Summerland by Elin Hilderbrand Review

Source: Hachette Book Group

Author: Elin Hilderbrand

Publisher:   Regan Arthur/Little, Brown & Co. 

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Format: Hardcover

Release Date: June 26th, 2012

Description:  

It's June 15th, the night of Nantucket High School graduation. Four juniors are driving home from a party when something goes horribly wrong and there is a crash. The driver of the car, Penny Alistair, is killed, and her twin brother, Hobby Alistair, is left in a coma. Penny's boyfriend, Jake Randolph, and Penny's friend Demeter Castle are unhurt--but suffer tremendous emotional damage. Jake and his family move to the other side of the globe--to the west coast of Australia--in order to escape the horrors of the accident. Demeter falls prey to alcohol abuse and other self-destructive behaviors that nearly lead to her destroying her own life.

SUMMERLAND delves into the circumstances surrounding this accident, the roots of which lie deep in the past, with the first interactions between these four friends and their parents. It's a novel about how tragedy affects individuals, families, and the island community as a whole, and how healing can happen, in even the most devastating circumstances.

Chaos`s Review:

As always, we shall start with the cover! I think its pretty. Summery in its own way. It doesn't reveal the story, and it just seems......... I don't know.....it's just.....PRETTY........ lol

On to the story! The beginning was a little slow for me but gradually as I continued reading on through the chapters, it got me hooked. Eline Hilderbrand did an amazing job on describing the characters, and basically gave an amazing insight into each background story into each character, which helped to better understand the story.

The setting is placed within Nantucket, and starts off with a High School Graduation party, in which Penny (the driver), Hobby (Penny's twin brother), Jake (Penny's boyfriend), and Demeter (friend) are on their way home with Penny behind the wheel. Until the car swerves off of the road and kills Penny, places her twin brother, Hobby, into a coma, Demeter lives but becomes an alcohol addict, and Jake moves to Australia.

The thing with this story is that, it wasn't just a plain book about a tragic accident, but it was more likely based towards -how- this accident came to be. What made Penny decide that she wanted to kill both herself and all the passengers within the car? Anger? Sadness? Depression? I'm not gonna tell you guys ^_0

Anyways, I thought this book would be kind of boring, but honestly, once I started I just couldn't put this book down, it was just an awesome Summer read, and would recommend it to anyone that wants to take a break from the usual supernatural love stories.