An Endless Summer - Review

An Endless Summer (Summer, # 2)

By: CJ Duggan

Published: July 11th 2013

311 pages

Genre: Young Adult, New Adult, Contemporary

Source: Personal Kindle Library

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Goodreads description--Sean looked out over the lake, squinting against the sunlight. He turned to me, his expression sobering as his eyes flicked over my face in a silent study.

“Come on Amy, I saved you once, I’ll save you again.”
I met his stare unflinchingly. “I don’t need saving.”
A wicked grin formed slowly. “Don’t you?”

After a rebellious summer night that almost claimed her life, Amy Henderson – the Onslow publican’s only daughter – is sent away to suffer a fate far worse than any other punishment:

Boarding School.

Three years on, a now nineteen-year-old Amy returns to Onslow for the summer. What once was a cauldron of activity with live bands, hot meals and cold beers, the Onslow Hotel now lies dark, deserted and depressing. All fond childhood memories of loitering on the hotel stairs and eavesdropping on customers’ colourful conversations are in the distant past.

How had her dad let it come to this?

With the new threat of putting the Onslow up for sale, Amy reluctantly turns to a local tradesman for help: Sean Murphy, the very same Onslow boy who saved her life all those years ago. With his help and that of some old friends, the task is clear: spend the summer building the hotel back up to its former glory or lose it for good.

In an endless summer, Amy soon realises that sometimes in order to save your future, you have to face your past, even if it’s in the form of a smug, gorgeous Onslow boy.

I didn’t really read the description for An Endless Summer except to see that this was Amy and Sean’s story. Sean was one of my favorite characters from The Boys of Summer so I was excited to read his story. In The Boys of Summer, Tess was concerned about the age difference between her and Toby, but then Amy was at least two years younger than Tess. So that means Amy is about 6 or 7 years younger than Sean. Again, the age difference doesn’t bother me. I’ve said plenty of times, my husband is 12 years older than me. But I guess I was just surprised that Amy would end up being the girl for Sean.

After having finished The Boys of Summer I kept getting the nagging feeling like I really needed to continue with this series sooner rather than later. And being the mood reader that I am, I followed my mood. And I’m glad that I did. An Endless Summer was a very enjoyable read. As the description says, the Onslow Hotel, which was the main setting for The Boys of Summer, has fallen into disrepair. Amy’s father has left hotel maintenance in the hands of an incapable and untrustworthy manager. Her father has focused his attention of late upon saving his marriage to Amy’s mother, and I’m not sure anyone can blame him for that. But the Onslow is Amy’s home. She’s never really felt at home in the city or at the boarding school she was sent to after a drunken, near death experience. And so when Amy needs a break from life in the city, she returns to the Onslow. What she finds breaks her heart, and she puts her all into repairing and restoring the Onslow back to its former glory.

Of course, Amy isn’t alone in the repairing and restoration process. Sean Murphy who also happened to be the one to save her from her drunken drowning incedent that sent her off to boarding school happens to be just returning to town himself. He’s successfully built a construction and contracting business that has made him pretty wealthy. And Sean brings his new skills and success to Amy’s rescue again. Amy doesn’t want to be indebted to Sean again. And this particular aspect annoyed me because sometimes you just need to accept help, but I also found myself proud of Amy because some things you just need to do yourself. She’s not completely a spoiled princess. She’s willing to get her hands dirty and work hard in order to see this project through to the end, but at the same time, she’s always been provided for and never really had to worry about money or necessities. Those things were always taken care of by her parents.

Similarly to The Boys of Summer, I loved the slow building relationship that Sean and Amy have. Sean definitely clues in a lot sooner than Amy does, but you can see her resistence to the idea is more about protecting her heart than anything else. Amy is feisty and essentially just what funny-boy Sean needs and wants. She doesn’t take his bull, but he doesn’t allow her any slack either. While these two do have a physical relationship, this book is not very descriptive when it comes to those scenes which I appreciate. I would definitely say because the of the physical relationship as well as their ages, I would classify this as a new adult book, but because the lack of description during these physical scenes, I would classify this as one of the tamest new adult series I’ve ever read.

Fans of Contemporary Romance everywhere will enjoy this series. I wasn’t particularly surprised by any of the events, and I think Sean’s backstory could have been explored a bit more, but other than that, this series has just been a joy to read. There haven’t been any moments when I’ve been too annoyed or frustrated with the characters. And there haven’t been any conflicts that felt like they were thrown in for the sake of having SOME kind of conflict.

An Endless Summer easily gets 4 Stars from me. I can’t wait to continue forward with this series. I don’t know that Chris has been a favorite character over the last two books, but I’m sure that will change when I delve into his book with That One Summer. I can see myself going ahead and purchasing that one soon. Have you read An Endless Summer? What did you think? Let me know!