Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler

Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler ☆☆☆☆

Box of tissues required!

I knew this book was about death and grieving, but as I began to read it I was holding up pretty well, it wasn't overly emotional, so I didn't think anything of it. Until they sat down on the beach and the weight of everything hit. I couldn't stop crying and I cried and cried for several chapters. Luckily I had tissues by my bed from the last time I my allergies acted up so I was good to go, just stuffy as I was falling asleep.

The reviews on the back of the book declare that Ockler will break you heart to pieces and put it back together again and she definitely delivered. While the book may not have ended the way I hoped for, it did end perfectly. She takes you complete through the grief of the protagonist who had finally begun to live her dream of being with her best friend's brother until he dies before they can label it, and without anyone knowing about it she is left to grieve on her own while she helps her friend grieve the death of her own brother. But more so, she takes you through the grief of the entire family as they try to piece their lives back together on a summer trip they had never made without him before.

I say it ends perfectly because in the aspect of the grief, they are forced to deal with their emotions and come full circle back through them until they reach something short of normal. So why did it not end how I hoped? Because in true "twenty boy summer" context I fall for a boy on the beach and hate that they had to leave. So now in my head I am recreating an epilogue ending in which they return to the beach the following summer and she moves out there for college the summer after that. There is my classic happy ending. But truthfully it was about the girls and the family and not about the boys so I can't ask for anything more.

There is only one thing I have a hard time believing (and this is where it loses a star) and that is the fact that this brother doesn't seem to have any friends of his own. While I admire his bond with his sister and her best friend that he falls for, he spends all his time with them and there is a two year age difference between them. I don't know many teenage boys that would fit that picture. Everything else is completely believable though and spot on.