Just for the Summer Review

By Abby Jimenez

Star rating: ★★★★★

Blurb

A sharp and scintillating summer novel that will make readers laugh out loud and cry happy tears from the New York Times bestselling author of Yours Truly. 

Justin has a curse, and thanks to a Reddit thread, it's now all over the internet. Every woman he dates goes on to find their soul mate the second they break up. When a woman slides into his DMs with the same problem, they come up with a plan: They'll date each other and break up. Their curses will cancel each other’s out, and they’ll both go on to find the love of their lives. It’s a bonkers idea… and it just might work.

Emma hadn't planned that her next assignment as a traveling nurse would be in Minnesota, but she and her best friend agree that dating Justin is too good of an opportunity to pass up, especially when they get to rent an adorable cottage on a private island on Lake Minnetonka.

It's supposed to be a quick fling, just for the summer. But when Emma's toxic mother shows up and Justin has to assume guardianship of his three siblings, they're suddenly navigating a lot more than they expected–including catching real feelings for each other. What if this time Fate has actually brought the perfect pair together?

Genre: Contemporary romance

Read if you Like:

⛵ Nurse heroine

⛵ Single guardian

⛵ Dealing with trauma

⛵ Incredible banter

My Thoughts:

Just for the Summer is a beautiful story about what it means to love someone in the good times and the bad. It will make you laugh and maybe cry. It is also the first book that has really surprised me with a twist in quite a while.

I loved Emma and Justine. What is a better meet cute than a matching curse? Their banter is adorable from their first conversation! I loved how they supported each other and always saw the best in each other. This story throws a lot of challenges Emma and Justine's way and I loved how they took them on together and supported each other in small ways. Emma was so reluctant to trust and Justin slowly wore her down.

I also loved the relationship Emma had with her best friend Maddie. One of the really interesting things about this book is that we mostly see Maddie from Emma's perspective and it's not until we start to see her from Justin's perspective that we really see how insightful and caring she is. Abby Jimenez did an incredible job showing how Emma's life experiences shaped her perceptions. I was really impressed by how she described psychological things accurately while also using different terms than psychologists use. As someone who is familiar with mental health disorders, I could see what was going on, but readers get to see how someone without the words to describe it might experience psychological issues.

While I adored this book and I 100% recommend it I think some readers, particularly those with a history of trauma involving a parent will find it very emotional. I recommend reading the trigger warnings and saving it for a time when you know you are in the right headspace to read it.

🌶️🌶️ - This story includes at least one open-door scene, however, it is not incredibly descriptive. In addition, there are several makeout scenes and a bit of sexual tension.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Forever for giving me early an earc of this book in order to review it. All opinions are my own.