Blog Tour (Review): The Summer of No Regrets by Katherine Grace Bond

ASIN: ‎B007PUT3JW
Publisher: ‎Sourcebooks Fire (May 1, 2012)
Publication Date: ‎May 1, 2012
Language: ‎English

Praise for THE SUMMER OF NO REGRETS

“Brigitta…was incredibly unique” Blogger Ambur, Burning Impossibly Bright ” —Burning Impossibly Bright
“This is an utterly sweet, captivating book that will charm you, make you think, and maybe even make you shed a tear.” —Cupcake’s Book Cupboard
“an interesting look at all that can change in the summer of a young woman’s life.” —YA Bibliophile

“The story line immediately captured my heart ” —Charming Chelsey’s
“…a novel of identity, true love, and the meaning of death; all told in the voice of a bright, thoughful, and passionately self-contradictory teenage girl.” —Book Talk

“…fun summer read with a little bit of a serious twist…You’ll laugh, you’ll tear up, and you’ll be on the hunt for a celebrity lookalike crush in no time” —Fiction Folio

“…the sort of book that should top your “to reads” list.” —Letters Inside Out

“…a delightful tale of self-discovery and of burgeoning romance.” —Allison Can Read

“The meaningful relationship that is created only makes you want more” —Books With Bite

“Readers can expect romance, drama, and incredible emotion” —A Cupcake and A Latte

The summer Luke came into my life, I decided to keep him a secret. Even from my celebrity-obsessed best friend. Maybe he *was* a dead-ringer for notorious Hollywood bad boy Trent Yves. And it was possible that everything he told me was a lie. And yes, I was probably asking for trouble. But all I saw was Luke–sweet, funny, caring–someone who would let me be the real me.

But which was the real him?

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I received a copy of The Summer of No Regrets by Katherine Grace Bond for an honest review. What follows is my opinion and mine alone. There was no compensation for this review.

When I first received the book, the author mentioned that the story is not your typical romance. Yes, it has that contemporary sweet romance feel. Yes, there is the well-known secret identity trope. And, yes, the author was not wrong. The book is definitely not what I expected.

But it had more.

Romance books are supposed to spur feelings within the reader. We fall in love with the characters and their journey. We enjoy the roller coaster of emotions from the discovery to the break-up to the reuniting. The genre gives us hope and brings us a sense of belonging. With The Summer of No Regrets, the hope and belonging are in the romance part, but there is an equally driven force for more.

Brigitta is the typical teen female lead. She’s not like other girls, but actually, she is. Yes, things about her are not like the public school kids she knows. Her parents are very much hippies, and she is homeschooled. But, like the other girls, she does have an immense fascination with the media and celebrities. That fascination is more of her guilty pleasure, and she would like you to know that she is deeper than that. So, like many teens, she’s trying to find her space in spirituality. All the while grappling with intense grief.

The Summer of No Regrets is more like a love note to that feeling of wanting more. Wanting someone to understand you and wanting a sense of community or a thing to actually hold and believe and nurture. It reminded me of my younger self, researching various religions and trying to find what fits me. I still haven’t found that feeling, not in the way I imagined as a teen, but I found peace, and I’m happy with that.

It is rare for a teen romance to elicit nostalgia for me, and even more rare that it has me thinking of spirituality, my life, and the world as a whole. No, Bond was very much right, this isn’t a typical romance. It is so much more, and I’m happy to have read it.

Photo Content from Katherine Grace Bond

Katherine Grace Bond wants to heal the rifts in our culture and in ourselves. She writes on writing, race, family, and relationships on Medium, and is at work on a time-travel fantasy, for which she spent a couple of months in France trying to chase down Manet. Her books include The Summer of No Regrets, about finding the meaning of life and death when the boy next door may be a movie star in hiding, and The Legend of the Valentine, illustrated by the awesome Don Tate. Her poetry collections include Considering Flight, about the uneasy dance between father and daughter on the razor’s edge of mental illness. When she’s not writing, she plays fiddle in an Irish band called The Scuppermonkeys.