Timeshare Boyfriend by M.K. Hale is live!
A fun, angsty and emotional coming of age story for two childhood friends who become enemies who become friends and then lovers, over the course of two weeks every summer.
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Blurb
The love of a lifetime—two weeks at a time.
Reliving the same summer romance at an annual timeshare turns first love into first hate.
Evie Turner and Adam Pierce start off with the perfect summer romance, but when they reunite five years later, he acts like she is wet sand on the bottom of his expensive shoes. Hurt and embarrassed, Evie dedicates her two weeks at the timeshare each year to making him regret his decision. Throughout their young adult years, she tortures him—in a bikini.
After his words sting like jellyfish, she wants him on his knees, begging for forgiveness. Begging for her.
The girl in love with love. The boy who watches mob movies to remind himself that trust means betrayal. A clock of two weeks ticks away until they spend another three hundred and fifty-one days trying to forget each other. Until next year.
As the passion between them rises with the summer temperature, Evie can’t help but feel his embraces are like a sunset: beautiful and temporary.
Above all, Evie must not forget one very important lesson: If he is hot, he can burn you.
Better get the aloe.
*Though this book begins in young adulthood, it transitions with summer time-jumps until the characters are new adults in college. As a new adult romance novel, the story contains mature situations and sexual scenes.
Review
3.5 “This is forever” stars
A fun, angsty and emotional coming of age story for two childhood friends who become enemies who become friends and then lovers, over the course of two weeks every summer.
Evie and Adam meet over a blissful summer when they are 10 years old while holidaying at their parents’ beachside timeshare. Evie is sure she’s met the love of her life, so when they reunite years later, she’s horrified when Adam completely dismisses her, and when he does pay her any attention, he’s cruel and mean. This is not the boy she has been dreaming of.
Through their teenage years, we follow their journey for a two week period every year as Evie holds out hope that the boy she has always loved will finally start to love her back, and she takes great pleasure prancing around in bikinis, flirting with other boys and generally doing whatever she can to spark a reaction from him. It’s funny and emotional, and a bit angsty, and although I never went to the extremes that Evie did, I cringed along with her, reliving the horrors of unrequited teenage love.
Maybe he was holding back his passion for me. Maybe looking at me filled him with the desire to embrace me.
I really needed to stop reading so many romance novels.
Through it all, we can see that there is something going on with Adam. There’s more than meets the eye with this angry teen boy, Evie just happens to be the one taking the brunt of his cruelty.
“Each year, I spend three hundred and fifty-one days trying to forget you.”
But as they grow older, they mature, they figure themselves out, and they start to come back together again, and suddenly, everything changes.
“I don’t want to hurt you. This summer, I want to heal you.” … “I think it’ll be good for us.”
Stay strong. “There is no us.”
“There’s always been an us.”
This book is a really mixed bag. It’s frustrating and angsty, until it isn’t, and during those times where they’re on track these two together are so freaking cute and there are some really sweet moments between them. When things are good, they’re gorgeous together, they have a fun, playful vibe and it’s clear that they feel so much for each other. At other times it’s angsty and a bit of a mess. They have a lot to work through, and as we follow them through summers together and into the college years, we get to see all of it.
“You have never in this lifetime ever been ‘just’ a friend to me.”
Evie is a self-confessed romantic who wears her heart on her sleeve, and determinedly holds onto the hope that Adam is the same boy that she fell for all those years ago. I’m not going to lie, she puts up with a lot from him, and there were times I wanted to slap him and give her a shake and tell her to move on, but she’s young and still has a lot of growing up to do.
Adam has been through a lot. He’s emotionally scarred, and his past has impacted the way he sees the world, and his views on love and family. It brings drama to his situation with Evie, and he struggles with the best way to handle their relationship.
They have a lot of growing up and figuring out to do, and we follow them through the rollercoaster that they put each other through. Again, it’s an angsty, dramatic and emotional journey, but they do find their happy ending, and their story finishes really nicely, with an epilogue that brings great closure.
It’s a cute read, and I really liked this one, it was just a bit heavy on the angst for me.
3.5 stars.
An Advanced Review Copy was generously provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.