Breaking Pointe

by Lani Woodland

Lily Madison has had a horrible year. Her parents died, she had to give up ballet, and her ex is pretending their break up never happened. Then one night her ex’s obsession with her escalates into a real threat. Luckily she receives a scholarship to a prestigious dance school in another state. She hopes it will be the fresh start she needs. Lily’s new life seems like a dream. She’s back in dance, making good friends, and enjoys her encounters with Liam, a sinfully handsome guitar player. But accidents keep happening around Lily and her ex won’t leave her alone. Lily starts to wonder if her new school was far enough away to escape the dangers of her old life.

Genres: Young Adult Contemporary

275 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2015

About the author

I became an avid reader in elementary school, when I first discovered the Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley Twins series. In sixth grade, I began writing plays and recruiting (with force when necessary) my friends to act them out. Most of these early works were inspired by She-Ra, the epitome of girl power to my young self.

I have a hard time enjoying any book without at least a little romance in it. I live in Southern California with my husband, our two children and a large collection of board games. I have worked as a spot-welder, babysitter, janitor, photographer, gymnastics coach, and movie extra. I enjoy bonfires at the beach, hole-in-the-wall restaurants, speed talking, chocolate as a cure-all, and the word "precisely."

I'm the author of Breaking Pointe, Stronger, THE YARA SILVA TRILOGY, including: Intrinsical, Indelible, and Inevitable, and Out of Bounds, the third book in the Pom Pom Periodicals series. With Erica Cameron I'm the co-author of the Laguna Tides series, starting with Taken By Chance. I also co-wrote the pirate adventure Pieces of Jade, books one and two of The Pom Pom Periodicals (That’s The Spirit, Give Me A C) and two short stories in Enchanted: Love Stories of the Paranormal with Melonie Piper.

Reviews

[Veray · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love how Lani writes her characters. They are real and believable to me. The ballet and dancing was fun to read about and also the music. Liam was such a sweet heart, but he really messed up a few times trying to do the write thing. Lily was insecure, but not too much. She had just been through too much and had lost her balance in live. It was good to see her healing and trying to return to the real world. The stalking stuff was scary and made me feel rather paranoid as I was reading it. I read it as fast as I could because I had to know who was doing all that bad stuff and I think I guessed it right, but only right before it was revealed. Then things were better until they got bad again. What an ending. Thanks for a great read!

[Memory · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the suspense in this book! It kept me coming back for more and it kept me awake far later than I should have been. :)

[Morgan Shamy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely ADORED this book. As a dancer, I slipped into the world easily and and was immersed within pages. I felt for the main character and cared about her… the setting was believable and so much fun, and was hooked with the mystery and love the interest. Fantastic tension. Relationships were awesome. Not predictable--I found myself surprised in a good way with where the author took the story. And this story is definitely for everyone, not just dancers--highly recommend!!!

[⚜️XAR the Bookwyrm · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a bit of a 2.5 star read, but on debate on how to round it, I wound up going with rounding down, because it just wasn't up to a 3 star standard for me. The book was very angsty, and while it could be classified as YA, it was over the top angsty for that genre too. The stalker plot was overblown and didn't feel as suspenseful as it should have been. Lily and Liam had too much "on again, off again" and deception to actually feel like a real romantic couple, and I couldn't bring myself to care about the secondary characters, because it was hard to keep track of who was who. While this was a short book, I didn't enjoy it much.

[Kathy * Bookworm Nation · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it.

I think I would have liked it more if it had been a NA (new adult) novel. It took me awhile to realize the characters were only 16/17 and not college aged. Maybe because it opens in a dance club and I just assumed they were older...

Lily is still grieving the loss of her parents and trying to figure out how to get her life back in order. She needs to get a fresh start and get away from her ex, who is quickly becoming a stalker. I thought Nolan's character was underused and for the most part, wasn't that scary/threatening. His texts were pretty harmless and when you think about how he is only 16 and missing his girlfriend they don't seem that bad. Don't get me wrong, stalkers can definitely be young and he would fall into that category, I just personally thought or was expecting something more menacing maybe. She is ecstatic when she is accepted into a very prestigious dance school. The boarding school becomes home for Lily and she quickly makes friends and starts to get into ballet again, something she hasn't done since loosing her parents. I think if you enjoy dancing you'll really enjoy this part of the story.

She also meets Liam, the drummer of a rising rock band. He keeps popping up and quickly a friendship forms. She'd like more, but his super hot girlfriend is in the way. Okay, here is another reason I thought this should be NA Liam's character is almost 18, yet his band is growing in popularity, so much so that he even performs for some function for the senator. He also is super-smart and created a Facebook type website that is crazy popular (making him really rich). Oh, and he inherited his grandfathers foundation and runs it. And he does all this while bouncing around from high school to high school and crashing at his brothers house. And is seventeen. If he is so rich, why not buy your own place? I just think if Lily and Liam had both been in college some of these things would have been easier for me to accept. Conveniently there are like zero parents around and since they live in campus housing, it just felt more like a college environment than a high school one. Maybe it was just me.

There is a bit of a mystery (although I had it figured out WAY too early). It did keep me entertained and there were some nice moments and it was fun seeing Lily grow and come back to life. Her relationship with Liam was interesting and there were times I was wondering what was going on. Which was kind of nice, I liked not knowing. Overall, it was enjoyable and I liked it enough that I'd want to read the next book.

Content
Romance: Clean
Language: None-mild, can't remember any
Violence: Mild

Source: Kindle Unlimited

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

a good story, well written, interesting characters

A lot of YA books are overly simplistic or try much too hardy to be 'current', including using so much regional teen slang that they're painfully dated.

Breaking Pointe isn't like that. The romance is a bit too fast, and the guy could be seen as invading the girl's privacy by reading her diaries, but his explanation for why he did it holds up, and she lets go of any offense for good reasons. Liam and Lily in some ways switched the usual gender roles--he falls for her first while she's trying to keep a level head; she tries hard to behave honorably, while he is less than honest with her, which gets them both hurt. The difference in their roles helped make this book different and better than a lot of YA. I'm very sick of the love-struck drooling girl trying all kinds of stupid questionable tricks to catch the gorgeous guy's attention.

I liked the parts about dance and Lily's feelings about it. Those felt real--what didn't was reading that Lily transferred into private school as a junior, found out in the first few days that she was way behind everyone else academically, but somehow her need to catch up on academics never got mentioned again. The rest of the book, she had time to rehearse all evening and go out on weekends, but never seemed to spend any extra time studying. I get the author cared most about the dance parts, but the story needs to stay in real life too.

I'll try not to make this a spoiler: The original stalker subplot was fine, but making it worse the way Woodland did felt like too much. One or the other type of incident happening, okay, but not both and certainly not together.

All in all it was a read in one sitting book, and I look forward to picking up some of her other books.

[Jessie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wasn't going to pick this up, because shirtless model on the cover usually screams "trashy romance", but after reading three other books by Lani Woodland I knew that I could trust her content. That saying about judging a book by its cover was proven true once again...

Lily's parents died 5 months ago, an her ex-boyfriend won't believe that they've broken up. The police don't take her complaints of stalking seriously because he's not threatening her in any way. Then on New Year's Eve, Nolan tries to drug her drink. When someone intervenes, he knocks over the drink and the police have no evidence to go on. Lily is afraid and knows she needs to get away from him. At just the right moment she's offered a scholarship to a performing arts school. She can start dancing again, and get away from Nolan.

There was suspense, and a sweet romance (not with the stalker, but a cute musician), and I loved the setting at the performing arts school. It made me wish that I could dance.

Content: clean (some kissing)

[Ellen Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was amazing. The plot moved fluently and had so many crazy thrilling turns you don't see coming. This is a must read book that will have you pouring over its amazing pages!

[Nahe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. A clean easy read with interesting characters. Of course I fell in love with Liam the moment he was introduced. Can't wait to read more!