Review: Break Me Down by Anna Downes

Break Me Down by Anna Downes
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I was provided a ALC of this book via Netgalley, all opinions are my own.

This was a unique audiobook.  The narration was very well done with a full cast, and this reads more like a play than a novel.  It has mixed media aspects with news reports, voicemails, and podcast episodes mixed in with main character's point of view.  The narration is interactive with each character being voiced by a different narrator which you tend to only see in graphic audiobooks.  This really made the dialogue interactive.  

The author has a background in acting and if you listen to the interview with the cast and the author, they discuss how accurate her portrayal of some of the crazy and inappropriate behavior portrayed in the book really is.  As I was reading I thought some of the things Georgia experienced with Marianna was a bit out there but the cast will tell you they either experience or have colleagues who experienced similar acting classes that were as out there as Marianna's.  They prey not only on your bank account but on your emotions under the guise of making you a better performer and like Marianna cross the line into abusive.

In my opinion this took far too long to get into the thriller aspect of the book.  Much of the book feels more like Georgia's autobiography while she was living in a cult, as she becomes obsessed with taking acting classes with her teacher Mariana.  Her boyfriend introduced her to the classes, and now she is determined to be the star pupil.  As a child star, Georgia is no stranger to acting, but after a long hiatus she wants to be back on top of the acting game.  Marianna's teaching methods are unorthodox, but Georgia feels challenged and ready to unlock her potential.  This has the feeling of an unreliable narrator at times as you are never sure if what Georgia is "remembering" is real or a fever dream of Marianna's making.  As the story unfolds we never truly find out what is real and what is fabricated, but we do learn that everyone has their breaking point and that with the right drive people can be driven (manipulated) do anything.

Overall the concept of this book was interesting, and I think I would have connected with the characters more if I connected more with acting.  It is a topic I'm not really interested in, and I'm not really interested in cult based thrillers where people are living their lives.  I am more of an action packed fast packed thriller person, and this was more of a slow descent into madness.

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