Written on my Heart by Cole Gibsen

This was my first experience with this author, but it is not likely to be my last. While I don't typically read books listed as YA, something about the description of this book when I saw it on Net Galley really caught my interest. When they offered me an ARC for review, I was excited, but then kept putting of reading it out of worry that it would read too young to keep my interest. Once I started the book, I realized I shouldn't have worried and was sucked in immediately. Both of the main characters had experienced so much in life, much of it hard, that they were old beyond their years.  

Ash is a barista at a coffee shop. She was recently thrown out of an extremely emotionally abusive home where she had been repeatedly beat over the head with her perceived faults for the last decade. She left with nothing and still had no friends and nothing really to claim as her own except for a meager savings she has been trying to build and a rented room in an apartment full off partiers.

Lane is a tattoo artist. It isn't what he planned to do with his life, but it makes him happy and provides a way for him to support his family. When Ash forms a bond with his sister, her co-worker at the coffee shop, Lane finds himself doing her a favor by covering up an old tattoo that brings bad memories. From there, the two begin a slow tap dance around each other. The interest is there, but Lane is keeping a very big secret, and the more time he spends with Ash, the more broken he realizes she is. Rather than making him want to push her away, her brokenness brings out his instinct to protect and help. Against all odds the two find themselves giving in to the pull of attraction and the deeper feelings they are developing. Unfortunately, just as things are going well, Ash's past comes to call and Lane's secret is revealed. Everything they have been moving toward is threatened and might just fall apart.

This was a deeply emotional story of two broken people trying to put to make their pieces fit together. I thought it was a great read.