Learning to Breathe Again: A Novel, Book One of the Work of Becoming Trilogy by Tonya Cam, author with Lily Redfield, narrator

Rating: 5 star rating

Learning to Breathe Again by Tonya Cam is a beautiful, heart wrenching piece of historical fiction. The story follows Mary Simons, a grieving young mother in 1933 Miami whose world is shattered after losing her baby. She spent months recording respiration rates on medical charts instead of baby milestones, and the heartbreak is palpable.

Then there’s Elena Wagner, a woman from New York, who hides behind beautiful silk dresses and an adoring husband, Arthur, trying to run from the painful memories of nursing her late mother and sister. When an unplanned pregnancy threatens to drag Elena back into that caregiver role, she is terrified.

A chance encounter at the Chicago World’s Fair brings Mary and Elena together. But their bond truly cements when economic desperation forces Mary’s husband, Frank, and Elena's husband, Arthur, to take work in the grueling sugarcane fields of Clewiston, Florida. Mary has difficulty living around the oppressive heat and the smoke of the cane burns, due to her bad asthma attacks. So this is part of the ending of the story.

I listened to the audiobook edition narrated by Lily Redfield, and her performance brought so much raw emotion to their struggles. The ending doesn't wrap everything up perfectly, but it provides a satisfying sense of emotional survival and closure. It highlights the saving grace of female friendship and sets up the next book in The Work of Becoming Trilogy. You absolutely need to add this to your TBR list.

Thank you, NetGalley, Hammock Oak Publishing, and the author Tonya Cam and Lily Redfield, narrator for the book review consideration. All opinions are my own.

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