“A story about self-discovery and identity, Dahlia Adler’s Cool for the Summer misses the opportunity to be a true beacon for the LGBTQIA+ community.”

Cecelia Beckman, Sheaf & Ink

I nearly did not finish this novel.

“What do you call it when someone’s neither a girlfriend nor boyfriend? Non-binary-friend?”

Dahlia Adler, Cool for the Summer
This quote struck a cord and not in a good way.

There were many reasons that this was a difficult book for me to read. But four chapters in I was starting to take notes. The first question I had when I reached Chapter Four was: did the publisher or Adler consider a sensitivity reader for this book? I question Adler’s portrayal of the LGBTQ characters in her book. It made me wonder if a professional expert, who is themselves Queer, had read Cool for the Summer. Did they give Adler feedback on her approach and certain passages that may read as harmful. If not, then why not?

I was trying to rationalize what exactly Adler was trying to say here in context to what was going on in that particular scene of the novel. The main character is at a football game. She’s scanning the crowd and sees her lab partner who is sitting with another classmate. Once I read this line and the character referred to the person sitting next to her lab partner with the list of “girlfriend, boyfriend, non-binary-friend,” Taylor is not given a specific gender. My assumption was that perhaps Taylor is nonbinary?

But it’s the way Adler wrote this line that made me pause and feel taken aback. I recognized it as being hurtful because of the way the main character tries to identify someone as though it were a laundry list ticked off one finger at a time.

My other concern was the writing of the novel itself. Going into reading I thought this novel would be a mashup of authors Becky Albertalli and Sophie Gonzales who both have written heartwarming and keen novels that often focus on LGBTQ representation. But, sadly, the writing felt flat. There was an extensive amount of exposition and very little witty and authentic dialogue interspersed in between. It felt as though I had picked up a teenagers journal, but not in the way some have described Albertalli’s Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda.

Further, there were so many cringe moments: be it representation or Larissa’s blasé social superiority within the high school scene and hierarchy. Compare Cool for the Summer to Tina Fey’s Mean Girls the latter is hilarious, but surprisingly genuine in depicting the sociology of the high school experience.

Whereas in Cool for the Summer I wanted that refreshingly new aspect of someone who is in the A list group, but is able to break from the mold. That Lara realizes she may not necessarily want to identify with this group of girls and may be better off without them. While at the same time, my hope had been Larisa’s story would be more insightful and empathic when it comes to her identity and sexual orientation.

The one thing that I felt Adler did well was the back and forth between Lara’s present and her past summer. Blended with a “Then” and “Now” it was a nice juxtaposition between what seemed like two separate characters. You began to see the puzzle of Lara’s feelings and her identity shape into something unexpected, but with scarcely any depth or insightful qualities that would warrant the reader to cheer Lara on in her quest of self-discovery.

Without sincere relationships, the novel felt hollow. Filled with overly stereotyped high school drama Cool for the Summer should be given another critical edit by sensitivity readers. Doing so could help provide meaningful feedback and edits to a story that could then be quoted as disarmingly tender.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for the advanced review copy of this book!

I am pretty sure I have little cartoon hearts in my eyes after finishing this book. I can't wait until May to hold a finished copy in my hand because I am absolutely SMITTEN with this sexy and fun bi romance!

Larissa has always been in love with football star Chase, but when she spends a summer away from home with her mom, and her mom's boss...and the boss's daughter... Larissa learns a lot more about herself, and her story becomes different than she ever thought it would be.

This book is told from two different timelines: one during Larissa's summer in the Outer Banks with Jasmine, and one during the following year of High School, when she starts dating the boy of her dreams only to realize this summer changed everything in ways she won't be able to go back on.

I have no complaints about this book. Ig was perfect. I love it so much. I love the story, the character, the plot, the writing. I am obsessed and I need more.

This was honestly everything I need in a YA Contemporary!

I am so grateful to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for giving me the opportunity to read COOL FOR THE SUMMER in exchange for an honest review!

I can only recommend what is already one of my favorite 2021 releases. COOL FOR THE SUMMER was a sweet romance complicated by high school drama. It was quick to pick up the pace, making it both thoroughly enjoyable and thoroughly exciting. The two narrative timelines only served to enhance the story; the storylines develop in tandem, mirroring how far along Larissa (the MC) was in processing the events of her Hot Girl Summer. With her first-person POV, the writing style was the right fit for a high schooler navigating friend groups, school popularity, and teen introspection. It featured focused LGBTQ+ representation, but also casual representation woven throughout with great background characters. It was a successful lesson taught in normalization!

I really loved how honest the novel was! Some particularly raw moments I appreciated: the subtleties of Lara being less wealthy than her friends; the feeling of anticipated love remaining unfulfilled after you touch someone you’re not as into anymore; the complex jealousy of repressed gay crushes; the friendships we only keep because we’ve known someone forever, even if the relationship isn’t as positive as it used to be.

Don’t think that the plot is as predictable as any ‘ol teen romance book. The twists will surprise you, the representation will impress, and Lara’s experiences will resonate with any queer reader.

Cons: There were times when the narrative was cringey or when I was worried that the side-characters were flat/under-developed. However, both of these aspects improved as the book progressed.

Final note: Jasmine is my new favorite uncommunicative disaster💘

~Cool for the Summer~
•
4/5 stars
•
2021 is the year for sapphic stories and I’m definitely here for it! I’ve been hearing good things about this one all over bookstagram so I’m excited to dive in! Thank you to Netgalley for approving my request to read this one.
•
Pros:
+I love Bi representation!!! She’s questioning and that’s okay!
+Lots of casual diversity and representation! You’ve got to love books that reflect what real life looks like
+Honestly there’s something so sweet and magical about a summer romance story. It just feels like anything is possible and I really appreciate them
+The main character likes to read romance books! Me too haha
+Also two jewish main characters!
+I loved the inclusion of cultural foods and how Larissas mom was foreign (from Russia). As a first generation American it was nice to see.
+Beyond being a romance story it’s a story of self discovery and finding confidence in yourself which is so important! I enjoyed seeing Larissa grow into herself
+The flirting in this is so sensual it’s kind of intense in a good way
+I appreciate the different friend relationships in this! And how each friend has their own interests!!
•
Cons:
-I’ve never been the biggest fan of books that jump around in time. I find that it’s always just a little confusing and Id rather it just be in chronological order. I get why its told in two time lines but it doesn’t mean I have to like it
-The classic miscommunication trope is alive and well in this one
-This came a little close to “all Bi people cheat” (is emotional cheating still cheating? if you’re thinking about someone else is that cheating?)but it was mentioned in the story that that’s a stupid stereotype so I’m not too mad about it
•
This was super fun! It’d be the perfect quick summer read and I definitely enjoyed it! I think there needs to be more stories about questioning your sexuality and exploring it. I definitely think people will enjoy this one.
•
(Will post to good reads closer to the release date)

Wow. This was a great story about a girls enlightenment of her sexuality.I loved the way the author made Lara’s feelings be confused and unclear. She was at times jealous, unsure, and lost. As she continued on her journey she grows, matures and becomes more understanding of the diverse and wonderfully unique person she is or can be. It is not an easy journey but having people around you that love you can make the trip a lot easier.
I loved this book. Real life may not end as well as it did for Lara but let’s strive to make it so.

God, I was not expecting to love this book so much.

I've always struggled with my sexuality - I thought I was straight for years until a certain night led me to realize that I was, indeed, not - so reading this felt like coming home almost. Larissa was insanely relatable as a protagonist, to the point of where I felt so many of her struggles deep within my soul. I kind of adored the fact that she had what I'd say was my dream life for my senior year of high school that, due to corona, didn't work out the way I wanted it to. Minus the fact that I write horror/dark fantasy where she writes romance,

This book surprised me in so many ways - how Larissa never put an actual label on her sexuality and learned to not care about it, how supportive everyone around her was, how it expressed how confusing sexuality truly was. I'm truly amazed by it. I feel like reading something like this, around the time I realized I was into girls, would've helped me so much. Though I'm happy that kids who were my age when I was questioning myself will have this, because I'm sure it'll help them out a whole lot.

I will 100000% be buying a copy of this when it's released next year, I love it that much.

Thank you St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the arc of this book. All opinions are my own.

This review might as well just be a letter of gratitude to Dahlia for this book and a love letter to Larissa, because this book is something that I felt with every fiber of my being. Minus there being an actual girl, Larissa is me, ten years younger.

Honestly, I’ve never come across a book that’s depicted a bisexual MC who’s struggling with her identity. I’m sure there are some out there, but this book has given me everything I’ve ever wanted in book form to describe how I’ve felt probably since high school, but truly the last 3-4 years pretty heavily. I’ve spent a lot of time wondering about my sexuality, much like Larissa is, after a fantastic summer with her mom’s bosses daughter Jasmine. It made me feel seen, heard and understood.

This book is so good I couldn’t put it down. Page after page I flew through this book. Watching Larissa discover and learn who she was and that her sexuality was fluid, not ready to put a label on it, was breathtaking. This is beautifully crafted journey of self love, self discovery, while also navigating coming out. The prose, diction and character arcs are weaved throughout the others, allowing each to become who their meant to be while getting by with a little help from their friends.

Stories with strong friend groups always draw me in because I adore my friends and the way Kiki (in particular), Gia and Shannon learned to love and be there for Larissa was similar to my friends and how they were with me when I came out.

Dahlia’s brilliance doesn’t just stop with the character arcs, in continues into the plot, the word choice and how heartbreakingly accurate it can be for someone struggling with their sexuality. The way she was able to also show how hard it is to choose between liking one gender or the other (in this particular case) and how even if you have friends who identify how you might, you may be oblivious to the signs for yourself.

Cool for the Summer gave me everything I’d been searching for in a book and more. My bisexual heart is overflowing with love, happiness and the ability to be seen. Go pre-order this book and devour it like I did when it comes out May 11,2021!

COOL FOR THE SUMMER had me at "Bisexual Grease" and followed through with a story about finding yourself *and* getting the girl. A fun, fast paced read that will make the perfect queer summer story for anyone looking for one.

Cool for the Summer centers around one big conflict: Larissa spends the summer hooking up with a girl for the first time, and comes home to her longtime crush Chase finally being interested in her. It’s perfect timing, because she left her summer fling behind in North Carolina. Except... her fling shows up as the new student in school. Very Grease but bi and with more turmoil.

The representation is pretty okay in this story - lots of side characters of varying inclusivity. Larissa and her girl love interest, Jasmine, are both Jewish, although Larissa is more like Russian Jewish and Jasmine’s family was from somewhere else. Other than that, though, the main cast of characters were almost all white and straight. Her set of friends from the beach were way more diverse but you only see them in flashbacks.

This book pretty much focuses on the love interest drama and the love interest drama only. There’s not really any secondary plot lines or any other inner conflict in Larissa. It kinda felt like a short story that just got stretched out.

The pacing was weird because of that. There were so many little peaks and valleys in their relationship, but they really didn’t go much of anywhere until the very end of the book.

I did like the mom’s reaction to finding out Larissa was interested in a girl, and I liked the way Larissa and Chase’s storyline ended. The tough talks in this story were pretty well done.

I just didn’t get much from this book and thought it count have benefitted from having a little more going on. I get that teens can get super infatuated and let love consume their lives lol especially with two love interests! So it’s definitely not unrealistic. It just wasn’t what I was looking for.

I’m so glad this book exists, though, and I’m really happy about what it will do for teens who may be unsure of their sexuality, or even teens who are 100% sure of their sexuality. I’ll be recommending it at work.

I absolutely LOVED this book. I started it and finished it in about 4 hours. I wanted to reread it as soon as I finished! I loved the kind of raunchy voice, and how genuine and sincere and relatable Larissa was. I loved the back and forth chronology, and how even the side characters didn't feel 2D. I thought Adler did an incredible job making the book feel so natural—it flowed so well that it felt like it'd been written like that, perfectly, without any editing or revision required (although I know that wasn;t the case!!). I've always been a huge Dahlia Adler fan, but this is easily now my favorite.

Dahlia Adler writes a book that would easily fly off the shelves in my classroom library. Cool for the Summer is a deep dive into young adult fiction, and Adler writes in the voice of youth in a believable way -- and with character development and plot movement that works well. I would gladly share this book with young adults, and recommend it for those of us in the YA appreciation crowd.

Lara's had eyes for exactly one person throughout her three years of high school: Chase Harding. He's tall, strong, sweet, a football star, and frankly, stupid hot. Oh, and he's talking to her now. On purpose and everything. Maybe...flirting, even? No, wait, he's definitely flirting, which is pretty much the sum of everything Lara's wanted out of life.

Except she’s haunted by a memory. A memory of a confusing, romantic, strangely perfect summer spent with a girl named Jasmine. A memory that becomes a confusing, disorienting present when Jasmine herself walks through the front doors of the school to see Lara and Chase chatting it up in front of the lockers.


- What a lovely, lovely read this was!

This is a terrific book. I like how the writer deals with the confusing feelings of the characters and the peer pressures of high school. It's done in a sensitive yet realistic way. The book is also entertaining and fun. Enjoyed it a lot.

(Thanks to NetGalley for providing access to a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review)

Whew, this was a super-fun read. Just to put this at the top, while this is something like a 4-star to my preferences, for an ARC that I'm considering for library purchase I'm reviewing from our students' perspective, and I'm gonna recommend the HECK out of this. 5/5. (But if you're combing my reviews because we have similar taste in, say, fantasy... actually, you should probably still check this one out. Because all of my fantasy five stars go to Jacqueline Carey these days).

I'll leave the synopsizing to others, but here's what I loved about the book:

***The main character, Larissa, has a strong, consistent, entertaining voice. She's popular, but somewhat grounded about it, and her narration is funny and insightful. Most importantly, she stays clear of 'mean girls' tropes, I don't really love in a narrator. I was a dork in high school, but in my experience the actually-truly-popular kids were popular because they were easy-going and kind to everyone. Larissa gets full marks here.
***Larissa's experience of bisexuality is overpoweringly relatable. Keeping this spoiler-free: it is evident from the book that Larissa experiences genuine attraction to people of more than one gender, but experiences all of the pressures of compulsory heterosexuality. It's handled really well, with a lot of nuance that feels true.
***shout-out to Kiki! Larissa and Shannon might be best friends, but Kiki comes through for Larissa hard. Gotta love a goth who podcasts! All of the side characters are so rich-- even Gia, who is kinda one-note, is a pitch-perfect rendition of a girl we all knew in high school.
***Excellent representation, but closest to my heart, Jews on different ends of the Jewishness spectrum vibing and not judging each other's expression of faith. While I'm a borderline secular Jew, it has always made my week to be invited to a more observant family's Shabbat or Seder. <3 <3 <3

There was one thing that didn't quite do it for me personally: the crux of the book was slightly ridiculous. HOWEVER, I thought about it a bit, and you know, teenagers are slightly ridiculous. While to my EXTREMELY sophisticated romance novel taste (BIG /s in case it wasn't obvious), the grand gesture fell flat, it is exactly the kind of fumbling romantic gesture teens make. TBQH it might have made me cringe because it was a little too close to something I did actually do. This didn't quite work for me, but putting myself in my teen's shoes, I think it would feel about right.

Thanks to YALSA for having Dahlia on a panel, so I got to hear about this fabulous book! I'll be pushing this at every teen I can for their summer reading next May.

**I received an ARC from the publisher on Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved reading this book. The characters, the story, the plot...all amazing! And oh...The drama and high school angst!! Lara has had the biggest crush on Chase since the start of high school 3 years ago, but he never noticed her...till now. You'd think that'd be prefect because that's what Lara is thinking since Chase is talking to her on the first day of school. Perfect! That is till a girl named Jasmine shows up at her school. Who's Jasmine? A girl Lara spent the summer with that was perfect, romantic, and a bit confusing. And Jasmine has spotted her... What happens this year? Who does Lara choose? You'll have to read to find out! It'll be worth it!

While this book didn't live up to my expectations, I definitely would love to put this in the hands of teens. i think it's a really great beautiful exploration of sexuality and questioning identity.

I was really excited to read this book, but unfortunately it just didn't live up to my personal expectations. i still definitely recommend checking it out though.

Hands down. I loved this book. I enjoyed each of the characters. I liked the genuine, motivational writing style. And I liked the idea of self discovery, pure emotional, inspirational outcome! Of course I liked the bisexual love triangle theme between Lara, Jasmine and Chase!

The only thing bothered me was the beginning point. I didn’t get exactly why Chase fell for Lara because they haven’t shared a deep bond, never talked before. Out of nowhere he started to flirt with her and of course Lara’s reaction was realistic. She had a crush on that guy for such a long time now she realized her feelings were not unrequited! Everything seemed so bright and hopeful but when she saw the girl she’d spent summer: her heart started singing “ Summer loving had me a blast. Summer loving happened so fast.”
So I want to scream her to tell me more she got friendly down the sand.

After my tribute to Grease: I must add I wish Lara and Chase knew each before, maybe they could be close friends and finally friends to lovers dynamics may work better with their insta beginning ( not for Lara but absolutely it was instant love for Chase)

But I liked how author executed the triangle idea and ending of the book was hopeful, heartwarming, sweet, inspirational!

Overall: I’m giving my entertaining, sweet, cute, lovable, poignant four young adult stars!

Special thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press/ Wednesday Books for sharing this digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest opinions.

I came into reading this book with stratospheric expectations. Unreasonably high. I never dreamed it would live up to those expectations and hopes let alone exceed them. But here we are. I love this book. I love Jasmine and Larissa and every bit of the heart pinching romance and the hard decisions of finding out the thing you always wanted isn't actually what you want any more.

Disclaimer: I received this ARC from NetGalley and I will be posting an in-depth review in May! This is a good summer read.