Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez
Just for the Summer wasn’t a summer book at all.
I would definitely not RECOMMEND this read for the summer, as it shares a lot of childhood trauma, and the struggles each character is facing. I had chosen to read it because, who doesn’t wanna read about 2 people with a curse, who fall in love with each other eventually.
Emma and Justin are two people with this “Love-curse”, where all their exes are falling in love, getting married, finding “THE ONE”. Everyone but them, so they come together with this genius idea to date each other for a while, and break up, to end this curse once and for all. And like any other romance novel you would expect them to fall in love, and navigate their relationship, a perfect summer read!
But the book lost the plot very soon, as Emma’s mom was introduced, and how she opened up to share her childhood trauma, of always being neglected, and never wanting to settle down, while Justin’s mom is going to prison soon, so he has no choice but to be the legal guardian of his siblings, and he is navigating his trauma about his father’s death.
The book lost its charm, the “curse” plot was thrown aside, and there was barely any connection between them, it just seemed like two friends bonding over trauma throughout the book. Although I like how the book is realistic, and not afraid to show the imperfections in characters and the build up anxiety or stress they had coming into real life, I wasn’t expecting this from just a summer-romance novel. It was definitely too much, and many parts of it felt reallyyyyyyyy repetitive and long, where I skipped pages and pages, but their bonding session WOULDN’T BE OVERRRRR.
It was a good read, but it felt like the author didn’t know how to end it. Spoiler alert!!!, Justin proposed to Emma in front of a toilet billboard because of this cringe-niche “thing” they had (Out of all of the things). It’s like he didn’t even try.
Reviewed by Teen Volunteer, 1/14/2026.