Just For the Summer

Thanks to Netgalley for my review copy.

I was hooked from the first paragraph. The story is about Ginny and Jacqueline. Both are in jobs managing hotel or resorts of different sorts. Ginny in Seattle in a Boutique hotel and Jacqueline in a fishing lodge. Through a site for a job swap they are able to swap jobs for a set time. In this case the summer. There are quite a few interesting characters. Ginny's boss Diane is very demanding and comes across as unreasonable and difficult to work for. Jacqueline is working for her Grandfather who she portrays as being stuck in time and unwilling to change the lodge.

There are other characters that help make the story but I won't say much as I want you to find out more. Its also Ginny and Jacqueline have a few things in common from childhood but interesting how different the Women reacted to this. I loved Ginny and her get up and go attitude but at times I wanted to reach in and shake Jacqueline for her attitude. It was interesting to see how the Summer played out and how the characters grow. I would love to talk more about this book as there is so much to unpack but you will have to read. Then we can talk about it.

The book does have a romance thread but its not the main thread.

Some of the characters were more likeable than others. I appreciated the growth in several of them. The ending was a bit abrupt for me, I would have at least liked an epilogue. The Christian content was very light as with most books from this author. An entertaining evening read.

I enjoyed reading Just for the Summer, set in Seattle and rural Idaho. Ginny has been a hard working employee at a Seattle boutique hotel for years, and she’s now managing the hotel. Ginny’s boss, Diana, is a horrible bully boss who blames Ginny for everything that goes wrong at the hotel, including Diana’s own mistakes. As a result, Ginny is a workaholic who’s always stressed and utterly miserable. When she comes across a job swap opportunity at an Idaho fishing lodge for the summer, she’s keen to try something new and different.

Jacqueline is bored and frustrated in her job where she’s managing her grandfather’s fishing lodge. She’s like a round peg in a square hole, and dreams of a more glamourous life in the city that’s more in keeping with her L. A. upbringing. The opportunity to swap jobs with Ginny for the summer seems like an amazing opportunity for Jacqueline to live in the city and use her hospitality degree.

I loved seeing how the job swap plays out in the story, and the different journeys and lessons learned by the characters. The romances that bubbled along in the background were sweet, and the side characters were delightful and often hilarious. I recommend Just for the Summer to contemporary fiction readers who like fish out of water stories with strong romantic elements and a relevant faith thread in the story.

Many thanks to Revell and NetGalley for the advanced reader copy.