Omg I love this book was my first of the author and won't be my last .... I fell instantly in love with Audra and Jake ...I love they had a connection but at first they both denied it ....love how you felt all the emotions that the characters was feeling and how they got past thru all their challenge....I hope we get to read more of these characters....hurry buy this book you won't regret
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“So life is about the in-between. Between the beginning and the end, between the past and the future. It’s about the now.”

What a stunning, emotional, and beautiful novel!!!! It’s literally the best debut novel I have ever read! I was quite intrigued when I read the synopsis, but nothing could have prepared me for what I read!

Audra wasn’t supposed to be enjoying her first year of college until she received a miracle…a new heart. Yet, someone else lost their life for her to live hers, and she is more than grateful for that. She wants to honor the young girl, Emily, who gave her a second chance at life. She enlists the help of Emily’s brother, Jake, to help her do that. From the moment she meets Jake, I know as well as she does that her life will forever be changed.

I can’t say how very much I loved Jake and Audra! Both are extremely complex characters. I knew Audra as the story is told from her POV, but I felt like I was discovering Jake and his secrets just like she was. Both are filled with pain and guilt over Emily but for very different reasons. She feels guilty because she has Emily’s heart, and Emily is gone. Of course, Jake misses his sister, but there are also secrets concerning her death that continue to hold him captive. Audra wants so much to take his pain away and to make her life mean something because of Emily’s gift. Jake trusts no one, but I could tell he very much wanted to trust Audra. There was no doubt in my mind that Jake wanted to take that leap with Audra, and I kept praying he would just let go and do it! In my opinion Emily was just as much a character as Audra and Jake. I, like Audra, was able to learn who Emily was. It amazed me how Fydman was able to bring healing through Emily. Audra’s friend, Kat, was an important character as well. She greatly impacted Audra’s life as well. I thought it was a genius move on the writer’s part to use secondary characters in such a powerful way.

As much as I loved the characters, I loved Lindsey Frydman’s actual words….her writing…the symbolism and the deeper meaning of the book. I was in awe with how she took a story filled with pain and turned into something beautiful. Lindsey Frydman gave us one of those rare books that not only grabs your emotions but your very soul! It makes the reader take a moment and look at their lives, and it very may well change the way you look at life. I know it made me take a breath and ponder how I look at my life. It’s one of the best books I have ever read!!!!

“My heart increased its manic cadence, and I was so never grateful to feel it. I placed my hand on Jake’s chest and felt his pulse beat in time with mine, thinking maybe the point of life wasn’t to live—maybe the point was to love.”

****Reviewed on behalf of Devilishly Delicious Book Reviews****

This was one of those book that bring on all the feelings. I knew from reading the synopsis that I was going to really enjoy it, and by the time I got deep into it I was already hating myself for picking a book I KNEW would make me cry. Which it did.



This is a book about healing.

A book about seeing the potential for your future and going for it.

About living for the day and finding the meaning in the little things.

It was a story about overcoming your past even if you don't get the answers you are looking for. You only have to long to live, so live.

also, it was a book about moving past grief. That was the hardest part of reading it. In this book you as a reader grieve for the characters loss and it creates that much more of an impact in reading.

I loved it.

I feel in love as they did and in the end I got the ending I was hoping for. Fantastic.

I started out really enjoying Audra and the overall voice of the story, though I was a bit disappointed at not getting Jake's perspective on things (with a story that is intended to be about two people who are falling in love with something like one having the other's dead sister's heart, I think that getting both sides just makes sense!). I expected this to be a story with angst over the question of whether Jake could be okay with Audra having his sister's heart, and confusion for both whether their connection was because of the HEART itself (sort of along the lines of the movie "Return to Me").

Neither of those are really much of an issue here though. Instead, it's actually pretty heavy, where Jake is basically a recluse with no friends who loves black & white photography, and Audra would almost be a recluse, except for her very bubbly best friend, Kat. Audra hunts Jake down and asks him to recreate photographs he took for his sister of what his sister called "done-its." They laugh at how silly that term is, but never come up with a better one!

Which really, I think, sums up the overall problem I had with this book: There are so many things brought up that just sort of get brushed aside and eventually forgotten. Things like their project itself, the troubled past that Jake has, suspisions that apparently everyone who was close to Emily (Jake's sister) have about her death... I would get interested in the conclusion to some of these and then realize that they weren't finished. Honestly, it was a bit like the show LOST, where you have a million questions of things that seem really interesting... and are left with more questions at the end with very few answers!

I do also feel that, while the writing was great overall, the characters were also underdeveloped and even a bit shallow. There are illusions to Jake having some dark thoughts that aren't ever explored further. Audra apparently dated after her heart transplant, but that's barely touched on (If she had only one friend from her childhood, how did she date? What happened to the boyfriend she had before??). Audra has no clue what she wants to do with her life, which also means that we don't get to know much more about her than that she loved her parents and her best friend, and she was born with a heart defect that resulted in a transplant at 16. I really wanted the character arcs to be both Jake and Audra going from people not allowing themselves to live, to people who had helped each other to discover themselves more and learn, especially through the "done-its," that life is too short to wallow in the past.

Mostly, I guess I just feel like this was left unfinished. I liked the setups, what I did know about the characters, the setting, the overall plot and the "done-its" aspect - I just finished this wanting more.

If you are looking for a book that is different from what you normally read this is the book you are looking for! Lindsey Frydman grabs your attention with a book filled with a new chance on life, overcoming your fears, love, and heartache.

Audra has a new chance on life. After receiving a new heart she decides to take up her donor's, Emily, "bucket list". To help document her adventure she enlists the help of Emily's brother to take photos of her just like he did for his sister.

Jake is still upset over losing his sister and when Audra contacts him to help her out, his first instinct is to blow her off. He decides to take a chance on her and hears out her idea to recreate Emily's "bucket list".

As Audra and Jake spend more time together, they start to grow closer and secrets begin to test them. Will they be able to hold onto each other while they navigate through issues that both of them might not be ready for? Or will they decide that it's better off to leave things alone and not fight for the truth or each other?

Oh boy - get the tissues out ready when you read this book! It is an emotive, tear jerker and a great read.

Two years ago eighteen year old Audra Madison was the recipient of the heart of seventeen year old Emily Cavanaugh, saving her own life as Emily lost hers. She’s wanted to find out more about the girl who died and enabled her to live so has used the internet to find out more about her. She’s discovered Emily’s tumblr photos, her ‘Done-It’ list, and wants to recreate them. She contacts Jake, the photographer and Emily’s grieving brother, asking him to help her do this. He agrees but the two are obviously wary and Jake is moody, inconsistent in his interactions, brooding and also very talented at both photography and playing the piano. He keeps warning Audra not to get close to him as he’s sure to hurt her . . .

The story is told from Audra’s point of view as she explores her own feelings of survivor’s guilt and her new chance at life. As she strives to discover more about Emily whilst settling into life as a freshman at University with her best friend, Kat, she accidentally also uncovers unexpected information and even more questions. There are other tragic events in the story; it is an emotional roller coaster, an angsty, heart wrenching story with so many twists and turns! I initially thought it was going to be a relatively straight-forward, run-of-the-mill new adult romance but it certainly isn’t. There are light hearted moments but it is the emotional turmoil that makes this story stand out from the rest. When I discovered this is a debut novel, I was amazed - this author is definitely one to watch out for in future!

Thanks to the publisher for enabling me to read a copy of this via NetGalley. This is my honest review.

4 angel stars!!

Since stars had a limited amount of hydrogen – and they needed that stuff to exist – they in turnhad a finite lifetimeof radiance. The way hearts had a finite number of heartbeats.
Never in my book worm life had I ever imagined that I would get to read a book such as this. Its autheticity and uniqueness caught me completely off guard since the first moment I started it. And may be the blurb gave me an idea what I was in for, nothing could prepare me for the greateness that was waiting for me just around the pages.

The Heartbeat Hypothesis is a story about a girl who has made her goal to reenact some memories of the girl whose heart is beating under her chest. But she has to ask the help of the photographer behind the photographic imprinting of those memories. So, Audra and Jake start travelling together his sister’s memory lane which makes them get closer with each other.

If someone would come up to me and said that thia story was based on real facts, I would probably believe him. It is simply so real and raw that I couldn’t help feel that these two characters are actually existing on this planet and this book was a part of their story. Both Audra and Jake are proven to be from the beginning characters with some very complex, but intriguing nonetheless, personalities and ways of thinking and dealing with problems. But as they spend more and more time in each other’s company, which leads to confessing personal truths, the change both are forced under is inevitable.

“Without the middle, being first or last means nothing.” The middle gace the rest its meaning.
What draw me into and made me love even more this amazing story, except the autheticity of it, was that, even thow it seems like a love story, its basic truth and foundation is build on the process each one of us has to go through, the sacrifices we have to make and the loses we have to endure so we can find our true self on the other side of the tunnel. And in the end, what matters the most and what makes our time on this planet worthwhile and special are the things we allow ourselves to feel; things like love, forgiveness, passion, friendship and even some pain which all together are what makes each being different. And Audra and Jake learn how to appreciate them while discovering their inner world and what trully matters.

“All you need is the combination of bright sunlight, suspended droplets of water, and the proper viewing angle, and you get to witness one of nature’s most famous masterpieces.”
My words are completely failing me when it comes to describe the story and my feelings about it. My mind, heart and thoughts are so emotionally charged by the journey of these two characters that it would need quite some time to write everything down and with the correct words. I ususally tend to say that no matter what I or any other reader say about a book, if you don’t experience it yourself you will never be able to grasp its majesty. And this book couldn’t fall more than bull’s eye on that opinion. This multi-layered story and couple put your emotional producer into the test, creating more of acommotion as you go deeper into it and get to witness what really they are made of.

Frydman surprised the hell out of me with this story. Her writing gave it all it got so it could bloom itno this lovely gem of literature. And if you are looking for unique love stories with characters who are raw and real, this is a book you don’t want to pass by. Trust me.

Audra Madison simply wanted to walk in the shoes of Emily Cavanaugh, a free-spirited teenager who died too young. After all, Audra wasn’t supposed to be here.

Thanks to Emily, Audra has a second chance at life. She’s doing all the things that seemed impossible just two years ago: Go to college. Date. Stargaze in the Rocky Mountains. Maybe get a tattoo. You know, live.

Jake Cavanaugh, a photographer with mysterious, brooding gray eyes, agrees to help chronicle her newfound experiences. She makes him laugh, one of the only people who can these days. As they delve into each other’s pasts – and secrets – the closer they become.

But she’s guarded and feels like she can’t trust anyone, including herself.
And he’s struggling with the fact that his beloved sister’s heart beats inside her.

This book was so heart-wrenching for me that I found myself looking back on my life and seeing so many things that I wish I had done differently. It's one of those books that you read and you really think to yourself "How can I be a better person and live my life to the fullest?" I don't want to be an introvert anymore who sits on the sidelines and doesn't interact with people. People see me and they think I'm outgoing but the truth is...I have intense Social Anxiety Disorder and this book for me made me really approach my "illness" head-on because life is short. Time waits for no man. I loved the characters in this book and when a book makes you stop and look at your own life...it's a good book.

Jake is an awesome hero because he's damaged and broken because he lost his sister. Audra has Jake's sister's, heart. This book reminded me of the movie Return to Me with Minnie Driver and OMG, I loved that movie (PICK IT UP!!) Seriously, this book had me crying and while first-person books are really hard for me to read, I'm starting to love them. You will absolutely adore this book from Lindsey! She is on my List of Authors to look out for.

Audra received a heart transplant from a young girl and when she's given the option to know who the donor is, she sends a letter with a request. She would like to complete her "Done it list" on Instagram. She finds out that Jake is on campus with her and chooses to approach him to ask him to complete the list with her. Will he help her? You’ll definitely need some tissues with this book, if not the whole box! In my opinion, she knocked it out of the park with this book.

What you’ll take away from this book is to live every moment like it’s your last because it might be. Live it to the fullest. Love the ones you’re with and tell them that you love them. Don’t let fear be your guide. Make your own list and live it out. I couldn’t recommend this book more!!

I was given a copy of this ARC from the publisher on NetGalley for an honest review. All of the above comments are my express opinions and no one else's.

When I first picked this book up, I thought it would a fluffy, possibly steamy read. That didn't turn out to be the case at all. Don't get me wrong, it starts out more on the light and feel-good side, but quickly I realized that there was more to the story than the premise implies. Audra, our heroine, received a life saving heart transplant two years before and suddenly the world is open to limitless possibilities. She no longer has to live one day at a time, just clinging to hope and a promise of a real future. Unfortunately, it came at the cost of her heart donor Emily's life and the guilt that comes along with that isn't easy to let go of. So she reaches out to Emily's brother Jake with a plan to enlist his help and come to peace with her gift.

Audra and Jake meet and make a plan to re-create his sister's photographs in order for Audra to "walk in her shoes" through her experiences. At first, I was seeing this solely as a healing process for the two of them while they developed feelings for one another. Simple, cut and dry. Well, I discovered that this was heading down a little bit of a darker path. Jake was moody, broody, and not very communicative. There were brief flashes from him, he'd give her a little bit of himself and then retreat all over again. He offers to give her piano lessons, and then eventually stands her up when their feelings start to blur past friendship. There is clearly something in his past that he's hiding, something that he's unwilling to share that's making him feel incapable of offering Audra love.

Audra is crushing hard on him, but their relationship is filled with secrets and complications. I enjoyed her at first, I thought she was a little bit awkward and sweet and her idea to honor Emily was commendable. But later, she started behaving...I don't know what else to call it but immature. First with her peeking at his very private journal and then hiding that fact. On one hand, I understand that he's not exactly being open with why he's keeping his distance, but that was such an invasion. What she discovered was more than a little disturbing, and she just somehow told herself to brush it under the rug as well.

But worse, when he finally does open up to her, she goes behind his back once again and uses the confidence he gave her to start snooping in the mystery surrounding his family.This is where things started to go a little OTT for my taste. I'm not going to go into what occurs after this, but what happens with his family was really out of left field. And I didn't feel as if anything was explained or resolved conclusively. I think the premise was a promising one, and I liked that it led me in a different direction than I anticipated. It was unpredictable. The writing was engaging and the characters dealt with serious life and death issues, some were addressed with delicacy. For example, the unexpected tragic twist with Audra around the middle of the book I really appreciated. Her emotions and reactions felt genuine and were emotionally complex. But when it came to Jake's history, and how that story arc unfolded, that's where it lost me.

I admire this author's writing and I'd definitely give a different book of hers a chance, but I think that all the pieces of this one didn't quite fit right for me. It's hard, because there really was a lot I liked here, just not consistently. If you're looking for a New Adult book with mystery, and a tortured, brooding hero then this could very well be the book for you. There were lighthearted moments, as well as introspective and emotional. I'll be keeping my eye on this author in the future.

The Heartbeat Hypothesis by Lindsey Frydman
4.5 stars!!!

“Our hearts have been friends for a very long time.”

The Heartbeat Hypothesis is the debut book of Lindsey Frydman and what a debut. As soon as I started reading this book I clicked with the story and the voice of the author, I then had to go back and check that this was in fact a debut and that is the biggest compliment. This story just flowed with ease, I was immediately transported into this NA gem and the author held me emotionally captive until the very end. Reading this book was effortless, emotional, captivating and I loved every single second.

“Everything is finite, isn’t it?
“Nothing lasts forever.”

When I have read “transplant” books in the past, more often than not the focus is always on the recipient and you never really hear much about the donor or the donor’ family. More often, never the twain shall meet, but sometimes they do keep in touch and The Heartbeat Hypothesis is not only a celebration of the life of the recipient but also that of the life of the donor. This side of the story was emotional for me, a life captured through pictures and yet I felt like I knew her and that is testament to the author.

“Sometimes grief is the price you pay for love.”

Audra was the lucky recipient of a heart at the expense of a young woman called Emily. Audra had reached out to Emily’s family and they had responded. Because of this she found out that Emily’s brother was at the same University as her and his name was Jake. Audra had also looked for any information regarding Emily, she wanted to know more about the heart that was beating inside her and because of her delving she came across Emily’s Instagram page. Emily’s Instagram was covered in whacky photo’s or random exploits that really brought her bubbly personality to life or were they just a front…a mask? These photos were taken by #MyFavoritePhotographerJake and were named her done-it list.

“Nothing in life is permanent. All of it will eventually disappear…Maybe we’re supposed to know that…accept it, and live our lives differently because of it. Rearrange our priorities based on the finite number of heartbeats we have left.”

Audra decided that she wanted to recreate Emily’s done-it’s as a kind of homage to the woman that had a given her life and it is here that Jake and Audra meet.

“And on bad days, when his aura of sadness blazed like an alarm he couldn’t turn off, I felt like I was doing everything wrong.”

Jake was a conundrum, one minute he was friendly, next he was detached, then he was curious, then he distanced himself. It was like someone was switching a light on and off constantly and you never knew what “Jake” was going to turn up. I was torn between his grief and him being uncomfortable knowing that his sisters heart was beating in the woman in front of him to him just being confused, insecure and hiding something. It was this raw honesty in Jake as a character that made him all the more intriguing. I was desperate to know the man underneath and I loved the way that Lindsey Frydman slowly lets us in.

“I thought I knew what loneliness was…But you can’t know lonely until you’ve lived the opposite.”

This is a story that will tug at every single heart string, from budding friendship to best friends, to grief, to guilt, to learning to move on from the past and embrace a future you never imagined you deserved. A book that has honest, real and relatable characters even if their lives are anything but. Lindsey Frydman delivered an exceptional read as a debut, a little towards the end I felt some plot lines were a little rushed hence the 0.5 deduction, but apart from that, this was a perfect read for me. I loved everything about it.

www.theromancecover.com

Book given in exchange of an honest review on Netgalley.

This was not the book I was expecting, and I don't mean it in a bad way. I was expecting a cute love story, where a girl fell for this sexy photographer (with an amazing back...yes the cover got me), but I got a much deeper story.
Audra's life hasn't been easy,and she now has a second chance, but she still has some heartbreaks in her future.

A girl with a borrowed heart that tries to find meaning in life and unexpectedly she finds it with Jake.

He is broken too and together they find a little place where happiness is possible. But life is not that easy and they have to overcome their problems in order to move forward.

Jake was a peculiar character, full of mystery and unpredictable reactions. Even when we get to know everything about him, he was still unknown in some ways.
It's hard to explain, but I felt like he had so much more to tell, like we had a lot more to explore about his personality.

Overall, a beautiful yet sad story about loss, love, life and death and how everyone is connected. About embracing every moment like it was your last because you never know when it will be.

The heartbeat Hypothesis is such a romantic theory, she saw it as an explanation of why she was given a second chance and a incentive to live her borrowed heartbeats to the max.
I though about it in a different way. I imagined making a choice of living a calm life and not spending your heartbeats too fast and live longer; or experiencing everything you ever wanted and maybe having a shorter but more fulfilled and happy life.

It's a tough choice, most of us live hanging between the balance but there are some who live on either side.

I found this to be a really sweet and honest read. Often I felt like there was something missing from the story, something more I wanted either from the plot or the characters I'm not sure. I had some issues with Audra in the beginning as I felt her voice was a little too immature but it grew as her character did throughout the story. I liked how the plot was handled, it was very well written. I enjoyed the situation with Kate and how it wasn't just a pseudo-serious thing to shake up the plot, she wasn't in the accident and all better. Her death really impacted Audra and her journey throughout the remainder of the story.

Overall an enjoyable read I would recommend.

* Reviewed by CM McCoy for North of Normal Book Reviews

Everything I want in an aching romance!

THE HEARTBEAT HYPOTHESIS is a page-turning New Adult sweet romance by debut author Lindsey Frydman. I've known this book since it was a manuscript, and I instantly fell in love with it!

Jake may or may not help Audra honor the organ donor who gave her a new lease on life. It's a tough call, since he's still grieving his beloved little sister's untimely death...and since his dead sister's heart is now beating inside Audra's chest.

This is an angsty, beautifully painful, push-and-pull love story told in first-person, past tense with an ugly-cry happily(?) ever after. Heart transplant recipient and university freshman Audra takes nothing for granted and is determined to live every heartbeat to its fullest. For starters, she'll tackle her heart donor's Done-It list, a photographic journal chronicling a life lived to the fullest. Enter Jake--a photographer. THE photographer. Also, he's her donor's reclusive, reluctant, bad-boy brother...

There's so much I love about this book! The 3-day lump in my throat was a little painful, but I did enjoy wondering if I was living every one of my heartbeats to the fullest. Also, I updated my bucket list, and instead of simply checking things off, I started a done-it list (it's here--scroll down to the Done-It List). All because of this book.

Audra is a super-likeable, charmingly nerdy university freshman who grows wonderfully through her journey past her expiration date. Jake is the perfectly distant, damaged goods. Frydman writes with a sure hand and an authentic millennial voice. Veteran romance novelists better look out! This debut author puts some big names in romance to shame with this stunning debut.

The romance in this book is sweet. The heartache is real. The cry is ugly.

Fans of Colleen Hoover and Nora Roberts will devour this fresh and emotional romance. This book is appropriate for ages 15 and up.

THE HEARTBEAT HYPOTHESIS earns 5 North of Normal stars!

Certainly a unique story. Good overall writing. Kept me interested.

**I received a copy of Heartbeat Hypothesis from Net Galley and Entangled Publishing in exchange for a voluntary and honest review**
The Heartbeat Hypothesis by Lindsey Frydman is the author's debut novel and after reading this story I have to say that it was a great first novel. It did drag a big in the middle but what novel doesn't?(within reason)I would give the book a 4.8 stars for her first effort Jake did have issues with his parents but having finished the book he turn out to be a well adjusted adult.

What would you do if in order to keep living you needed a heart transplant? Would you want to know who was the donor or approach the donors brother with a request no matter how odd it would be? Audra Madison received a heart transplant from a young girl and when given the option to know who the donor was she decided that she did want to know and sent a letter with a request, she would like to complete the her "Done it list" on Instagram. Audra finds out that her brother is at the same college that she just started attending and approaches Jake with a request to not only finish the list but name it "Cheez its". Will he accept her request? What if she decides to attend a memorial for his sister and it causes not only bad memories for Jake's parents? How would you feel? or better yet would you even want to know the donor or their family? Its a tough question and The Heartbeat Hypothesis deals with the tragedy of the loss of a young life but how Audra and Jake seem to be destined to find each other and help each other grieve and move on with their lives. There is another side story with Audra's best friend, Kat and how it effects her when a death occurs and how she deals with the grief.

Jake Cavanaugh misses his sister terribly and as a junior majoring in Photography he encouraged Emily to do a bucket list of sorts with him taking the photos. When he is contacted by the recipient of her heart, he doesn't know what to think but he goes ahead with the meeting with Audra. Everyone has a skeleton in the closet but its his family who deals with emotions by medicating themselves and he also feels that he somehow let Emily down when he went to college leaving her at home. Little does he know but somehow his sister decides to figure out how to get Audra and Jake together using her "Done it" list. It will take everything he has to redo her list with Audra but it will help both grieve and move on to explore if they can have a relationship with both memories and making new ones for themselves.

You'll need a few tissues for the ending but all in all it was a great debut novel and I look forward to new books by Ms. Frydman.

I won't lie, the cover caught my interest with this book the most. I love photography and I was I excited to see how the author wound that theme into the main plot of this book.

In general The Heartbeat Hypothesis was a good read. It had a steady pace that built slowly and Audra and Jake's friendship was given time to grow and develop. In essence it was a gentle read about two characters coming to terms with past events in their own lives and learning to live with the help of the other.

I will admit I did expect it to be a bit more emotional than I found it to be. For some reason I expected a few tear jerking moments, but there wasn't. I also thought it ended rather abruptly. The book seemed to go off on a tangent and to get back to its original meaning it had to be sped up. While it answered all questions and tied everything together satisfactorily, I would have liked the easy pace to have continued until the end.

Overall, for a debut book it was good. I might have gone in expecting more, but it was an easy read that was more about friendship developing than romance. It was a nice change from the usual romances I read.

Audra Madison knows she's lucky to have gotten a second chance at life when she received Emily Cavanaugh's heart. Now she's determined not to let anything stand in her way of living life to the fullest and creating memories that Emily should have been experiencing. But first she needs someone to chronicle her journey and there's no one she'd rather want by her side than Jake Cavanaugh. He's a photographer and just happens to be Emily's brother. But when secrets from the past start to unravel and Audra finds herself unable to stop from wanting to help Jake discover the truth of what happened to his sister once and for all, will she lose the man she's falling in love with?

I'm not usually one to read New Adult Romance unless I really like the blurb, which I did for this book, so I'm glad I chose to read it as it was a delightful read full of plot twists that made me sympathize with everything Audra goes through that shows her life's too short. Right from the beginning, this story immediately drew me in because of what the heroine is going through and what she wants to do to honor the life of the teenage girl whose heart Audra ended up with to save her life.

The dialogue was intense due to the heroine's back story, believing she was going to die until she received a heart transplant. However, it was plot twists in what happens to Audra and what happens to the heroine's best friend that made this story a real page turner for me, even if they did make me cry. How much does the heroine have to endure before she finds happiness? Will she be able to help Jake overcome his past by finding the truth of what happened to his sister? Yet, there were also some light-hearted moments throughout this story that made me smile. Audra is good for Jake. She's the one person he can completely open up to about his past, which was needed to help him heal.

Both Audra and Jake were fantastic characters, and I loved every moment they conversed whether Jake was being friendly towards the heroine or whether he was being a complete jerk. Audra is strong and brave when it comes to everything she goes through and I liked that she didn't give up on Jake in the moments where he tried to push her away, because he believed he wasn't good enough to be her friend let alone anything else. Indeed, she's a fighter when it comes to her condition, dealing with her grief and showing Jake that he's not alone. That she's there for him, if he'll let her in. While Jake, he's been through so much and losing his sister was hard. He hasn't dealt with his grief and has closed himself off from getting close to people, yet Audra manages to break through his walls. And really, I was cheering for her every step of the way because Jake needed her.

Overall, Ms. Frydman has penned a fantastic read in this debut book, which was filled with plenty of emotion that I felt along with the characters, especially the heroine. The way this story ended had me worried due to Jake's reaction to what Audra does when it comes to trying to find the answers he wants, but I was glad he made things right between them. Besides, what Audra did and what it led to helped him find some peace to his past in the end, which he desperately needed and deserved because of what he believed really happened to his sister. I would recommend The Heartbeat Hypothesis by Lindsey Frydman, if you're looking to read your very first New Adult Romance, or if you enjoy books by authors Sophia Henry, Ophelia London or Jennifer Blackwood.

Reading 'The Heartbeat Hypothesis' is like hearing a new voice that speaks out for teenage angst that's fully captured in its powerful, moody glory. But the subjects that Lindsey Frydman deals with here are difficult, heavy and weighed down with the solemnity of death, life and deception.

Here, high school melodrama is eschewed in favour of melancholic episodes, wistful photographing of lonely landscapes and soulful conversations as teenagers live through and attempt to define how cosmic justice (if I could ever find a better term) has played a role in their lives. It's more than a search for identity now; their questions turn into a search for the reasons for living (deep, angsty stuff) as the beginning chapters made me hold my breath in anticipation of how things would develop between a girl who has been given a new lease of life with the heart of a dead girl and her brother who clearly hadn't yet sorted out his grief.

Both Jake and Audra are damaged in their own ways and while I liked them to begin with, I think I couldn't understand the tangent the story took towards the end. I couldn't understand, least of all, why Audra suddenly poked her nose into Jake's business when she had no right to, leaving us with a so-called mystery that would never be solved. In fact, by the time I was through the last quarter, nothing seemed to fall into place except that after a string of tragedies, Jake and Audra kind of thought they could still belong to each other. Frydman's nuanced writing draws out Audra's emotions perfectly, yet only her motivations and sense of purpose are made clear. On the other hand, Jake himself and his family remained as frustratingly obscure as ever, without any light shed on the events a few years earlier that I'd frankly expected.

Consequently, if I was overwhelmed in the beginning, I finished the story more bewildered than satisfied, wondering if there was some chunk of the book that I'd actually missed.

The greatest gift on earth is that of life, some would say that to be given a second chance at life, a new heart, a new ray of hope for your family is the best thing, but not Audra, not when she knows the young beautiful Emily had to die in order for her to live.

Audra reaches out to Emily's family, and she meets Jake, Emily's brother- the guy who should have "Brood" as his middle name. He's a photographer and she has this crazy idea of doing what Emily did based on the photos on her Tumblr page.

The question on my mind as I kept turning the pages was, "would Jake ever forgive himself for not being there to save his sister?" There is a shift of focus somewhere in the middle when it dawns on the reader that life brings down everyone, and grief consumes everyone in their own way and pace.

The Heartbreak Hypothesis takes you on a journey of love, forgiveness and most of all...healing from grief. It is not an easy journey but as Jake and Audra learn, it is a journey worth making.

I really loved this book.

Honestly, 3 stars is probably not indicative of how much I enjoyed most of this book. I say most because, for a good three quarters of it, I was really liking it. The writing was good, the story was engaging, possibly the only issue I had was how quickly they got together (I feel like a slowburn would have suited this a lot more). And then the last quarter happened.

It started off with the reveal that Jake (the love interest) had been abused as a child, as in beaten to the point where he thought he would die. Implied multiple times this happened. And because we're all about using abuse as an angsty plot point apparently, this is only ever mentioned once. Never past that.

Then, at the same time as he's telling Audra about this, he makes this comment:

"But... what about your mom? I mean, was it just your dad who..."

"My mom couldn't stop him, even if she'd wanted to. Sometimes I don't know if she did want to."

Because if she'd wanted to stop him, wouldn't she have left? For her own sake? To save her children?

"She's mentally ill," he said, sliding off the bench. "But it's never been a good enough excuse for me."


Where to even start with this. The assumption that she didn't want to stop him because she didn't leave? The victim blaming? The implication that her having a mental illness was behind her not leaving? The fact that he thinks she's using that as an excuse not to leave? It's all messy. And I wouldn't have minded it so much if the narrative had called all these things out. But guess what. It does not. This is brought up this single time, and never challenged. Just thinking about this quote makes me angry and I'm starting to wonder if I shouldn't rate this lower.

Tack onto this, the fact that, at the end, his mother burns down their house, killing herself and his father, and that this is painted as her "cracking"? Even messier.

There's also a point where Audra reads Jake's diary (violating his privacy much?) because she's so curious, and the contents of this diary imply that Jake has had or is still having suicidal thoughts. But don't worry (Jake says), he only ever thought about it, only ever planned where he might do it, he never really considered going through with it. And with that, this plot point is just brushed aside.

With all this, I feel like this book had ample opportunity to explore a love interest with a mental illness. The question is, whether I would actually have wanted it to, given how much it demonises his mother who does have one (an unidentified one, too. So don't worry, we aren't just demonising a single mental illness! It's equal opportunity demonisation).

So yeah. On second thoughts, I'm rating down.