Description
Finley has always felt most comfortable in someone else’s shadow. Fortunately, she’s got Colin, her magnetic boyfriend, who sweeps her along for activities, friendships, and future plans. Then she goes on a last-minute trip with her distant mom to a family vacation house that Finley didn’t know existed and is now about to be sold.
Her mom was estranged from her own parents and siblings since leaving home for college, and it’s a novelty for Finley to see her aunts and cousins. There’s also the handful of teens who work at the Egg, her aunt’s diner, and make up a found family of their own—including undeniably handsome guitarist Ben.
Then her relationship with Colin goes into freefall, and Finley’s roadmap for life after high school is gone. She has no choice but to live, for the first time, without plans. The longer Finley stays, the closer she gets to the truth about why her mother stayed away—and why she’s brought Finley here now.
And the closer she grows to new friends at the Egg, the more she starts to fall for charmingly awkward, soulful Ben and to realize how much of herself she’s been missing. By the end of the summer, nothing will be the same—for this community or for Finley herself.
Review
Finley has just graduated high school, and lives with her dad, step-mum and younger half siblings. She has had a very distant relationship with her mum, who is a high-flying businesswoman, ever since her parents divorced.
Finley met Colin the first day of junior year, after she changed schools for a fresh start, and they have been inseparable ever since. She blended into his friendship group, and they had made plans for the future, and she thought her life and their relationship was going along well - or it was until she had to miss out on going on a cruise with Colin so that she could go with her mum to New York for a week.
If that wasn’t bad enough, a late change of plans results in them going to the lakeside town of her mum’s estranged family, instead of New York, as they prepare to sell the old family home.
Now things with Colin are not good at all, and her life is in tatters. She is amongst family, who are initially like strangers to her, and she is not sure how she is going to get through this. But they embrace her with love and warmth, and helping at her aunt’s diner keeps her distracted. Not to mention the new friendships she is forming, particularly with Ben, who has a way of making Finley see that there might be more to life than what she had planned.
Her mum’s family are surprised that her mum has finally shown up, and as the week progresses, Finley starts to piece some things together as to what might have led to her mum’s estrangement, and why she now sees an urgency to get things sorted out with her sisters.
This is a great YA romance about finding out who you really are, family relationships and connections, and learning to stand on your own, without relying on those that you thought would always be there, that will be enjoyed by those 14 and up.
