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ella7211's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
lighthearted
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Sexual assault
Moderate: Death of parent
Minor: Alcohol
fesja_reads's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death and Animal cruelty
Minor: Death of parent, Sexual assault, Vomit, Rape, and Gun violence
nenaveenstra's review against another edition
emotional
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
This was a wonderful story of sisterhood, friendship, love and hardship. There was ace, bi and lesbian rep, as well as some other good conversations (check content warnings). I deeply loved this little book.
EDIT: after reading some reviews, I find myself agreeing with some of the negative comments about this book, and yet, I still stand by my rating, which I now realise is deeply subjective. It just gave me that fuzzy feeling in my chest that only the best books can.
EDIT: after reading some reviews, I find myself agreeing with some of the negative comments about this book, and yet, I still stand by my rating, which I now realise is deeply subjective. It just gave me that fuzzy feeling in my chest that only the best books can.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Animal cruelty, and Animal death
Minor: Death of parent
A parent dies by drowning, it's not described very graphically, but it's there.elliott_roi's review against another edition
5.0
🌊
"I think a person can be a home, sometimes, just as much as a place or a house can."
"Summer of Salt" by Katrina Leno ended up being a 5 star read for me, which I did not expect. I thought it would be a light summer read, and while it definitely worked as a summer read, it also dealt with some tougher topics.
I absolutely loved all the characters and the uniqueness of the island that they live on. The overarching mystery kept me invested throughout the book and I absolutely loved the fantasy elements woven into the story. There's also a very sweet sapphic romance, which made me swoon.
So yeah, I highly recommend this book, especially if you enjoy magical realism, sapphic romance, and interesting characters. I know this book is gonna stick with me for a long time.
"I think a person can be a home, sometimes, just as much as a place or a house can."
"Summer of Salt" by Katrina Leno ended up being a 5 star read for me, which I did not expect. I thought it would be a light summer read, and while it definitely worked as a summer read, it also dealt with some tougher topics.
I absolutely loved all the characters and the uniqueness of the island that they live on. The overarching mystery kept me invested throughout the book and I absolutely loved the fantasy elements woven into the story. There's also a very sweet sapphic romance, which made me swoon.
So yeah, I highly recommend this book, especially if you enjoy magical realism, sapphic romance, and interesting characters. I know this book is gonna stick with me for a long time.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual assault
Moderate: Death of parent
juliamb's review against another edition
lighthearted
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, and Cursing
Minor: Gun violence, Death of parent, Murder, Rape, and Vomit
laran_s's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence
Moderate: Gun violence
Minor: Death of parent
cutlet's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
An enjoyable read about a world very similar but not quite identical to our world. A little predictable but not bad. Fantastic description of friendship and how strong that love can be. Cute budding romantic relationships but even cuter that they're not the main focus for most of the book.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Sexual assault, Death, Death of parent, and Child abuse
ilvy's review
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.25
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, and Rape
Minor: Death of parent
iridium's review against another edition
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Don't have much to say about this one. (EDIT: Lol I always say this, don't I?)
As others have said, the atmosphere of this one was pretty great. A lot of the language was very lush and moody. I really loved this approach to magic. Also, I was surprised by how much genuine tension there was in this setup. Leno really made me care about this bird.
Some of the elements of the world-building did feel a little strange to me, but it was one of those things where I think it was because of the genre.
Elements that felt weird:
-So no Fernweh ever had a son or a brother? OK, I guess....
-Email exists but isn't really a part of this book. Like it feels sort of technology-less for a while. I guess that was a deliberate choice.
-I feel like, given the size of this community, everyone would have a Fernweh ancestor, right? So like the whole island would be magic. Or at least its female population.
-The big one: the notion that no Fernweh woman had been off the island, the notion that the high school students had never been off the island, the idea that anyone at all on By-The-Sea had lived to age eighteen without being off the island. I know that the book says they have all the things they need right there, but I just don't buy that. I really think it might have been realistic if there was a city or a town on the mainland that people would take a ferry to in order to go to the mall or whatever. I know that strict realism isn't quite the point of books like this, but you could still work that town into the book's ethereal premise, like maybe the larger, mainland county seat of On-The-Coast (or whatever) would be full of mundane people who look down on the islanders because they don't Get It. If nothing else, I feel like at some point a bored teenager would try to get off the island just for the hell of it, just to see what it was like, just to take a train ride to Boston or whatever the nearest big city is.
I noticed some other reviewers tagged this as POC rep? I guess there was the cop, maybe I'm forgetting someone else. Other than that, it's very WASPy. It doesn't say where By-The-Sea is or what state it takes place in, but I imagined By-The-Sea as being a Martha's Vineyard-type place, and while Martha's Vineyard does have a permanent Native population and a significant holiday-home black population, it's stereotypically pretty white, and I suppose the smaller nearby islands are even whiter. Kind of a strange thing to leave unacknowledged in a book like this, though.
Things I liked:
-LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION! Aside from those other quibbles, I really loved the world of By-The-Sea. I could totally imagine it.
-The prose. Descriptive and poetic.
-The family. I loved Georgina and Mary's relationship. It was sweet and loving without being saccharine or unrealistic. I also really liked the mom.
-The magic. Good stuff. I'm not sure that I'd classify this as "magical realism" as others have been doing, just because of a few too-grounded elements like Mary worrying about hiding her floating power from her future college roommate, but it does have a similar, liminal-feeling sort of vibe. A different approach to fantasy within the YA genre.
Things I didn't like:
-Sometimes the dialogue could get a little forced. Just a little, but it stands out all the more against the backdrop of this effortless sort of prose.
-I dunno, I feel like Georgina and Prue, like, barely knew each other? I guess the romance wasn't the point, but still.
-Lines about how men make war, men hide behind guns and also use nuclear weapons... I don't know, I found that all a bit much. I'm not looking at it from a #NotAllMen sort of perspective, necessarily, I'm just saying that it seems sort of spurious as far as arguments go. Luckily, there wasn't a whole lot of this in the book.
- I wasn't really surprised that everybody sided with Mary at the trial like the book seemed to expect you to. The book didn't build up this expectation that Mary wouldn't be believed. This is where a larger, oblivious town might have come in handy for the plot.
Now, let's talk about the Thing.
So I had skipped to the end and seen the acknowledgements page, and as such I knew that there would be assault in this book. It kind of turned the book into a whodunit for me. And Peter was the obvious suspect. Then it turned out he did it. The book didn't wrong-foot you at all. I was waiting for it to be Harrison, just as a twist, and then the moral of the story is that Anyone might be a rapist, even someone who Seems Like They Would Never Do That, and then there would be tension between Georgina and Prue about it. But that's not what happens. And if it wasn't Harrison, maybe it could have been another woman, or one of the offhandedly mentioned male characters like the mayor. But no, it's just the obvious guy, and the book never even tries to establish any kind of red herring.
Roger Ebert wrote this review of Radio Flyer that I thought about while reading this book. Basically, Radio Flyer is another fantastical (arguably magical-realism) sort of story, where a little boy who is abused by his stepdad is going to try to use a Radio Flyer wagon to fly into space (and he does have some reason to believe this might work). But then, where would the movie go from there? Either the kid gets to space, in which case, the movie is suggesting that you can escape child abuse through magic, or the kid doesn't make it, in which case the moral of the story is that child abuse always wins. Would Summer of Salt pull a Radio Flyer at the end? To be honest, I'm not sure whether that's what happened. I did really like the ending, though. But I'm not sure how to feel about the way it handled sexual assault. What does this metaphor imply about sexual assault survivors? I honestly have no idea. But I did like the ending a lot. It also must be said that Summer of Salt kinda sounds like Summer Assault, and if that's on purpose it's a little tasteless.
I did really enjoy this book. Might be the kind of YA that could appeal to non-YA fans.
As others have said, the atmosphere of this one was pretty great. A lot of the language was very lush and moody. I really loved this approach to magic. Also, I was surprised by how much genuine tension there was in this setup. Leno really made me care about this bird.
Some of the elements of the world-building did feel a little strange to me, but it was one of those things where I think it was because of the genre.
Elements that felt weird:
-So no Fernweh ever had a son or a brother? OK, I guess....
-Email exists but isn't really a part of this book. Like it feels sort of technology-less for a while. I guess that was a deliberate choice.
-I feel like, given the size of this community, everyone would have a Fernweh ancestor, right? So like the whole island would be magic. Or at least its female population.
-The big one: the notion that no Fernweh woman had been off the island, the notion that the high school students had never been off the island, the idea that anyone at all on By-The-Sea had lived to age eighteen without being off the island. I know that the book says they have all the things they need right there, but I just don't buy that. I really think it might have been realistic if there was a city or a town on the mainland that people would take a ferry to in order to go to the mall or whatever. I know that strict realism isn't quite the point of books like this, but you could still work that town into the book's ethereal premise, like maybe the larger, mainland county seat of On-The-Coast (or whatever) would be full of mundane people who look down on the islanders because they don't Get It. If nothing else, I feel like at some point a bored teenager would try to get off the island just for the hell of it, just to see what it was like, just to take a train ride to Boston or whatever the nearest big city is.
I noticed some other reviewers tagged this as POC rep? I guess there was the cop, maybe I'm forgetting someone else. Other than that, it's very WASPy. It doesn't say where By-The-Sea is or what state it takes place in, but I imagined By-The-Sea as being a Martha's Vineyard-type place, and while Martha's Vineyard does have a permanent Native population and a significant holiday-home black population, it's stereotypically pretty white, and I suppose the smaller nearby islands are even whiter. Kind of a strange thing to leave unacknowledged in a book like this, though.
Things I liked:
-LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION! Aside from those other quibbles, I really loved the world of By-The-Sea. I could totally imagine it.
-The prose. Descriptive and poetic.
-The family. I loved Georgina and Mary's relationship. It was sweet and loving without being saccharine or unrealistic. I also really liked the mom.
-The magic. Good stuff. I'm not sure that I'd classify this as "magical realism" as others have been doing, just because of a few too-grounded elements like Mary worrying about hiding her floating power from her future college roommate, but it does have a similar, liminal-feeling sort of vibe. A different approach to fantasy within the YA genre.
Things I didn't like:
-Sometimes the dialogue could get a little forced. Just a little, but it stands out all the more against the backdrop of this effortless sort of prose.
-I dunno, I feel like Georgina and Prue, like, barely knew each other? I guess the romance wasn't the point, but still.
-Lines about how men make war, men hide behind guns and also use nuclear weapons... I don't know, I found that all a bit much. I'm not looking at it from a #NotAllMen sort of perspective, necessarily, I'm just saying that it seems sort of spurious as far as arguments go. Luckily, there wasn't a whole lot of this in the book.
- I wasn't really surprised that everybody sided with Mary at the trial like the book seemed to expect you to. The book didn't build up this expectation that Mary wouldn't be believed. This is where a larger, oblivious town might have come in handy for the plot.
Now, let's talk about the Thing.
So I had skipped to the end and seen the acknowledgements page, and as such I knew that there would be assault in this book. It kind of turned the book into a whodunit for me. And Peter was the obvious suspect. Then it turned out he did it. The book didn't wrong-foot you at all. I was waiting for it to be Harrison, just as a twist, and then the moral of the story is that Anyone might be a rapist, even someone who Seems Like They Would Never Do That, and then there would be tension between Georgina and Prue about it. But that's not what happens. And if it wasn't Harrison, maybe it could have been another woman, or one of the offhandedly mentioned male characters like the mayor. But no, it's just the obvious guy, and the book never even tries to establish any kind of red herring.
Roger Ebert wrote this review of Radio Flyer that I thought about while reading this book. Basically, Radio Flyer is another fantastical (arguably magical-realism) sort of story, where a little boy who is abused by his stepdad is going to try to use a Radio Flyer wagon to fly into space (and he does have some reason to believe this might work). But then, where would the movie go from there? Either the kid gets to space, in which case, the movie is suggesting that you can escape child abuse through magic, or the kid doesn't make it, in which case the moral of the story is that child abuse always wins. Would Summer of Salt pull a Radio Flyer at the end? To be honest, I'm not sure whether that's what happened. I did really like the ending, though. But I'm not sure how to feel about the way it handled sexual assault. What does this metaphor imply about sexual assault survivors? I honestly have no idea. But I did like the ending a lot. It also must be said that Summer of Salt kinda sounds like Summer Assault, and if that's on purpose it's a little tasteless.
I did really enjoy this book. Might be the kind of YA that could appeal to non-YA fans.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent and Rape
cgbr's review
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, and Cursing
Minor: Rape, Death of parent, and Grief