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A review by bottomofthebookshelf
Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner
2.0
*Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for giving me this eARC in exchange for an honest review*
Big Summer follows a plus sized social media influencer named Daphne as she attends the wedding of an ex-friend who bullied her in the past. I liked some of the messages of this book about body positivity and social media culture, but other than that I really didn’t enjoy this book. I feel like I’m the minority, as this book as so many positive reviews but this just wasn’t for me. I found myself struggling to get into the story and didn’t even really want to pick the book back up multiple times while reading.
First of all, I wasn’t a fan of any characters in this book. Even the main character Daphne criticizes society for being judgemental, yet is extremely judgemental herself. She also makes silly decisions the entire book and it was so frustrating to read about, especially when it comes to doing things that could get her in trouble. Also, I found every character of colour in this book to be pretty stereotypical. For example, the only Asian character in the book has parents who disowned her for not becoming a doctor.
On top of this, I didn’t like the writing style of this book. There were so many flashbacks in the first half that I was losing track of what the present story was. There was even flashbacks inside flashbacks at some points. The genre also changes half way through the book from contemporary/romance to a murder mystery which I did not enjoy. A lot of the plot points in the mystery portion of the book just weren’t realistic or believable, especially that ending. Throwing in a twist ending doesn’t work if it’s a complete stretch and unbelievable. There’s also a alternate timeline in the first chapter that ends up barely meaning anything to the story and I just didn’t understand the point of it. Overall, I was quite disappointed by this book and do not recommend it.
Big Summer follows a plus sized social media influencer named Daphne as she attends the wedding of an ex-friend who bullied her in the past. I liked some of the messages of this book about body positivity and social media culture, but other than that I really didn’t enjoy this book. I feel like I’m the minority, as this book as so many positive reviews but this just wasn’t for me. I found myself struggling to get into the story and didn’t even really want to pick the book back up multiple times while reading.
First of all, I wasn’t a fan of any characters in this book. Even the main character Daphne criticizes society for being judgemental, yet is extremely judgemental herself. She also makes silly decisions the entire book and it was so frustrating to read about, especially when it comes to doing things that could get her in trouble. Also, I found every character of colour in this book to be pretty stereotypical. For example, the only Asian character in the book has parents who disowned her for not becoming a doctor.
On top of this, I didn’t like the writing style of this book. There were so many flashbacks in the first half that I was losing track of what the present story was. There was even flashbacks inside flashbacks at some points. The genre also changes half way through the book from contemporary/romance to a murder mystery which I did not enjoy. A lot of the plot points in the mystery portion of the book just weren’t realistic or believable, especially that ending. Throwing in a twist ending doesn’t work if it’s a complete stretch and unbelievable. There’s also a alternate timeline in the first chapter that ends up barely meaning anything to the story and I just didn’t understand the point of it. Overall, I was quite disappointed by this book and do not recommend it.