is there a way to highlight one of those breaths
Nice try.
I think the best we can do is make manual pasting and covering-up easier.
This is one of the Punch tools. Theory has it you can “punch copy” some background sound and then select the “evil sound” and punch the background sound over it, covering it up. That’s basically it. You would think you need to carefully manage the injected sound and juggle timing and all, but no. It automatically configures the patch to the select evil sound.
Have you tried different microphone positioning and orientations? Are you asthmatic?
I poo-poo’d the idea of global breath removal, but it is possible to set up Effect > Noise Reduction and try it. The problem is going to be deleting some normal vocalizations, too, by accident.
Drag-select a breath (and nothing else). Effect > Noise Reduction > Profile.
Select a whole chapter and Effect > Noise Reduction > choose settings > OK.
The audiobook people have a nice, gentle Noise Reduction of the Beast (6, 6, 6) and you can try the Audacity default settings. 12, 6, 3.
I think there’s a breath removal in the Audiobook notes. Looking.
Koz