The Summer I Found You

Publication: 1st March 2014
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company
Pages: 240
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Appropriate: Young Adult
Buy It: Amazon+Barnes & Noble+The Book Depository

All they have in common is that they're less than perfect. And all they're looking for is the perfect distraction.

Kate's dream boyfriend has just broken up with her and she's still reeling from her diagnosis of type 1 diabetes. Aidan planned on being a lifer in the army and went to Afghanistan straight out of high school. Now he's a disabled young veteran struggling to embrace his new life. When Kate and Aidan find each other neither one wants to get attached. But could they be right for each other after all?

My Thoughts.

The Summer I Found You is the first book of Jolene's I've read that wasn't co-written with another author, and I have to say that I loved it!

The concept and storyline was new to me, before this book I'd never read a story regarding this topic, it's about a young soldier who was injured in a bomb explosion in Afghanistan, that not only killed his friend but cost him his right arm, pardoned from the army and having to learn to live with his disability, Aidan is depressed, with everyone he knows seeming to be uncomfortable around him and unsure of exactly how to carry on a conversation in case they offend him somehow, until he meets Kate, his cousins best-friend, who says whatever she's thinking and who jokes around with him about only having the one arm.

But after becoming friends, and then a couple Kate is still keeping a secret from Aidan, she has Type 1 Diabetes, happy that someone doesn't know she has it and furthermore that she's not questioned about her blood sugar level every five minutes, she keeps putting off telling him, afraid that he won't want anything to do with her when she does reveal to him her disease, but once Aidan finds out that she's been keeping this from him, can their relationship survive this kind of deception this early on, or this the end of them as a couple for good?

With a storyline that you don't see a whole lot of in YA contemporary novels, this was a breath of fresh air, a fantastic story with loveable characters, you can't go wrong by picking this book up.

I give this 4/5 stars.

Jolene grew up in South-central Alaska. She’s lived in Anchorage, near the Alyeska ski resort, on a cabin on an island on a lake, and then in a boring old house.

Jolene kissed a boy on her high school graduation night. One she’d wanted to kiss for a long time. They got married two years later, have built two homes together, survived military deployments, law school, student loan debt, and two children.

Jolene plays the guitar, takes pictures, and loves to hike. She doesn’t like rivers, but loves the ocean. She loves to fly, but gets motion sick. Her ultimate vacation would be to sail through the deserted islands in The Bahamas. Two years ago, she got that wish when her parents retired on a sailboat.

She taught high school French when she was only a few years older than her students, and then taught middle school math with her degree in political science and French.

She spends grocery money on designer fabric, shoes, and books.

Jolene cannot express how many times she wished she could write a whole novel. And now she has. Many times. Life is good.

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