Reviews with content warning for Gaslighting - Hurricane Summer

Hurricane Summer by Asha Bromfield is a brilliant, blistering debut.
Seventeen year old Canadian teen Tilla and her nine year old sister Mia have been sent to stay with their father in the countryside of Jamaica for the summer. Tilla expects she may have to confront how she feels about the father that is largely absent from herself, her mother and her sister’s lives, but she isn’t prepared for what awaits her in country: people that view her as a privileged foreigner and a multitude of secrets that her presence threatens to expose.
First love, friendship and exploring the land (Bromfield gives readers gorgeous descriptions of Manchester, Jamaica) are amongst the more tender parts of this novel, however it is a story that reckons with a lot of trauma.
Described as a coming of age story that examines the transition from girlhood to a young woman and the complicated relationship between a young woman and her absent father, Hurricane Summer also tackles colourism, sexism, misogyny, infidelity, domestic abuse, incest, abortion, sexual assault, immigration, abandonment, grief, poverty, class, privilege and more.
Not all of the issues are adequately covered, however I admire the authors attempt to raise awareness to these serious issues to a young adult audience.
The patois is accurate and Bromfield captures the easy humour of Jamaicans very well. Tilla’s story is quite an extreme depiction of reactions to people ‘from foreign’, though I do feel Bromfield shows what it feels like to be the butt of a joke everyone appears to be in on.

Andres death was unfortunate as he was the only consistently kind character and didn’t get to experience a different kind of life away from the hostility he was exposed to. There could have been a different way to show readers Tilla’s growth without killing him.

An unexpected standout for me was a moment between Tilla and her father where she confronts him about him abandoning their family in Canada. It was a sad yet necessary conversation that was more melancholy for its lack of resolution.
I wanted Tilla to stand up for herself earlier than she did, but I can appreciate that she’s a teenager in a new surrounding without much allies. Toward the end, the book becomes more dramatic and poetic in terms of language which is quite a departure from the tone of the rest of the book, which I don’t think totally works.
Much like a hurricane, this story is powerful and sweeps readers along for an emotional ride.
Hurricane Summer is a coming of age story that I will be thinking about for a long time. I am glad to have read it.

Content Warnings

piperlee's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

2.0

This was a really beautifully written story of self-discovery, courage, and learning to derive purpose from oneself & not others. The growth of the mc was powerful & her narration full of raw emotion.

And it was extremely heavy. I think too heavy for me. It felt like 90% struggle and despair with only 10% of joy and redemption. So much trauma was fit into one storyline, & mixed with the mc’s own internal dialogue of self-doubt and depression…it was hard for me to get through.

**do not read this if sexual assault is a triggering topic for you** there was graphic on-page description & emotional abuse and gaslighting afterward from basically everyone about the incident. It never was resolved & the truth about what happened was never shared which created a snowball effect of shaming and lies. I felt it was handled poorly & was very disturbing to read.

Trauma felt like a device for growth & I take issue with that. And when there is so much trauma fit into one story, it felt like a lot was glossed over & not properly dealt with. The ending especially felt over the top & incredibly distressing simply for the point of the mc’s development.

Further, I didn’t like any of the characters. There were obvious antagonists that we’re not supposed to like, but even the mc…she wasn’t likable. The only character I felt drawn to was Andre.

So I’m giving this a low rating because I had a hard time enjoying it. But it was very well written & the theme of redemption and freedom in the end is important. I listened to the audiobook read by the author & that was also very well done & added to the intensity and emotion of it all.

Content Warnings

bookwormbullet's review

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challenging dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Wow. What a heartbreakingly beautiful book. I went into Hurricane Summer with no expectations other than a glance over previous reviews and finished this in one sitting. Many reviewers stated how there are a lot of potential triggers in the book, and I do wish I had taken those warnings more seriously because this book is very explicit for a Young Adult book. There are no content warnings attached to the book, so here is a list of TWs: rape (explicit, on-page), sexual assault (explicit, on-page), physical abuse & domestic violence (explicit, on-page), slut-shaming (explicit, on-page), colorism & racism (explicit, on-page), bullying, death (drowning, off-page), gaslighting (explicit, on-page), and cheating. I would definitely recommend this book for readers 16/17+ and do agree that this probably should have been marketed as New Adult even though Tilla is 17 years old in the novel.

Asha Bromfield does a really good job of explicitly portraying what many people of color who are a part of the diaspora of their home country go through when they have to balance both of their identities (in Tilla’s case, her Canadian identity vs. her Jamaican identity) while traveling to and from their home country. I also liked how Tilla’s feelings regarding her identity and her relationship with her father naturally contrasted with Mia’s feelings. The relationship Tilla has with her father was really devastating. Her father, frankly, was a horrible father to her and Mia and as much as I wanted Tilla to unleash all her rage on him and get back at him for treating her so horribly, I understand why she forgave him and told him that she loved him at the end of the novel. It’s a feeling many children of immigrants feel--that even though their parents may not be the most perfect parents to exist, they still love them for sacrificing their livelihoods and moving to a country they know nothing about, all in the hopes of ensuring that their children have a better life.

It was also really hard to read about Tilla’s relationship with her relatives back in Jamaica, but still relatable. I’ve also experienced this line of disconnect between children of immigrants and their extended family who still live back in their home country, especially when these two parties don’t see each other often. I was so happy that Tilla at least had Andre while she was in Jamaica, especially after witnessing how both of them are treated by their relatives, but my heart completely broke at the end of the novel. I really have to admire Tilla for still acknowledging how much Jamaica has strengthened her after everything she endured that summer.

As stated, this book is definitely relatable for those of us who are children of immigrants. Please take the content warnings seriously if you choose to read this and only read this if you are in the right headspace to take it all in, because it was really heavy. I’d give Hurricane Summer four stars overall!

Content Warnings

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