The Summer I Turned Pretty

 December 28th, 2023

Rate: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

" For me, it was almost like Winter didn't count. Summer is what mattered. My whole life was measured in summers."

The Summer I Turned Pretty 

-Jenny Han

After the disappointment that was "My Life with the Walter Boys", I needed a good book, a good pick me up if you will. I walked into this book, with no high hopes honestly, and it had everything to do with the book before this. But I am so glad that I stuck this book out. Jenny Han never disappoints. As the first book in the series, it was heartfelt, and sappy and teenage like. After-all its a YA novel. 

Let's get into this book, shall we? The book is focused on two families, The Conklin's and The Fisher's. They spend every summer together at The Fisher's Beach House on Cousins Beach. The two moms, Laurel Conklin and Susannah Fisher, have been best friends since they were kids, and that friendship has lasted a lifetime and on to a new generation of Conklin's and Fisher's. 

Steven and Isabel Conklin were raised with Conrad and Jeremiah Fisher, always spending their summers together, always inseparable. Until this summer that is. Everything has changed. Steven and Conrad are about to go off to college and Jeremiah, is going off to football camp. Why does it feel like this is the end of the Summers in Cousins Beach?

For as long as Isabel aka Belly, can remember, it's always been Conrad Fisher. Her summers are focused on him, watching him, learning him from the sidelines while secretly falling in love with him. She had hoped one day that she would be enough, and that she would be pretty enough, interesting enough, that Conrad would finally love her back. But this summer is unlike any other. Conrad is withdrawn, moody and cut off from the world, and would rather be by himself than to be around anyone else. And Conrad isn't the only one who is acting differently. Jeremiah has been low-key falling in love with Belly since she showed up at the beach house. 

Belly is 15-going on 16 and her body is changing. Where she was once the dangly, nerdy, pre-teen with glasses, gone is that girl now. And in her place is loose-long haired, contact wearing beauty that has taken the nerdy girl's place. If Jeremiah has noticed Belly's change in appearance, Conrad will have noticed too. Except to Belly's dismay, it does not seem like Conrad cares about Belly at all, until Belly starts a summer fling with a boy named Cam.

Interjecting himself on Belly's dates with Cam, it seems Conrad has a jealousy streak a mile long, and deals with it, by drinking and being overbearing and overprotective. It's enough to annoy the hell out of Belly and enough to make Cam question, if Conrad has a thing for her, and if She has a thing for Conrad.

In the mist of all the angsty teen drama, The Fisher Matriarch has been behaving oddly, often spending time in her room, and falling asleep early and as always by her side is Laurel.

This book also left off on a cliff hanger, but seeing as it actually has a plot, and character development and a story and it is the 1st one in the series, I don't mind it, makes me ready to read the second installment. I gave it Four Stars, it doesn't have any steamy scenes, we are reading about teenagers here. But it is well written and keeps you engaged and makes you re-live your younger teen days, where the crushes you had, had the power to crush you emotionally. If you like the nostalgia, feel that it gives off, then the Summer Novels are for you!

Will this Summer at Cousin's Beach be the last? What is the secret that is being kept by Conrad, Laurel and Susannah? Does Belly confess her feelings for Conrad? Does Conrad feel the same for Belly? Does Cam become a fixture in Belly's life? Or is he just a Summer Fling? What happens between Belly and Jeremiah? Questions, questions, questions.....