A review by brinleywrites
That Summer Feeling by Bridget Morrissey

emotional reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

When I read the premise of That Summer Feeling by Bridget Morrissey, the concept excited me. I wanted to love this book. A book about a sapphic romance at a summer camp for adults sounded like it was written specifically for my tastes... It wasn’t.

Garland, a recently divorced third-something, looking to start fresh and live out her summer camp dreams of her childhood. But Garland isn’t like most women, she believes in fate. At the camp, Garland runs into a man, who she randomly met at the airport when she was heading off to her honeymoon and when they met, Garland felt like she could see their future together. But instead of developing feelings for this man, Garland has a crush on his sister, Stevie. 

The implicit promise of this novel is capturing the concept of “that summer feeling.” The inexplicable feeling of running around bare-foot in your parents’ backyard. Holding hands on the dock at camp. Kissing a girl for the first time under a tree. It’s driving with the windows down as Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift plays loudly. It’s a feeling that is often impossible to recreate and capture as an adult. The book seeks to have the characters catch this feeling and have the readers feel this emotion as well. That Summer Feeling fails to do this. 

For a book identified as “adult” and a lot of the characters are canonically in their thirties, the characters read late teens to mid-twenties. The conversations and language feel stilted. I love the idea of giving characters in their thirties a spotlight. I love allowing people to find love past twenty-five, but That Summer Feeling doesn’t do that. Simply put, they don’t seem like realistic thirty-year-olds. 
The characters are flat, and I mean all the characters. For example, the Nook brothers, as I refer to them (Tim & Tommy are their real names in the book just like Timmy & Tommy from Animal Crossing), felt like caricatures with no real development. Also, Garland spent too much time thinking about the past and future rather than the present. I cannot tell you one thing about her character besides the fact that she was married, divorced, had a sister, and a bumper sticker that read “honk if you’re divorced!” I struggled to understand who she was for those reasons. The rest of the characters just felt like they were there to fill up empty space. Perhaps this is the challenge of writing a standalone book that takes place at a summer camp.

Let’s talk romance…. If I had realised this book was “instant-love,” I probably wouldn’t have requested it. The pacing of Garland and Stevie’s relationship was way too fast. As someone who loved summer camp, I understand that a single day can feel like a week (I believe this is actually something the book did well); but the rollercoaster instant speed Stevie and Garland fell in love felt too unrealistic even for summer camp. The book made one self-aware comment about “U-Hauling” (IYKYK), but a one-off comment wasn’t enough for me to suspend my disbelief. 

Again, I think the book’s main issue, besides the instant love, was its scope. The book didn’t explore any plotline with depth. Because of this lack of depth and character development, I didn’t find myself falling in love with the characters. I also struggled to keep reading this book at times. It just felt way too unrealistic and the characters often read as 16-21 to me. The concept was good, but the execution was lacking. I wouldn’t recommend this book. It was “meh.” 

Thank you to Berkley Romance and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. This book will be out on May 30th, 2023. 
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