Veena’s review of For the Love of Summer by Susan Mallery
Women’s Fiction published by MIRA 04 Jun 24
Could you find yourself living together with your husband’s ex-wife? Or even actually becoming friends with her? As this book shows, anything is possible if the intermediary is someone you both love and don’t want to disappoint. That friendship thing is more about chemistry and compatibility, I think, but let’s go through Ms. Mallery’s take on it.
Erica is a successful entrepreneur and businesswoman. Having run a successful business myself, I’m impressed with the way Ms. Mallery showcases Erica’s leadership skills when an employee messes up. Sometimes it’s little things like this that draw a reader into a story, and that’s what happened for me. Despite her business success, Erica is struggling on the family front, when her daughter Summer seems to spend more and more time with her father’s family.
Then boom! Summer’s father is arrested and her stepmother, who is heavily pregnant, is left with nothing, not even enough money to take care of her little family. Summer persuades her mother to take in Alison to live with them, resulting in a strange living situation. The family dynamics are interesting as relationships change and evolve.
Once bitten twice shy, Erica has a friend with benefits relationship that everyone but her knows means more to her partner than he shows. I really like the way the story plays out and how everything comes together perfectly.
This is a feel-good read with no pressure.
Grade: B
Summary:
As the owner of Twisted, Seattle’s best salons, Erica knows that the sharpest cuts come from the people we love. She’s terrified that she’s losing her teen daughter, Summer, to her “other” family, especially to her stepmom, Allison.
All it takes to blow up Allison’s happy life is one collect call. From prison. Her beloved husband, Peter, has been arrested, leaving Allison pregnant, broke, scared and alone with a toddler. But when her stepdaughter ferrets out the truth, the teen rushes to the last person Allison wants to ask for help—her husband’s battle-ax ex.
Erica would do anything for Summer, even take in the woman her daughter loves like a second mom. Allison feels intimidated by Erica—a woman who would never let herself become so dependent on a man. But the more time they spend together, the more Allison realizes what Erica truly needs is a friend. Can two women who married the same man move beyond their complicated past and rethink what it means to be family?
No excerpt available.
