Story for the Week
I have blogged about my very best friend Stephanie a lot…too much to even include all the links to previous blog posts. (The Best Friends Become Your Family, Feeling a Little (Maybe a Lot) Warm and Fuzzy, Are You Who Your Friends Think You Are?—you get the idea.)
There are some people who come into your life and become permanent fixtures. Stephanie is that for me—the non-biological sister who is a sister just the same. Corinne and I were talking a few weeks ago about being angry with people, like so angry that you don’t want to talk to them ever, you block them on everything, you want nothing to do with them going forward. I’m not sure how the topic came up, but it started about parents. I told her that I don’t recall ever being legitimately angry with my parents, let alone so angry that I wouldn’t talk to them.
That’s how we got to the Stephanie conversation. In the almost 40 years we’ve known each other 😲, I only recall being mad at her twice…and not even close to mad enough to stop talking to her. On the other hand, before my husband passed away, I gave him the silent treatment more than once. 🤣
What is it about your closest friends that make you more likely to let things slide, more likely to forgive and forget, than the person you vow to spend the rest of your life with? I literally can’t imagine my life without Stephanie in it.
And this type of friendship isn’t unusual as far as I can tell. If it was, you wouldn’t see examples of it in television, movies, and books. A couple of the best examples I can think of come from Grey’s Anatomy. If you’ve never seen it, first of all, I’m shocked, but second of all, you should at least watch the first dozen seasons or so. (The later seasons are questionable, but I’m invested now and can’t stop until it’s over.)
At the end of season 1, we find out that Derek Shepherd (who has been seeing Meredith Grey) is married. His wife shows up in Seattle in the season finale, and viewers find out in season 2 that Derek left New York because his wife Addison cheated on him with his best friend. Cue the love triangle, the fights, the tears. In season 3, the best friend Mark Sloan shows up, but he eventually tells Derek that he didn’t come to Seattle for Addison. He came for Derek. “I didn’t come to Seattle for Addison, I didn’t come to Seattle to be chief. I came to Seattle for you, okay? I came to Seattle to get you back…I know I wanna take that back, but now, it’s been said.”
In another episode, when Christina Yang (Meredith’s best friend) says she and Meredith are close and to ask anyone, Derek interjects. “Yeah, Dr. Yang and my wife sometimes have sleepovers, in my bed, with me in it.” In yet another episode, Meredith walks into the bathroom while Alex Karev is taking a shower because she needs advice.
Meredith: Alex.
Alex: Mer?
Meredith: Okay, so Izzie’s not here, and Christina’s not answering her phone, and I have a thing. So I need you to be a girl for me.
Alex: What’d he do? You want me to kick his ass?
Meredith: He wants me to have a baby.
Alex: So you do want me to kick his ass.
Meredith: Alex.
Alex: Do you want to have a baby?
Meredith: A baby doesn’t want me. I had the worst mother in the world. I would be the worst mother in the world.
Alex: Izzie wants a divorce. She sent the papers—the official papers.
Meredith: Want me to kick her ass?
And yes, all of these are fictional, so if you need a real-life example, I was talking with a friend about a situation where someone in Corinne’s class made some very inappropriate comments. I asked his opinion, and while we were talking, his son got in the car. I repeated the situation, and his son gave me his opinion. When I said, “That’s what she did,” he said, “Wait! Someone said that to Corinne? Do I need to kick someone’s ass?!” We’ve known this family since the kids were in kindergarten, and they have come through for us more than once. They’re ride-or-die for sure…and I do think he would actually be a girl for Corinne if she needed one.
In the book reviewed below, the best friends had a falling out about five years prior—complete no contact, one told the other she never wanted to see her again, and they never talked about it. Yet when they are face to face, they talk briefly and immediately fall back into their friendship as if it never happened. But they are not so forgiving with the men in their lives.
Which brings me full circle back to Stephanie. She is the person I can say anything to without judgment. And she is the person I can rely on for anything. I would kick someone’s ass for her…or I would have when I was younger and before the arthritis kicked in. 😉 Last Christmas, I bought a candle for her as part of her gift. I didn’t care how it smelled (although you can’t really go wrong with lavender). The sentiment printed on the jar mattered—meaningful and funny: “I would fight a bear for you, dear friend. ❤️ Not a grizzly. Or a brown bear. Or a panda. But maybe like a care bear? I’d fight one of those for you.”
Her birthday is coming up next weekend, so the timing of this book’s release is fortuitous because it allows me to dedicate this post to her before her birthday. 🥳
Wishing the happiest of birthdays to my very best friend, Stephanie.
I love you, and I couldn’t do life without you. 🥰
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐½
3.5 Stars for Summer After Summer by Lauren Bailey
327 pages
Publisher: Alcove Press
Publication Date: May 7, 2024
I received an advance copy of this title from NetGalley and Alcove Press in exchange for an honest review.
Publisher’s Description
Olivia Taylor’s marriage is in a death spiral when she agrees to come home to the Hamptons to help her father and sisters pack up the family estate. If it looks like she’s running away from her soon-to-be ex, Wes, and New York City, well, she is. But someone has to take care of things and that’s always been Olivia’s role in the family. After years of financial trouble, someone’s finally bailing them out with a huge offer to buy their beachfront property, which is a good thing, although it means losing the home she grew up in, where her mother died, and where she first met Fred, the love of her life.
It’s been five years since the last time things blew up between Olivia and Fred, but much longer since the first time. At this point, Olivia fears it was never meant to be, so there’s no reason to feel butterflies in her stomach at the idea of seeing him again. They’ve already tried, and tried again…and again…but she’s newly single, and she isn’t the same person she was the last time—and Fred has changed too.
This time, things will be different. Maybe, just maybe, the fifth time’s the charm.
************
Main Characters:
- Olivia Taylor – 35 years old, a teacher in New York City, was a tennis player in high school and college with her sights set on Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, felt like she was the one who had to take charge after their mother died when she was 14, left her husband after he cheated and is spending the summer helping clean out the family estate in Southampton because it has just been sold so their father can move into a smaller assisted living residence
- Charlotte Taylor – 37 years old, Olivia’s older sister, stayed at home with her father after their mother died and Olivia went off to college, called Olivia a couple weeks before in a panic because they only had two weeks to get the house packed up and cleared out
- Sophie Martin – 33 years old, Olivia’s younger sister, married to Colin and living in New York where he works in financial services but isn’t as far ahead as he could be because his father is a vice president at the same firm, Sophie is the only one of the sisters with kids, Olivia describes her as the biological link between her and Charlotte, good friends with Colin’s sister Lucy who recently started dating Fred
- Aunt Tracy – Olivia’s late mother’s best friend, was a mother figure to the sisters when they were growing up, moved to Florida for the winters several years ago
- Ashley Dale – Olivia’s childhood best friend, they had a falling out several years prior and haven’t spoken since
- Fred Webb – 37 years old, runs a successful shipping business with offices in London and the U.S., Olivia’s first love who she was on-again/off-again with over many summers, bought the estate where Olivia grew up
- Wes Taylor – Olivia’s husband, dated Charlotte briefly when they were teenagers
- Ann Clay – Charlotte’s girlfriend, a real estate attorney who brokered the deal for Fred’s purchase of Olivia’s childhood home
Can general adult fiction and romance also be a coming-of-age story? I wouldn’t have thought so until I read Lauren Bailey’s Summer After Summer.
Told in the first person from Olivia’s point of view, the story begins with Olivia driving to Southampton from New York having left her husband Wes after he cheated on her. Her family’s estate is under contract to be sold, and her father is moving into an assisted living facility, so Olivia and her sisters plan to pack up the house for the sale. When Olivia arrives in Southampton, Charlotte informs her that the property sold for $25 million, each of them would get $5 million, and the buyer is Olivia’s former love Fred. 😲
From there, the story shifts to 20 years prior, just before Olivia’s 16th birthday when she meets Fred. Thus begins their on-again/off-again love story, with life events putting them in the same place every five years or so. Each time they meet, their love story is passionate…and ends with devastating heartbreak (not a spoiler).
We know that eventually they permanently go their separate ways since Olivia is a teacher and married to Wes (see, not a spoiler). Fred is successful enough in business that he paid $25 million for Olivia’s family home. We also know, since this is a romance, that they should end up together.
Olivia has a lot to sort through before they can be together. Packing up her childhood home, including her mother’s belongings that haven’t been touched since her death more than 20 years before, takes its toll on Olivia mentally and emotionally. Her marriage is in shambles, she hasn’t spoken to her former best friend Ashley in five years, and the man she clearly has never gotten over is in her face and dating one of her friends.
This story resonates in a lot of ways. They say you never get over your first love, and that is definitely a theme here. Olivia has typical disagreements with her sisters. When she’s packing up the house, the last room Olivia wants to go through holds all her mother’s things, which I can appreciate. She gets annoyed at her aging father.
But then there are elements that just bother me. I both like and dislike Olivia and Fred together…if that makes sense. They have a volatile relationship. When they’re teenagers, I can understand how easily they split up. Teenagers don’t know how to communicate about deep relationship issues, but as they get older, go to college, start their careers, I would expect them not to fall into those patterns of not talking about the big stuff. I would hope that they would learn from their mistakes.
From a writing perspective, unrelated to the story really, there were things that started to pull me out of the story the more they happened. For example, Olivia calls her father by his first name, William. I don’t have a problem with that. In fact, my daughter calls me by my first name as well and has since she was small. However, when she talks about me to other people, my daughter says “my mom.”
Olivia refers to him as her father in the first chapter, but then in Chapter 3 when she explains why she calls him William, he’s William for the rest of the book. It’s awkward, especially in conversations, and especially since she still refers to her mom as “Mom.”
- “‘I’ve just been thinking about Mom a lot…Do you think she was happy?’
‘With what?’
‘Her life. William.’”
As the author introduces characters, I expect some sort of basic description (show, don’t tell), but the descriptions include a lot of unnecessary detail. I don’t need a fashion show description of what everyone is wearing…unless Olivia is a fashion designer and notices those things, which she’s not.
- “The object of this grooming is thirty, Asian, petite, and very pretty. She’s wearing a black linen pantsuit cinched at the waist by a large leather belt with an intricate design on it, and high, high heels that bring her up to Charlotte’s height.”
- “His black hair is mussed, and he’s got a very French-looking mustache, too large and droopy. He’s wearing a crisp white shirt and black dress pants.”
And from a plot point perspective, Fred tells Olivia that her father was on the brink of bankruptcy when he offered to buy the property. The story is set in 2023, but in 2008, when the housing market crashed, William and Aunt Tracy tell Olivia she needs to look for more scholarships to finish college because there’s no money left. Olivia describes to the reader all the financial difficulties William has had, but it takes 15 years for him to be on the verge of bankruptcy and to force a sale of a 26- or 27-room estate? (That’s another thing. Olivia mentions that they could never agree on whether it was 26 rooms or 27. What??)
Assuming the property has long been paid off since it is a family estate, the property taxes alone are likely $1 million a year. William doesn’t work, and one year he didn’t pay the taxes. How has he not sold off pieces of the land? How has he not been forced out before now?
I did like the ending…although I wasn’t crazy about the mental gymnastics Olivia did in regard to her marriage to Wes. But there are parts that were surprising, which is why 3.5 stars. It’s definitely better than “ok” and will be a nice summer beach read (maybe in the Hamptons?). And I do really feel like Olivia found herself at the end, which wraps up the story nicely.
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