Title: Breathe
Author: Kate Bishop
Narrator: Teri Clark Linden
Published: July 2013, Audible Studios
Length: 11 hours, 41 minutes
Source: Personal copy via Audible
Alex thought she had
married the man of her dreams: successful, gorgeous, and delighted by
her small-town charm. When he walks out six months later, proclaiming to
have ‘found himself’ (with the help of a stunning yoga teacher), she
‘finds herself’ alone in an unfamiliar city, vengefully drinking through
his prized wine collection, living on takeout, and refusing to answer
the door. When this fails to cure her broken heart and bruised ego, she
reluctantly allows her new friends to intervene. Slowly, Alex learns to
define success on her own terms; she discovers the secret to love in all
its forms, and the perfect flying crow pose, one breath at a time.
My thoughts: This was a cute, fun book. Being that I practice yoga (somewhat sporadically at the moment), I was familiar with the poses and was able to understand all the yoga terminology, but I could see that if you did not do yoga, this might not be quite as enjoyable.
I found Alex to be quite a quirky, interesting character. She is quite stunned when her husband up and leaves her for his yoga instructor. She’s struggling to move on, but with the help of some friends and yoga, she finds she does have the strength to be her own person. I really enjoyed her journey of finding herself. It’s got a few bumps along the way, as you might imagine, and it’s easy to identify with Alex as she goes through this.
The yoga theme throughout the story had me itching to get back to my own practice. All the classes and poses were almost a tease to me…I take classes at my gym, but I could clearly picture the image of people lining up early to get into a yoga class with a certain teacher. There are a few classes like that at my gym, though I tend to go for the quieter ones!
I’m glad I picked this one up and will be curious to see what comes next from Kate Bishop.
Audio Thoughts: This is the first time I’ve listened to Teri Clark Linden narrate a book and I quite enjoyed listening to her. She had a calming voice, which I equate with yoga, so that was a good fit. I’ll be looking to see what else she has narrated.
Hmm sounds quite interesting, I like ones where the heroine finds herself after being dumped! Yoga – not so much, attended a few classes in my day, but too stiff now!!
I like to contrast of drinking her way through his wine collection and eating takeout with the practice of yoga. Might be an inspirational read for me since I do way to much of the later and not enough yoga.
I love that she drank her way through his wine collection. Sound perfectly reasonable to me 🙂