Heartbreak Hill was a story that dealt with a lot of tough subjects including death, dealing with grief, and a fresh start. I am a fan of not only the good emotional reads, but Heidi's writing. If you're not familiar please take caution.
Greyson has congenital heart disease, a fact he knows and a reason he has kept his crush in the friend zone. He doesn't think he has much to offer her. Greyson collapses after a basketball game and is taken to the hospital where he is kept in coma waiting for a new heart because his own has stopped working right.
Rafe Karlsson has plans to run a marathon. When a vehicle enters the race lanes, he is killed, saving a woman from the car, leaving behind a wife and two daughters.
Nadia was having to make a difficult decision to donate her husband's organs and save others. She had a supportive family but we all grieve differently.
While in the midst of grieving, she had to make a decision and still be the supportive parent for her daughters.
I was recently in Nadia's shoes when my husband suddenly died unexpectedly, no one can tell I how to grieve, and what do u do when your person is just gone? For me it's been 5 months and I still struggle.. there's no timeline for grief.

i unfortunately ended up dnfing this at around 30% - i found it really tough to get through and i don’t think i was in the right headspace for it. i do think it was beautifully written and it definitely had me crying, i will try to revisit it once i feel up to it.

thank you so much to netgalley, the publisher and the author for the arc 🫶🏻

This story was heartbreaking. I shed a lot of tears. There are two sets of stories here and both become intertwined. Grayson and Reid are best friends that had a one time encounter, and then Grayson put her firmly in the friend category (even though he wanted her for himself). Reid was ready to start dating other men since Grayson wasn't stepping up. Then he collapses after a basketball game and she finds out he has a heart condition that he has ignored for a long time. As he is laying in a coma,, she is angry that he didn't take care of himself and is terrified he won't make it. This is one couple.
Rafe and Nadia are happily married with two little girls. Rafe is running in a race and after pushing another runner out of the way, is hit by a car and is brain damaged and will not survive. All the the family is heartbroken but against his mother's wishes, she donates his organs so others may live. Nadia and the girls really struggle and notice that his mother really wants nothing to do with them. The girls get angry for their mother and they will see them less and less. It takes quite awhile for them to start to act normal again as they miss Rafe horribly. Rafe's best friend starts coming around to help with household chores, like lawn care, etc. The girls really like him and he tells them he is still their Uncle Kiran.
The sweet part of the story is that Grayson and Nadia had been a couple in high school and had parted ways. They hadn't been in love, just together. When their lives became intertwined, it was due to Rafe's doing. I found it very interesting that the story talked of the heart remembering it's past life when it's with it's new owner. Very interesting.
The story held a lot of heartbreak, but also new beginnings that started from a tragedy. This book was well worth reading and more than once.

I got this book from NetGalley and am voluntarily leaving a review

Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to read and review an early copy of Heartbreak Hill. I loved the story. It’s about a man who dies saving a lady’s life and his wife gives the gift of life to others by donating his organs so he will live on. Both sides are heavily impacted. One by the loss of their loved one and the other by being given a second chance on life. Your emotions will definitely be all over the place. Heidi Mc Laughlin has written a very impactful and emotional story. I would highly recommend this book just have a box of Kleenex’s beside you.

It's been a very long time since I physically cried while reading a book, and while that might seem like a bad thing it's the opposite because of how good the story and writing were that they moved me so much.

I felt the story was so relatable and flowed so well. I loved all the relationships in the book.

This was the first book I've read by this author and I'm definitely looking forward to future ones.

Heartbreak Hill
By: Heidi McLaughlin

📚💕⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💕📚

Breaks you from the beginning!

Omg in yet another book that Heidi McLaughlin tears you apart we get Grayson and Reid’s story. And Rafe and Nadia’s in a very emotional book about Love, Loss, Generosity and honestly two different people fighting to live and maybe even a little bit of permission to be happy whether from guilt or having no idea How. I’m on a book hangover and might be for a few days. Yikes I loved this book even through all my tears.

Authors Blurb: Grayson Caballero sees the glass half-empty. Born with a life-threatening heart defect, he’s been living on borrowed time. The uncertainty of tomorrow makes him push people away, helping Grayson to avoid any real commitment.
Then he meets Reid Sullivan and falls madly in love. The two work together at the Wold Collective, Grayson as a project manager and Reid in HR. They even live in the same apartment complex. But Grayson continues to keep his distance, despite their obvious attraction. And Reid’s not interested in waiting around.
When Grayson collapses at a basketball game, Reid learns he’s been keeping secrets from her. Now his life hangs in the balance…and a stranger from Boston holds the key to his survival.

Nadia Karlsson makes a life-changing decision after her husband, Rafe, is involved in a tragic accident near Harvard Square. Her choice will unwittingly alter the course of Grayson’s future and tie his fate unexpectedly to her own.

This book has everything I love in a book. Then you add that it's beautifully written and believable. It is easily a five star read. Written in multiple POV this story flows so incredibly well that the next thing you know you’re 80% into the book and loving every second of it. The believable way the characters interact is perfect. Run, Hop, Jump or use your (1 click) finger to do whatever you have to do and get this amazing book. It'll break your heart, you'll want to scream with frustration and anger. This is a love story that is created from friendship, loyalty and the need to make each other live again. It is not necessarily the fall in love kind of story but love created from tragedy. There are wonderful twists and turns in this book and I'm personally glad I read it. The book written in 3rd person was very well written and moved without any gaps in the story. I highly recommend this book it will keep you captivated to the very End.

Thanks Netgally for letting me read and review.📚💕

This story talks about very relatable topics..
How one thing can change everything
How one thing can change other's life
Truly leaves you thinking...
The story is well crafted, well presented.. a little bit slow but you keep interest while reading..
A story about friends, about family, about loss
.
Read if you like
Friends to lovers
Loss and grief
Second chances
.
.
Thanks to Netgalley, Author and Montlake for this arc

Hold onto your heart with this one, cause I will take you on an emotional rollercoaster. Heidi will pull on all the heart strings over and over again, right from the very beginning. It is beautiful in every single way.

Grayson is a basketball lover with a secret of his own. He falls in love with Reid, who works in HR. When he collapses during a basketball game, a stranger in Boston might be the key to saving his life. As four lives collide, all of them are forced to face their heartbreaking consequences of their own.

Without spoiling too much of the story, all I can say that this is a slow-burn romance. The first four chapters were interesting and engaging but it went slow from then.

I do not like both Reid and Nadia. I feel that character development needs to be improved on and so do the world building and plot. Some parts are implausible and far-fetched. Some are too convenient.

This doesn't make me cry although the ending is heart-warming. To be honest, the ending is clichéd and predictable. Overall, this is still an easy and delightful read although not the best.

Heartbreak Hill is devastatingly beautiful. It was honestly one of the best books I’ve read this year. The way Heidi McLaughlin navigates the subject of grief with the characters had me crying because I was feeling their pain.

I really enjoyed the three different perspectives as it gave a wider insight to the many feelings of one situation.

Grayson is a young and seemingly healthy man, but he is actually not as healthy as he shows. He has had a heart disease since birth, and he assumes his days are numbered. Reid, a Grayson coworker since meeting Grayson, felt an attraction to him and wanted each other to be together, but Grayson, even after a faithful night, made it clear that he wanted to keep Reid in his friend zone and not more. After an argument, Grayson suddenly showed a serious sign of a heart attack, and after surgery, the doctor declared that he needed heart transplantation or else he was not going to make it. Nadia, Rafe's wife, never expected her husband to have an unexpected accident and never come back. She couldn't believe everything that happened to her life suddenly. In the morning, she whined to Rafe that she wanted to sleep, and at night, she said condolences. The torment hasn't stopped because she faces a new challenge. Is she willing to share the heart of the one and only person she has loved for many years?

First, note that the book is HEA, and the book has been written from people's perspectives. The book is a slice of life and describes not only Grayson and Reid's journey to marry but also the emotional circumstances of people who have a role in their lives. The book seems so real to me. It's everyone's accuracy that not everybody is born healthy or stays that way, and Grayson wasn't an exception. Heart disease is pretty common if you think about it, and the fact is that the book really describes the real world, not the bubbly happy universe of romance where the characters have minor problems that will be solved when they get together. It's exactly about what-ifs that some people don't have a chance to consider ever again.


The book got me thinking about lots of things. I wanted to blame Grayson for being a coward to confess to Reid, but when I went through the book, I couldn't blame him. He loved someone and truly wished a happy ending for her, and considering his disease, he doesn't want to be a coward and confess to Reid, but when I went through the book, I couldn't blame him. He loved someone and truly wished a happy ending for her, and considering his disease, he doesn't want to be a memory that Reid could never get rid of, and that hurts more when he has a heart attack because Reid thinks Grayson doesn't love her enough, even though he actually loves her more than anything and doesn't want to hurt her because what if he couldn't wake up tomorrow? Imagine one happy day, like every day your partner wakes you up. I made breakfast for you, like always kissing you goodbye and promising a fun evening with you, or the simple comment that I will be home in the afternoon. It's simple, right? So what happens? If that one specific person never comes back—not this afternoon or ever again? People always assume people around them will always stay the way they are. We plan for the future like it's a given, and we always say, "I will do that tomorrow." But what if there is no later? There is no next day, hour, or second. And the funny things you would have are, "If I hugged him tighter, if I said I loved you, if I never argued that day, and..." But the truth is, there is no what-if when the people who should be here are not there anymore.

I have the urge to rate 5 not because of superior writing or perfect skill but because of the sensitive point the author used in her book, and it can make you consider what you would do. If you were in the characters shoes and it's a strong factor that I appreciate, instead of spice, I prefer the term empathy in this book because, in the middle of a crisis, it's not the time for romance, but hey, the relationship bonus of book couples is sweet. I'm not a fan of self-care or improvement books and am not going to recommend them, but the book does help me consider the possibilities I thought were given, so I think it's worth reading.

Heartbreak Hill by Heidi McLaughlin is an excellent book if you’re looking for something that will give you a good cry but at the same time infuse you with the hope and inspiration. I should preface this review by saying that I have a soft spot for organ transplant stories because I’ve experienced it in my family. What I never “knew” or heard of was “cellular memory” and I found it fascinating but at the same time a bit upsetting. That being said, this storyline will grab your heart and twist it into a million pieces. The author very aptly gives the reader the insight into each character’s thoughts and feelings in a very organic and realistic way, most especially Nadia. Her chapters literally gutted me – I was a blubbering mess of tears. But watching her navigate through her grief and ultimately mature and grow and find meaning in her life was inspiring to say the least. Reid and Grayson’s chapters were more focused on their romance and their growth in their relationship with each other. I tangibly felt and understood Grayson’s frustration and sadness - it felt so real to me. And Rafe & Nadia’s girls – oh my, they were the hidden gems in this story. If you didn’t feel every emotion those girls felt while reading this book, you didn’t read the same book I read because I felt their pain as well as their happiness. Very uniquely written and so very different from any other book I’ve read. I would call it an inspiring and feel-good read even though I would suggest grabbing a box of tissues! It may not be for everyone, but I most definitely enjoyed it and highly recommend it. I’m grateful to have been given an opportunity to read and review an advance copy of this book for NetGalley.

4* What I've come to expect from this author -emotions galore.

This is a sad-sweet tale that ends well, a year or so after tragedy. However, I felt like I gelled more with Nadia and her girls rather than Grayson and Reid, because it didn't seem like we got to know the latter well. It's hinted to as to the reasons Grayson didn't declare his love, but that sounded like self preservation rather than selflessness. And he was a bit of an idiot, tbh, knowing about his condition but not raking his meds. Why? We weren't given a reason. Reid herself, possibly because her name sounded so masculine, I couldn't 'see' for most of the book. I think I began to see her, and her backbone, when Grayson dropped his reveal. And sadly, I couldn't see any passion or grand amour between them, though I got a sense of this from the absent Rafe and Nadia.

The tale ends sweetly, but it's a little imbalanced and not quite enough time feels as if it's passed between Grayson clocking he has Rafe's heart and telling Nadia and family. A few more visits and a bit more time would've felt more believable and reasonable. I was far more invested in Nadia and her future than Grayson and Reid's, likely because the author doesn't go there with the latter. Not sure why editors didn't pick up on this, and why there was such an emphasise on extended family members for pretty much all to disappear, and for dumped-in family conflict to seemingly resolve itself by itself. Maybe it was time that helped? Still, it's worth a read.

ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Montlake for my reading pleasure.

Sent from AOL on Android

4.5 stars

Rafe and Nadias' story hurt so much! I was ugly crying for half of this book. The grief that the author describes for Nadia really hurt but was written so well. The title couldn't be more perfect for the book.
Rafe dies in a horrible unexpected accident and donates his organs. In another place, Grayson receives Rafes' heart. Grayson gets a second chance at life, but he suddenly feels like his new heart is broken or missing something. He goes down a path of destruction, wondering if he even deserved this new heart. I loved how the book had a happy ending for everyone because I needed it after all the crying I did. If you love to cry while reading, this ones for you.

If you are looking for a happy read - look somewhere else. Heidi McLaughlin takes her readers on an emotional journey that at points were very difficult to read. Loss, organ donation and trying to find your way to new beginnings are the key elements. The characters were very well represented but the heartache might have been too much. Glad everyone got their HEA in the end but it was a long upsetting road to travel. This might be a better movie than a book.

5 Stars ... make sure to have tissues handy!

This has to be the saddest book I have ever read. I was crying by the third chapter and at times I was literally sobbing. This book deals with sensitive situations that will break your heart. I felt so sorry for Nadia and her daughters and the author portrayed their heartbreaking emotions brilliantly ... people just don't get over loosing a loved easily. There can be bad days for a long long time. The chapters would go back and forth between Grayson, Reid and Nadia ... so there were some happy points like when Grayson finally gets is head on straight. This is one of those books that is going to stay with me for a long time.

Grayson was born with a heart defect and because of that he has kept Reid at a distance. As Reid tells him she's going to move on, he collapses and is rushed to the hospital. He is put into a medically induced coma till a new heart can be found. Rafe, Nadia and their two little girls are the perfect family living in the suburbs of Boston. Rafe has run in an annual street race and this year he has set his mind to win. But after a tragic accident he is left on life support. Nadia makes the decision she knows that her husband would want by donating his organ so he can save other lives even if her and her daughters hearts will be forever broken.

I received an early copy courtesy of Montlake through NetGalley.

I received a free copy of, Heartbreak Hill, by Heidi McLaughlin, from the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Grayson Caballero has a heart defect, he tries to keep people at bay, until he meets Reid Sullivan and falls in love with her. Wow, this book is so complex, but such a dazzling read. It made me cry.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.

This was a heartbreaking read that really grabs you from the first chapter to the very end. A tragic story that gives you all the feels and gives you hope. I don’t want to give too much of the story away…just know if you love a high emotional story then this is for you!

The book explores the concept of cellular memory, where a heart transplant patient experiences the emotions and memories of the donor. The story follows Grayson and Reid but delves into too many unnecessary side characters and details, making it feel overwhelming. Grayson's reluctance to share his heart condition with Reid seems unrealistic, and their romance didn't feel engaging. However, Nadia's story post-accident was more compelling, showcasing her struggles and resilience. Despite some flaws like repetitive elements and excessive side characters, the book had its moments and wasn't a total letdown.

Another tearjerker by Heidi Mclaughlin. We 5 adults and 2 kids who are the main characters

Grayson, heart patient living on borrowed time. Likes Reid, his close friend, colleague and lives in the same apt. Safe, who dies and his heart is donated to Grayson, Nadia, Rafes widow with 2 little kids. Kiran, Rafes friend in love with Nadia.

After his heart transplant, Grayson reaches out to Nadia and her girls. What follows is how the relationships of the 3 main character evolve. Graysons communicatio, or lack of, leads to some rocky moments.

The book was sad, it was slow and definitely keep those tissues ready.