A review by shahnamarie
The Myth of Perpetual Summer by Susan Crandall

4.0

I was glad to pick this up and get back to some Historical Fiction. I love it as I always reiterate every time I do a review on a Historical Fiction book. Two pages in and I was already getting hooked. My obsession with the Manson murders is real and on page one, Tallulah starts speaking of how people can be brainwashed into doing senseless actions. I stated thinking of the Manson murders, and then as I turned the page, it was brought up itself. I wss hooked instantly. This instant connection was lost quickly though as the story had very little Historical Fiction aspects and little murder. It was more about a very dysfunctional family and how people's lives are changed and molded based on these experiences. 
The story goes back and forth from past and their present. The past part started a little slower for me than their present time. There was a lot of background information needed to understand character dynamics and so forth. The children's' lives were sad and it helped make sense of the current events. Tallulah's relationship with Maisie was so innocent and naive for the time making it hard to read knowing the underlying issues that their friendship would eventually endure.
The chapters that take place in the past are indeed important and necessary but I didn't find myself as interested. In the first half of the book, it was a large chunk of information that I wasn't really loving. I actually felt like I got more of a sense of important happenings in the past that shaped their present in conversations between Tallulah and Ross that are taking place in the more recent time period chapters.
As the book continued, I felt a tad let down. It was definitely interesting and I did enjoy the story in its entirety but it definitely veered away from the murder brought up in the beginning and focuses more on Tallulah and her life making her who she is and her siblings are in the present chapters. There's nothing wrong with this but I was looking more for what would be going on with that entire situation.
As the past chapters are important, the information is necessary but I feel like much of these chapters have extra "fluff" as I call it. The Civil Rights Movement is of little importance to the novel itself and the Maise relationship is unfortunately underdeveloped making it seem kind of pointless all together.
With that being said, I was still interested in what I was reading. I was just expecting something a little more suspenseful maybe. I set myself up for that though and that shouldn't take away from reading this novel.
Crandall does do a good job with some character development and then leaves some characters (possibly intentionally) very vague. As for the story itself, it's interesting to notice some differences in the time period as Tallulah's dad was screaming manic depressive disorder from the beginning for me. As the book centers around the dysfunctional family, it's also very sad that much of the dysfunction really centers around mental illness. The taboo of being mentally ill is so strong especially in our novel's time period. It's disheartening to recognize this in the novel not only with the father but other characters as well.
The ending for me was a bit rushed. Everything fell into place all at once and randomly. Things came back to the surface that was long forgotten about and the solution was thrown out immediately for all of it. I would have liked more of a an buildup to the end and less information and stories that didn't have a direct hit to the problems and solutions.
I still think the novel is pretty solid and enjoyed the read. I do suggest it.