Blog Tour: An Endless Summer + Boys Of Summer by C.J. Duggan {Reviews+Giveaway}
Welcome to my stop on the An Endless Summer blog tour hosted by YA
Bound Book Tours. Click HERE to see the full blog tour schedule!
Today I am super excited to share my reviews of both books in the Summer series.
The Boys of Summer (Summer #1)
by: C.J. Duggan
Publication Date: Dec. 17, 2012
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Group: New Adult
Source: e-copy provided by YA Bound tours and the author in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Page Count: 321 pages
My Rating: 4.5/5 stars
It seemed only natural to nickname them the ‘Onslow Boys’. Every time they swaggered in the front door of the Onslow Hotel after a hard week’s work, their laughter was loud and genuine as they settled onto their bar stools. I peeked through the restaurant partition, a flimsy divider between my world and theirs. I couldn’t help but smile whenever I saw them, saw him ... Toby Morrison.
Quiet seventeen-year-old Tess doesn’t relish the thought of a summertime job. She wants nothing more than to forget the past haunts of high school and have fun with her best friends before the dreaded Year Twelve begins.
To Tess, summer is when everything happens: riding bikes down to the lake, watching the fireworks at the Onslow Show and water bomb fights at the sweltering Sunday markets.
How did she let her friends talk her into working?
After first-shift disasters, rude, wealthy tourists and a taunting ex-boyfriend, Tess is convinced nothing good can come of working her summer away. However, Tess finds unlikely allies in a group of locals dubbed ‘The Onslow Boys’, who are old enough to drive cars, drink beer and not worry about curfews. Tess’s summer of working expands her world with a series of first times with new friends, forbidden love and heartbreaking chaos.
All with the one boy she has never been able to forget.
It will be a summer she will always remember.
Quiet seventeen-year-old Tess doesn’t relish the thought of a summertime job. She wants nothing more than to forget the past haunts of high school and have fun with her best friends before the dreaded Year Twelve begins.
To Tess, summer is when everything happens: riding bikes down to the lake, watching the fireworks at the Onslow Show and water bomb fights at the sweltering Sunday markets.
How did she let her friends talk her into working?
After first-shift disasters, rude, wealthy tourists and a taunting ex-boyfriend, Tess is convinced nothing good can come of working her summer away. However, Tess finds unlikely allies in a group of locals dubbed ‘The Onslow Boys’, who are old enough to drive cars, drink beer and not worry about curfews. Tess’s summer of working expands her world with a series of first times with new friends, forbidden love and heartbreaking chaos.
All with the one boy she has never been able to forget.
It will be a summer she will always remember.
The Boys of Summer is on sale this
week only for $.99! Get your copy now!
I had so much fun reading The Boys of Summer! It was the perfect summer read filled with loveable characters, great adventures, and sweet, steamy romance! I definitely recommend reading this one before An Endless Summer, so you can get to know the characters. It can be read as a stand-alone, but I enjoyed it so much more having read the first.
The book starts off introducing us to our main character, Tess, who is dealing with the ridicule and taunting of some of her male classmates- one of them being her ex-boyfriend. They have dubbed her Tic Tac Tess because of her body shape and where her best friends Ellie and Adam stand up for her, she is content to meld into the shadows and pretend it's not happening. Tess starts off a bit shy and awkward. However, as the book progresses we see a whole new Tess. Spending the summer working at the Onslow Hotel might not have been Tess's idea of a great summer, but after meeting the older Onslow Boys, as they nicknamed them, things are starting to look up.
Tess has been crazy about Toby Morrison ever since she was in 7th grade. Being older, she admired him from afar and now she finds herself spending time with him and his friends. I loved Tess and Toby. Their relationship was not rushed and was paced perfectly. I think what I liked most was that Tess and Toby really formed a friendship first. You could tell her was interested in her by the fact that he knew her name, but he was already in a relationship with another girl. Toby was also more on the quieter side. He was not nearly as loud and rambunctious as his best friend Sean (who we will really get to know in An Endless Summer!) Yet, he saw beyond the easily intimidated, nervous girl. He saw her strength and her unwillingness to act hateful even when she was being taunted. I really respected Toby. Even though you could tell he was interested in Tess, he never overstepped his bounds while still attached to his girlfriend, Angela. She really was awful. She had no problem making Tess feel 2 feet tall and embarrass her in front of the others.
Tess's best friends Ellie and Adam were great. Ellie is fun, flirty, and confident. She is not afraid to chase after boys and get what she wants, which is the complete opposite of Tess. She is a good friend to her and really helps in bringing out the confident, sexy Tess. She does tend to be boy crazy, so there have been many times where she's left Tess high and dry to chase after her next conquest. Adam, on the other hand, is quite protective of Tess. He watches out for her and doesn't want her to get hurt. I really loved the camaraderie between these three.
The Onslow Boys consist of Toby, Sean, Stan, Ringer, and Chris. All of them are older (in their early 20's) but are a great group of guys. Sure, they've been know to break a few hearts, but they were really good guys. Sean is probably the biggest male presence in the book (besides Toby). He becomes a good friend to Tess and where Toby is more serious, Sean is a big goof-off and just a loveable guy. Ellie ends up finding herself attracted to Stan and after a slight overreaction, Ellie ends up hurting him to protect herself. You could tell how much he really liked her, so watching them figure their stuff out was really cute. Ringer isn't really a main player and Chris is Adam's older brother and also in charge of running the bar at the Onslow.
This was such a great story about making the best out of every situation. Tess didn't want to go and work at the Onslow Hotel, but so many great things came out of it for her and her friends. They fell in love, formed new friendships, and made some great summer memories. That's not to say everything was perfect. Tess certainly learned the hard way not to make assumptions before finding out all of the facts. However, when it's all said and done, I loved watching her grow as a person and really come out of her shell.
An Endless Summer (Summer #2)by: C.J. Duggan
Publication Date: July 11, 2013
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Group: New Adult
Source: e-ARC provided by YA Bound tours and the author in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Page Count: 311 pages
Order Links: Amazon
My Rating: 4.5/5 stars
Sean looked out over the lake, squinting against the sunlight. He turned to me, his expression sobering as his eyes flicked over my face in a silent study.
“Come on Amy, I saved you once, I’ll save you again.”
I met his stare unflinchingly. “I don’t need saving.”
A wicked grin formed slowly. “Don’t you?”
After a rebellious summer night that almost claimed her life, Amy Henderson – the Onslow publican’s only daughter – is sent away to suffer a fate far worse than any other punishment:
Boarding School.
Three years on, a now nineteen-year-old Amy returns to Onslow for the summer. What once was a cauldron of activity with live bands, hot meals and cold beers, the Onslow Hotel now lies dark, deserted and depressing. All fond childhood memories of loitering on the hotel stairs and eavesdropping on customers’ colourful conversations are in the distant past.
How had her dad let it come to this?
With the new threat of putting the Onslow up for sale, Amy reluctantly turns to a local tradesman for help: Sean Murphy, the very same Onslow boy who saved her life all those years ago. With his help and that of some old friends, the task is clear: spend the summer building the hotel back up to its former glory or lose it for good.
In an endless summer, Amy soon realises that sometimes in order to save your future, you have to face your past, even if it’s in the form of a smug, gorgeous Onslow boy.
“Come on Amy, I saved you once, I’ll save you again.”
I met his stare unflinchingly. “I don’t need saving.”
A wicked grin formed slowly. “Don’t you?”
After a rebellious summer night that almost claimed her life, Amy Henderson – the Onslow publican’s only daughter – is sent away to suffer a fate far worse than any other punishment:
Boarding School.
Three years on, a now nineteen-year-old Amy returns to Onslow for the summer. What once was a cauldron of activity with live bands, hot meals and cold beers, the Onslow Hotel now lies dark, deserted and depressing. All fond childhood memories of loitering on the hotel stairs and eavesdropping on customers’ colourful conversations are in the distant past.
How had her dad let it come to this?
With the new threat of putting the Onslow up for sale, Amy reluctantly turns to a local tradesman for help: Sean Murphy, the very same Onslow boy who saved her life all those years ago. With his help and that of some old friends, the task is clear: spend the summer building the hotel back up to its former glory or lose it for good.
In an endless summer, Amy soon realises that sometimes in order to save your future, you have to face your past, even if it’s in the form of a smug, gorgeous Onslow boy.
My Review:
C.J. Duggan has done it again! The second installment in the Summer series does NOT disappoint! An Endless Summer takes place a few years after The Boys of Summer and Amy Henderson, Chris and Adam's cousin is our protagonist this time around. We met Amy briefly in TBOS and she was a bit of a snarky, wild 15 year old then with a smart mouth. Now, at 19, Amy is more grown up. She still has that spunk, which I loved. Where Tess was shy and awkward, Amy is anything but. She can be hard-headed and stubborn and refuses to be saved. Especially by Sean Murphy. She was saved by him once after nearly drowning in the lake and after that her parents decided to send her off to boarding school to hopefully reform the wild child in her.
As I said in my review above, Sean is handsome, fun-loving, and confident. When Amy returns to the Onslow, Sean comes to her rescue more times than she'd like. As much as she tries to run him off, he refuses. Amy has come home to find her dad's hotel in a pitiful state. After he left to be with her mother in the city, the current caretaker of the Onslow really let it go to crap. This was Amy's childhood sanctuary and she is determined to clean it up and make it what it once was. Sean is constantly there to help Amy, and ends up bringing back the whole gang to get the Onslow back on its feet. Again, C.J. handled the romance SO well. You can tell Sean cares for Amy by the way he is constantly helping her out, but it takes Amy a bit to realize just how attracted to him she really is and how she doesn't want him to look at her like a kid sister. She wants him to look at her like the woman she's become and want her. What started as innocent flirting and teasing leads to so much more. Sean tells Amy he doesn't want to play games and on several occasions his words and actions leave her floored. There were times that Amy did act a bit childish and I loved how Sean wasn't afraid to call her out on it. The two just had such a fun rapport and I loved their chemistry together.
As I said, all the old crew shows back up to help with the Onslow. Toby and Tess fans will be happy to see them back and happy as ever, as well as Ellie and Adam, who are just as fun and lively as they were in the first book.
I really like where C.J. took Amy's character. Amy learns that sometimes you have to swallow your pride and cowgirl up. She learns that it's ok to accept help from others when you need it and to fight for what you love and believe in. But when situations are beyond your control you have to learn to accept and move forward. This is another great summer read and I can't wait to find out who the next book in the series is going to focus on!
About
the Author
C.J
Duggan is an Australian author who lives with her husband in a rural border
town of New South Wales, Australia.The Boys of Summer is Book One in her Mature Young Adult Romance Series.
***GIVEAWAY***
1 Signed paperback copy of either The Boys of Summer or An Endless Summer (INT) and 5 ebook
copies of The Boys of Summer or An Endless Summer (INT).
a Rafflecopter giveaway
6 comments
These sounds so good and I have been meaning to read them for a while and now that you loved them... well it just means I need to figure out a way to fit them in. Awesome reviews my dear friend.
ReplyDeleteThanks Teresa! I had seen people talking about The Boys of Summer for awhile, but never really gave it a second glance because I was so busy but wow, I'm glad this opportunity dropped in my lap! I really enjoyed both books!
DeleteI bought this! If you say it's 4.5 stars then I know I'll love it too :-)
ReplyDeleteYay! Did you already have the first one? Both are awesome!
DeleteI already had the first book on my TBR, and I've also added the 2nd. Excellent reviews, Jessica! And thanks for hosting an international giveaway! They are the best :)
ReplyDeleteLexxie @ (un)Conventional Bookviews
Thanks Lexxie! I love seeing international giveaways! They really make me happy because I know it sucks when they're US only!
DeleteLeave me some comment love! And I will get around to commenting back!
My blog is an award-free blog, however, as I just do not have the time to follow-up.