Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez is a fantastic book marketed as a romantic comedy, but it is so much more. It is a love story and you will laugh, sometimes out loud, but the best parts of the story are the friendships and mental health representation. All the love is present in this book, but our favorite was the non-romantic love. We love how Abby writes and we love how she accurately portrays mental health.
Alyssa and I are also huge fans of dual POV and the use of different formats in books, and you’ll get a good dose of that as well. We adored the prologue and epilogue. There’s also a “cursed” trope in this book which was fun and something different.
Our combined rating for this book is 4.75 stars. Abby Jimenez is an auto-read author for us. Thank you, Abby for another amazing story!
Favorite Quotes
Alyssa
But my foolish heart would hope anyway. It didn’t know how not to.
Abby Jimenez – Just for the Summer
Meagan
Not everything that comes out of a crisis is bad. Sometimes your traumas are the reason you know how to help.
Abby Jimenez – Just for the Summer
WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD!
 Alyssa |  Meagan | |
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First of all… Phew. I maaaaaay have needed a few tissues for this one. Loved it and gave it 5 stars. | ||
I almost gave it 5 stars, but second guessed myself. I’ll trust my gut and go with 4.5 stars. It had a top-notch book scent, though. Different than Twisted Love. I may have to go down a book scent rabbit hole. | ||
That calls for an RBF Bookshelf post. | ||
I even made my husband smell it. | ||
THAT calls for an AITA post. | ||
LOL. That Prologue! I was laughing on the first page. And the ugly dog. I love a good book dog. I made a sticker for how I was picturing him. | ||
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Ahh! It’s perfect. The dog is pretty amazing. He’s hardly ever in the action but has a huge presence through the whole book. | ||
Yes! And the raccoons. The drunk scene with the raccoons had me LOL. I can see us saving baby raccoons. | ||
I would totally save baby raccoons with you. But I may not stick one in my cleavage. The funniest scene for me was the fake bridge proposal. | ||
But we have to talk about the unicorn floatie. In fact, I made a sticker… | ||
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Loveeee it. It’s so so cute. Would it really have taken him an hour to get to the cottage? | ||
Well, it took about 20 minutes on a slow boat, I think. I get it was meant to show how desperate Justin was to get to Emma. But I got that before he grabbed the unicorn floatie. | ||
Right. How was there no back up water transportation. And how did they not think of that when they rented the cottage! | ||
The illness trope always gets me though. Like in The Hating Game. Plus, it brought us Jacob. | ||
JACCCCOB. Plus Brianna, it was nice to “see” her too. | ||
I loved all the cameos. I didn’t remember Neil, but I love that he accepted Amber as his punishment from the universe. | ||
This book definitely made me want to read Part of My World again. Among others. I love Daniel. | ||
Unicorn floatie aside, Justin has dethroned Jacob as my favorite book boyfriend written by Abby. | ||
Really? | ||
You didn’t like him??? | ||
I did. He is just a little cheesy for me. | ||
Needy. Justin is needy. But, I did love his surveys! | ||
Yes, that’s a better description than cheesy. Because I do like his humor and how sweet he is. He is just… needy. | ||
True. He needs more self-confidence. Ok, I take it back. Jacob is still my favorite. | ||
Justin has the best friends though. They were so good to him. I sobbed when they showed up and just sat silently with him. | ||
I KNOW. Fixing up the house for him and showing up. What do we think about Maddy? | ||
Maddy is a little tough. | ||
She’s a sour patch friend. Her tough love is a little intense. | ||
True. But she has Emma’s best interests in mind. And at the end it made sense why Maddy was so tough with her. | ||
Yes! She was probably sick of sacrificing so much for Emma and enabling her. She really is such a good friend. I liked her more as the book went on. | ||
I also loved how considerate Emma was of the kids and enjoyed watching her relationship with them unfold. Especially the one with Sarah. It was great to see how their relationship really helped Sarah out. | ||
Right? When Sarah said she knew Emma would answer if she called. | ||
I loved all the friendships in this book. The friendship between Christine and Leigh made me cry more than the romantic relationship. | ||
Yes, the friendships were better for me than the love story. | ||
Oh definitely. I also question Insta Love. | ||
I feel like most of Abby’s books have Insta Love. The guys fall hard. I’m kinda into it. | ||
Yeah, and I guess they did talk a lot before they met. And Justin put all that effort into their dates. | ||
They did build the relationship. | ||
I loved the part where Justin describes what real love looks like versus book love. How it’s not in the big moments, but in the everyday moments. | ||
Abby has the best words. | ||
Yes, I loved her use of the word small for how Emma reacted when being triggered. | ||
How she became an island. For me it was the description of how trauma leaves cracks to be filled. Abby covers mental health so well. Which makes sense when you read her acknowledgements. | ||
Yes, this had the healthiest 3rd act breakup ever. It was reasonable. | ||
And the best makeup ever. They actually communicated and told each other how they felt. | ||
You could tell Emma had really healed. | ||
Yes, but Emma taking 300 pages to realize how messed up she was? The lack of self-awareness was a little unbelievable. | ||
The whole time I was wondering why she wasn’t in therapy. | ||
THANK GOD SHE GOES! | ||
But would 6 months really be long enough? | ||
Maybe? Hopefully she stays in it. Justin needs it too. I’d take him to group therapy. I did think she showed growth. Staying in one spot. Accepting Maddy’s moms. | ||
I want to Abby’s friend. There’s even a Michael Scott (The Office) nod in this book… “I’m a little stitious.” I feel like this would make such a good movie with all the imagery. | ||
Maddy would be an amazing movie character. | ||
The raccoons. The ugly dog. The Toilet King. | ||
Seriously. So… Before we do the next review, we need to figure out how to get a transcript of our conversations. This was hard to type out. | ||
It’s called a podcast, Alyssa. | ||
HAHAHA. Someday, Meagan. Someday. | ||