Review: It’s Not Summer Without You

It’s Not Summer Without You, by Jenny Han. The summary:

It used to be that Belly counted the days until summer, until she was back at Cousins Beach with Conrad and Jeremiah. But not this year. Not after Susannah got sick again and Conrad stopped caring. Everything that was right and good has fallen apart, leaving Belly wishing summer would never come.

But when Jeremiah calls saying Conrad has disappeared, Belly knows what she must do to make things right again. And it can only happen back at the beach house, the three of them together, the way things used to be. If this summer really and truly is the last summer, it should end the way it started--at Cousins Beach.

Gah!!! I just finished the book (book 2 in the Summer series), and I practically need to do some deep breathing exercises or something. Because I’m seriously freaking out. Hallelujah that book 3 is already out. Idk how the heck I could handle it if it wasn’t. Because man oh man do I want to read that book so badly! Whew. Okay. Trying tame the fangirl gushing and write a calm review . . .

So when I finished the first book (The Summer I Turned Pretty) a few months ago, I was like, “Hey, this was a good book. Good summer read, etc. etc. Maybe I’ll track down the rest of the series.” I wasn’t, like, totally in love with it or anything--I just enjoyed it and that was that. And then came this book. I have no idea when I became so invested in these characters. Belly. Conrad. Jeremiah. Can I be their friend? And hang out with them at the summer house and go to the beach and get tan, and I’ll secretly hate Belly just a little for having BOTH brothers in love with her, and she’ll hate me a little for taking some of their attention off her, but overall we’ll have good times?

But man was this book was love-triangle city. Which usually annoys me big time, but for some reason I can handle it in this book. Instead of making me roll my eyes, the whole “will it be Conrad or Jeremiah” thing had me on the edge of my seat. Probably because I am totally 100 percent on Team Jeremiah. I know, I know. Everyone who loves this series is always swooning over Conrad. And at the end of the first book, I was like “Well, I like Jeremiah better, but I can see why Belly likes Conrad.” But in this second book, I fell completely out of love with Conrad. He’s a total jerk. And everyone makes excuses for him--his mother just died, he’s sensitive, he’s hurting--but the fact remains, he’s still being a jerk. Especially to Belly. Jeremiah on the other hand is happy and thoughtful and funny WHILE STILL BEING HOT. So for most of the book it drove me completely crazy that Belly was still so in love with Conrad when he was basically being mean to her.

And honestly, Belly kinda annoys me. I mean, I like her and she’s totally easy to relate to, but she’s so obsessed with Conrad and so possessive of both the boys, even to the exclusion of her family and other friends. Half the time, I just want to be like, “You don’t own these boys, Belly. Take a step back.” The other half of the time I want to remind her that she’s 16 and a little too young to be so sure that Conrad is THE ONE. But even though she sometimes gets on my nerves, I still love her to death--which says something about Jenny Han’s skill as a writer, I think.

I was really happy with the way the book ended. Seriously. And then I turned the page and found out there was another chapter (can it be called a chapter if it’s a paragraph?) called “A couple of years later.” And after reading that . . . well let’s just say there’s no way I’m not reading the third book. As soon as possible.