A review by sammyl
The Summer Garden by Paullina Simons

2.0

Let me begin by saying that I was and still am a huge fan of the first novel of this series, "The Bronze Horsemen". I fell in love with the characters and couldn't stop thinking about them. After I had finished reading the book I took about another three weeks to start another novel simply because I didn't want to let go of Alexander and Tatiana's love story... but you guys aren't reading this to hear me gush about "The Bronze Horseman". With that being said, I disliked (for lack of a better word since hate is too strong word of a word) "The Summer Garden". All of the reasons why I fell in love with the characters in the first novel are eradicated in this novel. Honestly, this novel had no real plot. The story was all over the place. It is as if Paullina Simons realized she was becoming rich off these books and just continued the story for the sake of continuing that cash flow. Alexander became a complete douche bag, which is kind of understandable considering the experiences he's had. Despite this there are some situations that Paullina put him in that were totally unnecessary. As a matter of fact there were a lot of events in this book that were completely unnecessary to me such as the chapters that featured Saika, the attempted attack on Alexander and Tatiana, the telling of the grandchildren's lives, etc. I really believe Paullina had nothing to write about so she included certain events to make the book lengthy. As for Tatiana she became a complete insubordinate to Alexander and literally tolerated anything he did to her. There were some enjoyable parts. I liked how Alexander saved Anthony, albeit it was very unrealistic that at his age he would have been able to do so. I also liked the way the story ended the series similar to the way Tatiana and Alexander met. Overall, this book was exhausting and took me about three months to read. Reading certain parts were absolute complete torture. I advise anyone who loved "The Bronze Horseman" as much as I did to not read this book. It will ruin the series for you. If I had to do it all over I would not read past the first book… but if you must at least stop at the second book and spare yourself the torture i allowed myself to endure.