to understand--if not actually like--Nick's character.

Nick is the kind of boy that you would look at and immediately say "man, that kid has it all." But you would be wrong. Because although he has a dad who makes a ton of money, and lives in a big, fancy house, and drives a shiny red sports car, Nick doesn't have a fairytale life. His father is abusive, both mentally and physically, and he can't even remember his mother. He has a best friend, Tom, who has the show more kind of family he wishes he had himself, and a pretty important A-list group of schoolkids that he hangs out with. His life isn't great, but he manages--until he meets Caitlin, falls in love, and things all fall apart.

BREATHING UNDERWATER starts out with Nick appearing in court in answer to a restraining order that his once girlfriend, Caitlin McCourt, has taken out against him. The judge doesn't fall for Nick's innocent "who me?" act, and sentences him to stay away from Caitlin, both on school grounds and off; to enroll in a six month counseling class dealing with family violence and anger management; and to keep a journal, at least five hundred words per week, detailing what happened to end up where he is, and why.

A lot of the book is told through Nick's journal, and it's through the words he writes that we come to know how abuse is a cycle--and how, many times, the abuser doesn't even realize that he's become like the person he most hates. This is Nick's story, the dawning realization that everything he hates about his father is manifested in his treatment of Caitlin. How did a boy who supposedly has it all end up beating his girlfriend senseless in a parking lot? How can love be so mixed up with the need to control that it leaves you breathless and shaking, angry at the person you love the most?

Alex Flinn has written a very important story, that of family violence and the toll it takes on everyone involved. This is the kind of cycle that needs to be broken, before more young people like Nick repeat the only thing they know. A truly informative book, BREATHING UNDERWATER is not to be missed. show less

I like this book a lot less now than when I first read it. When I first read it, at the age of sixteen or so, I found it excellent and unique. However, having read more about battered women and batterers and the way the "system" treats them (The Stalking of Kristin is a good nonfiction treatment of the subject) I know that group therapy for batterers does not work out so wonderfully as Alex Flinn shows in this book. At the end of this book, Nick is practically cured and so are the other people in his group. But it usually doesn't work that way in real life. I've felt disillusioned towards this book since I found that out.

Narrated by Jon Cryer (yes, that Jon Cryer). Throughout the first disc this came off as a ho-hum standard romance. But when Nick's violent tendencies first appear, I was shocked to realize I had been sympathizing with Nick up to that point. From then on, I was interested in the working mind of this young abuser and seeing his perspective. His perspective and actions are unacceptable, of course. Nick comes around thanks to his anger management class, his introspective journal writing, and the tragedy of Leo. His turnaround seemed to fall in line almost too easily. Still, a valuable book for teens who might be in similar situations, whatever their side.

I thought it was interesting to get into the mind of an abusive boyfriend to see what he was thinking and what caused the seemingly senseless anger. While the book was interesting and the character grew and learned from his mistakes, I just wasn't drawn into the characters enough to truly CARE or to truly feel anything from the book.