What Unbreakable Looks Like

What Unbreakable Looks Like is a novel unafraid to explore the topic of human trafficking and its impacts on victims. 

Poppy…Alexa…Lex…was trafficked. But now she’s free. Except she can’t help thinking about whether it would be easier to go back. Whether she’s too much of a burden on her aunt and uncle who’ve taken her in. And whether she’ll ever be able to have real, good relationships…or whether she’s too damaged, too broken, to live such a normal life. 

This story is anything but subtle, which means it doesn’t talk down to readers about its many dark and troubling themes and doesn’t shy away from the darker parts of Alexa’s character that she is trying to change. 

As the book goes on, the story becomes not only about trafficking, but about other types of trauma as well, and focuses largely on the huge amount of work people have to put in after difficult events are over so that they can restore normalcy to their lives. Unlike many other novels, Unbreakable is more about life after trauma and what that looks like, rather than trauma itself.

However, the discussions and awareness that this book attempts to showcase, though important, are undercut by amateur writing.

Lacking thoroughly in descriptions, studded with jarring scene-jumps from paragraph to paragraph (which will hopefully be fixed by page breaks before publication), and fraught with notes of unrealistic dialogue and characterization, the story is much less engaging than it should be. The lack of subtlety, although it gives a nice bluntness to the topic, is overmuch in the too matter-of-fact style of narration.

Admittedly, the second half of the novel gets much better as we finally start to see flashbacks, which better express Alexa’s trauma and the changes to her lifestyle, and we start seeing some character descriptions so that we can actually picture and remember who people are. Alexa’s incessantly hypocritical narration ( I would never let her in. But I wanted to be close to her so badly!) in every other paragraph lessens considerably as well, which is an incredible relief. 

But it all feels like too little too late, and by the time I felt that it was actually possible to feel invested in the characters, I couldn’t. Alexa had already established herself as a somewhat unrealistic, and unlikeable character. And that’s only cemented as the romance rolls along, which ends up taking the focus of the story even more so away from the legal and mental health implications of human trafficking to center around the relationship instead. This throws into the mix a heavy dose of the YA love-saves-all trope, as well as some scars-and-trauma-are-sexy type motifs. 

I rated What Unbreakable Looks Like 2 out of 5 stars. However, fans of Coral may like this.

Thank you to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for an early copy in exchange for an honest review.