Customer Reviews

My Almost Epic Summer

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

After being fired from her mother's salon, Irene has to find a summer job quickly. She'd rather be drawing the hairstyles of heroines from literature, her passion. She carries her notebook and a few classic books everywhere, looking for inspiration.

However, the job she ends up taking doesn't seem to provide much inspiration. She will be spending the summer babysitting young siblings Lanie and Evan in a house that only has television for one hour a day.

Luckily, Irene is creative. She comes up with Food Chicken, a dare-style game where each person puts a food item into a bowl, mixes it up and takes turns taking a couple of bites. But getting sick is not her plan for the summer, especially as she continues to receive emails from her far-away friends about all the acquaintances and boyfriends they're making at their camps and relatives' houses.

At the beach, where Irene and the kids bike to in the afternoons, Evan is "rescued" from a fake injury by gorgeous Starla, the lifeguard. Starla has the nerve to ask Irene for $10 to pose for a drawing in her notebook. Then she starts telling Irene about her love gone wrong, D., who dumped Starla at the end of the school year. She's out for revenge and wants Irene to be a witness to the nasty things she does to get his attention. Then she posts information about these actions on her blog along with her horrible poetry. Is this the kind of friend Irene wanted to make?

As she grows more uncomfortable with Starla, she becomes sort of comfortable with D., who turns out to be Drew, a boy she knew in grammar school. Irene thinks he's a hottie --- and he's interested in Irene, too.

Watching the kids, keeping Starla from going too crazy, and maintaining Drew's attention make for a busy and exciting summer after all. Irene quickly makes decisions about what --- and who --- are most important to her and why.

Adele Griffin is a National Book Award Finalist who has created a fun and very human character in Irene. MY ALMOST EPIC SUMMER will be a hit with anyone who worries about having a boring summer.

--- Reviewed by Amy Alessio

I started reading this book and i am a pretty fast reading but it was taking me forever. it also was interesting at all. I got to the part where Starla stole from the store where D works. I was so bored that I stopped reading it!:( Whatever! Just if your thinking about readung it, DON'T!!!!!

I started reading this book and i am a pretty fast reading but it was taking me forever. it also was interesting at all. I got to the part where Starla stole from the store where D works. I was so bored that I stopped reading it!:( Whatever! Just if your thinking about readung it, DON'T!!!!!

Irene has a dream--to one day open a beauty salon specializing in the hairstyles of famous book heroines. You know, Great Women in Literature, like Franny Glass, Shug Avery, Janie from Their Eyes Were Watching God. The only problem is, she's just been fired from her own mother's hair salon. Fired. By her own mother. Clearly, this hairstyling business is going to need a bit of work.

But her mother and Judith Prior, owner of a secondhand shop a few doors down from her mom's shop, approach her with a proposition for a summer job-- Judith will pay Irene to babysit her two children, Lainie and Evan, for the summer. Suddenly Irene's plans of drawing more hairstyles in her Heroine Heads notebook, of sunning herself on the beach, are thrown out the window in return for watching two kids.

She's relegated herself to a boring summer when she meets Starla, a new lifeguard at Larkin's Pond, and suddenly Irene's days are looking up. Starla is everything that Irene is not--beautiful, outspoken, brazen, and obsessed with boys. As Starla appears to take Irene under her wings, other things begin to fall by the wayside--like Irene's responsibility towards Lainie and Evan, her good sense, and her easygoing nature.

MY ALMOST EPIC SUMMER is a quick, entertaining read that will have you both laughing and cringing at the situations Irene finds herself in. Although not as emotionally involved as most of Ms. Griffin's previous releases, this is a great book for summer reading!

I was very disappointed in the content of this book. I did not like the language or the fact that there were references to domestic violence between the main character's mom and her live-in boyfriend.