Reviews with content warning for Cursing - Cool for the Summer

I’m not going to lie, originally I bought this book because the cover screamed bi vibes and I just couldn’t not read it then. I absolutely loved this book. It was such a lovely read. It was lighthearted and the humor was very much on point and it even had a great happy ending that did not disappoint. There really wasn’t anything I disliked to be honest. I loved reading the glimpses of then and seeing how much Larissa changed and started questioning things and figuring them out eventually. It was also rather nice reading about an MC that didn’t worry about labels so much and just went with it. Overall this was easily one of my new favorites.

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sierranorgan's review against another edition

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emotional funny reflective relaxing fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.75

Absolutely loved this book! Listened to it on audio (my first audiobook!) and really enjoyed it. Wished we could’ve had more time with some of the characters than we did though, so I’d love like a novela of these two!

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leahlovesloslibros's review against another edition

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lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

If you're looking for a cute, easy summer read, this is it. Dahlia Adler bottled up teenage yearning and newfound queerness in the cutest way in this semi-retelling of the classic movie Grease. High school senior Lara has been pining after Chase Harding for years, and is thrilled when she returns from a summer in the Outer Banks to find that he finally returns her interest. After all these years of doing nothing but dreaming of being on the arm of the dreamy quarterback, she can hardly believe that she "got him." However, when Lara's summer fling, Jasmine, shows up as a new student at her school for senior year, Lara's world is quickly turned upside down. She should be ecstatic that she finally has Chase all to herself, but she can't stop thinking about Jasmine....

The back-and-forth that Lara goes through when trying to decide between Chase and Jasmine is relatable, even if you are not queer; having to pick between two individuals of interest is a difficult situation to be in. Add in the fact that she is trying to decide between a guy and a girl, and that's what makes this story unique, especially since she had never been interested in girls before Jasmine, so [potentially] being queer is uncharted territory.

While I mostly enjoyed the storyline, as well as the dual timeline, I thought that the character development fell a bit short. In most cases, the relationships between the characters (family, friends, and partners) were just kind of flat or surface-level, in my opinion. I also sometimes felt like the diversity was a bit tokenized; like diverse characters were mentioned here and there, but not really fleshed out more to celebrate their diversity.

Overall, I did enjoy this book and would recommend it as a light, breezy read for summer or even fall.

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