Summer Reading
Jenn McKinlay
435 pages
Berkley
published May 16, 2023
I really wanted to read some summery books this summer and so I picked this one up. With a swoony librarian as a hero, how could this one go wrong? Sam loses her chef’s job and goes back home to Martha’s Vineyard to watch her half brother. Sparks fly when she meets the new librarian but wonders how it can work when she doesn’t read due to her dyslexia.
So an opposites attract sets up this romance. But I liked the friendships that form and Sam’s and her half brother’s change in attitude towards each other even more than the relationship. And while I love that this book includes a neurodivergent character, I did grow a little weary of it popping up. With devices being able to read aloud what is on screen and audiobooks, the world is better equipped to help out this issue.
I did root for Sam and Bennett, which is what I judge all romances by. They drew close when they helped each other overcome obstacles. I liked their chemistry as it jumped off the page. I loved Sam and Tyler’s relationship and how it went from non-existent to a sweet sibling bond.
And I almost forgot to mention all the talk of food, since of course Sam is a chef. Make sure you don’t read this one on an empty stomach.
When a woman who’d rather do anything than read meets a swoon-worthy bookworm, sparks fly, making for one hot-summer fling in New York Times bestselling author Jenn McKinlay’s new rom-com.
For Samantha Gale, a summer on Martha’s Vineyard at her family’s tiny cottage was supposed to be about resurrecting her career as a chef, until she’s tasked with chaperoning her half-brother, Tyler. The teenage brainiac is spending his summer at the local library in a robotics competition, and there’s no place Sam, who has dyslexia, likes less than the library. And because the universe hates her, the library’s interim director turns out to be the hot-reader guy whose book she accidentally destroyed on the ferry ride to the island.
Bennett Reynolds is on a quest to find his father, whose identity he’s never known. He’s taken the temporary job on the island to research the summer his mother spent there when she got pregnant with him. Ben tells himself he isn’t interested in a relationship right now. Yet as soon as Sam knocks his book into the ocean, he can’t stop thinking about her.
An irresistible attraction blossoms when Ben inspires Sam to create the cookbook she’s always dreamed about and she jumps all in on helping him find his father, and soon they realize their summer fling may heat up into a happily ever after.
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