Belly measures her life in summers. Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August. Winters are simply a time to count the weeks until the next summer, a place away from the beach house, away from Susannah, and most importantly, away from Jeremiah and Conrad. They are the boys that Belly has known since her very first summer–they have been her brother figures, her crushes, and everything in between. But one summer, one terrible and wonderful summer, the more everything changes, the more it all ends up just the way it should have been all along.
My Review
“Would you rather live one perfect day over and over or live your life with no perfect days but just decent ones?”
I started reading ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ because I felt like a reading slump was heading my way and a couple of people told me that this would be the perfect book to read in such a situation. And it actually is because this was such a quick read and I finished it in less than a day. It’s also a perfect summer read that you can enjoy while spending your time on the beach.
But even though it was a cute book, it was also very cliché and often quite predictable. But that wasn’t the worst thing about this book because it’s something I can usually live with. The worst thing was definitely the main character, Belly. She was such an annoying character and such a whiny little brat. I know that this is a coming of age novel and many girls that age might tend to behave like her but in my opinion, she was just way over to the top. She was complaining so much, she literally made me want to rip my hair out at some points.
Belly was constantly going on about how badly the boys were treating her, how they were always treating her like a child (though she was the one that constantly acted like a 9-year-old) and how they never asked her to come along when going somewhere. She literally made them responsible for everything she didn’t like, for example how she didn’t know anyone in the town they spend their summer breaks in because it would’ve been their job to take her to parties … like seriously though, what the hell? She can walk and talk, she should’ve left the house herself and made her own friends in that town instead of spending all her summer sulking because the three boys just preferred doing their own things.
She was literally such a pain in the neck, I think she was even more annoying than America from the Selection series and I actually thought that was impossible.
All of this just made me feel like I was way too old for this book and I really don’t know if I’ll actually continue this series even though I liked the other characters. I loved Conrad, Jeremiah and Steven and I also think that this book was generally very well written. But because of the main character and the fact that I felt a little too old for the entire story, I can only give TSITP 2.5 out of 5 stars.
(PS: I’m sorry about the fact that half of this review is just me complaining about the MC but she was literally driving me insane!)
Have you already read ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ and did you like it?
