“Just for the Summer” Book Review

The latest romance from Abby Jimenez, author of “The Friend Zone” and “Part of Your World.” Mild spoilers ahead for this ARC

Hello and happy Wednes-

Oh, wait. It’s Thursday. My bad! Got knocked off my schedule a bit this week, but here I am! Only a day late, go me.

Today we’re going to be talking about an ARC I was pretty excited to get: “Just for the Summer” by Abby Jimenez. I’ve read her previous books, which include “The Friend Zone” trilogy and also the “Part of Your World” series. Series? Yeah, I’ll call it that.

A quick synopsis: Justin and Emma are cursed. It seems that everyone they date (and eventually break up with) go on to find The One immediately after. Honestly, they’re both sick of it. When Justin’s Reddit post on the subject goes viral, Emma sees it as a crazy coincidence, but Justin sees it as an opportunity when she reaches out. The only way to break the curse? Date each other, then break up. The curse has to cancel each other out, right? 

After agreeing to “fake” date for the summer, things take a turn for the both of them. Justin’s suddenly responsible for his three younger siblings and Emma’s toxic (to put it lightly) mother shows up out of the blue. Will they be able to break the curse and find their happily ever afters? What if their happily ever afters are closer than they think?

My rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

I have a soft spot for Abby Jimenez. She manages to bring together romance and heartbreak very well, and I’m not just talking about romantic heartbreak. The characters in her novels have some real – and tough – problems and legit need therapy and I am here for it. She’s not afraid to tackle the big issues, and she writes it in such a way that it doesn’t bog down the story and still lets the romance flow.

This book in particular hit me hard. Yes, I cried, gosh darn it. 

THE CHARACTERS. Justin won me over immediately. He’s a sunshine sweety pie that loves making online surveys and e-vites for dates and it should be way too cheesy but it made my heart melt instead. It’s just adorable; he’s so thoughtful! He also has a heart of gold, putting his life on hold essentially for his siblings in their time of need.

So here’s where some mild spoilers come sprinkling in.

The reason Justin is taking over caring for his siblings is because his mother is going to jail for six years for fraud and embezzlement. She is allowed a month to get her affairs in order, then she’s supposed to turn herself in. Their father died in a car accident years before. Honestly there’s a lot of trauma the kids in this book have gone through, and I’m also talking about the main characters too. But Justin does his best to keep a good attitude about it; he loves his siblings and is more than happy to do this, it’s just not the best timing when it comes to Emma entering his life. 

Emma is… well, she was just kind of “blah” for the first half of the book. She didn’t excite me or even really give me a personality for a while, and I think that’s because we didn’t know the extent of her trauma for a while. The biggest thing (and the thing that made me cry) was her childhood with her mother. She was neglected; her mother would leave for weeks at a time, and this poor child would have to take care of herself, sitting around waiting to see if her mother would come home. Sometimes she would, sometimes she wouldn’t. Her mother just didn’t want to be a mother, and that’s fine. Being a woman who doesn’t want children is fine. When it’s not fine is when you’re already a mother, you refuse to have anyone help you because you don’t want anyone to take your child away from you, then just… not take care of the child you claim to want and love? The mother needs therapy, the daughter needs therapy, and also the daughter needs to cut that cord, like, now.

Emma is an adult now; she should not have to worry about where her mother is or if she’s okay. She’s not her caretaker, but in the end I can sympathize with Emma. It’s her mother, she loves her. When her mother was home with her when Emma was a child, it was the best time. They’d play together, she’d make Emma her Halloween costume from scratch, they’d garden together. It’s adorable and fun and such a great environment… until it’s not. 

Honestly I wanted to just punch this woman in the face. She neglects her child for weeks until someone finally notices and she is put in the foster care system. It’s horrendous. It’s despicable. And I am so happy Emma finally managed to cut that cord in the end. Everyone around her, including Emma’s best friend Maddy, saw how toxic and horrid this woman was except Emma. So for Emma to finally start working through her trauma and not shrug it off like she was doing the whole book was amazing. I was proud of her, and I came from being meh about this character to liking her in the end. Especially when she started getting the therapy she needed. 

THE ROMANCE. Justin and Emma were cute together. I could feel the chemistry between the two before they even met. The curse situation wasn’t the best plotline, but if it got these two together, that’s fine with me. I’m actually glad it wasn’t the curse storyline that got in their way, because that would’ve been a thin and irritating excuse. Instead it was the trauma these two needed to work through before they could have a solid and true relationship, which is what makes sense and makes it all the more satisfying in the end. They were charming together, and it’s probably because Justin was such a charming fool. He played no games; he was like, “Huh, I think I like this girl,” and when they played their “What are You Thinking?” game he was like, “Yeah, so I really like you even though it’s only been a few weeks. Crazy right?” Awww, you cute little sap, you.

I also loved their dynamic due to the chemistry. They had great banter together and they didn’t trauma dump on each other too much. It was spread out enough to be believable, and when it came to Emma, sometimes it didn’t come at all. Which is fine, because in Emma’s mind she didn’t process her trauma, so why talk about it?

THE END (SPOILERS). Honestly, I got pulled out of it a bit when it all came full circle and Emma found out about her family. For the whole book she believes she has no family. No father, no siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, nothing. Her mother told her it was just the two of them and then bailed on her ass. (Gag.) While I love the idea of Emma taking the DNA test and getting over her fear of finding out the truth of who she is, I didn’t love the idea of her family being the same people from another Abby Jimenez book.

Should I have seen this coming since all her books are in the same universe? Sure, maybe. But I guess I wasn’t expecting them to be related. I mean, how big is Minnesota?? Here I am thinking it’s a decent size state, but silly me, everyone’s related to each other or friends with each other!

So it turns out Emma’s half brother is a man named Daniel, who was one of the main protagonists in the book “Part of Your World.” Of course I re-read “The Friend Zone” books in preparation for this ARC, but I didn’t re-read “Part of Your World.” Whoops! Because of this, it took me a hot second to remember who Daniel and Alexis were. But I got it, I caught up. I’m so smart!

Anyway, although I wasn’t a fan of who Emma’s family was, I did appreciate the fact that she had family. However, the waterworks came back when Daniel started talking about how Emma’s mother would come by every once in a while just to hang out and take someone’s money and stuff. So you’re telling me that while this tiny child was alone having to fend for herself for weeks, her mother was only two hours away hanging with the family she claimed didn’t exist??

When I said I wanted to punch this woman, I meant kill her slowly and bury her body in the garden next to the carrots Emma had to dig up and eat to survive. 

Thankfully, Daniel’s stories were what broke the camel’s back and Emma swore her mother off for lying. For leaving her behind instead of letting her be with her grandparents, her family. Again, so proud of Emma with that; I can’t even imagine how hard it would be to swear off the only family you ever knew, even if she is a toxic, horrible woman.

The very end, with the six-month time jump, felt a bit rushed. But that’s what happens with time jumps; the reader is still in the headspace of where the character was at one time, then suddenly it’s a different headspace because time has passed for the character, but not for us. Also I don’t think six months is long enough for what Emma has gone through, but I am not a licensed mental health professional, and everyone’s process is different.

Thanks to NetGalley and Forever Publishing for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. “Just for the Summer” comes out next week, April 2nd, 2024! 

Until next time, my lovelies!