Reviews with content warning for Cursing - It's Not Summer Without You

I wanted to read this book because I loved Jenny Han’s To All the Boys I Loved Before series and with this being picked up by Amazon Prime, I was interested to see what was going to happen in the next series. I didn’t enjoy the first book and didn’t have a lot of hope for this book and I'm glad I didn’t because this book was disappointing and made me want to gouge my eyes out.

This book is still based on Belly, who we met in the first book. She is now sixteen years old. She used to count the days until summer, until she was back at Cousins Beach with Conrad and Jeremiah. But this year, she isn’t looking forward to it. Her and Conrad have broken up and not talking anymore and Susannah, the boy’s mum has recently passed out. Everything that was right and good has fallen apart, leaving Belly wishing that summer would never come. However, one night, Jeremiah rings Belly to tell her that Conrad has disappeared. Belly knows what she must do to make things right and it can only happen back at the beach house, the three of them together, the way things used to be. If this is the last summer, it should end the way it started – at Cousins Beach.

You know when you rely on a minor character to bring the comedic effect or just save the book – this book didn’t have any of them. I didn’t realise how much Susannah saved the first book until you read this book and there is no Susannah. Every single one of these characters absolutely annoyed the shit out of me. Belly didn’t learn her lesson from the last book and life in general of “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all” - she spends half of the book being unjustifiable mean and then the other half just feeling guilty and trying to apologies. Jeremiah and Conrad both need a slap in the face for letting a girl get in between especially when it’s Belly. Like I love a love triangle in tv shows, but they never seem to work in books, and this was one example of one. Steven was just jealous and was only needed to move the story along. Taylor was right to be upset but didn’t need to dismiss Belly’s feelings about Conrad so much. “Badass” Laurie lives up to her name in the last 2 out of 5 chapters and then again, she’s hiding for most of the book. Belly and Steven’s dad whose name I can’t remember isn’t even in this and Mr Fisher just shows up again to stop us listening to how Belly is feeling guilty or wanting to be in the centre of attention.

The only reason I didn’t DNF this book or give it a one star because there was an additional POV from Jeremiah, I would have preferred it to be Conrad but oh well. I don’t know if I should or would pick up the last book in the series and let’s hope the TV show is better.

Content Warnings