Discover Summer Lovin (Costas Sisters #2) Formulated By Carly Phillips Format Printable Format

you ever read a book so poorly written you just want to break through years of reserve and upbringing and swear like a sailor I didnt throw Summer Lovin by Carly Phillips across the roombut I came close.
I didnt finish the first book in this series, Under the Boardwalk because the instalust overwhelmed any halfway interesting plot pointpages in.
Summer Lovin kept me interested long enough that I figured I should just finisha decision I regret.

Summer Lovin tells the story of Zoe, a former FBI agent from a large Greek family, and Ryan, a lawyer from upper crust Massachusetts.
And I do mean tells the story, Using an overabundance of adjectives and adverbs and not nearly enough action, Theoretically the storyline follows their relationship with Sam, the girl Zoes family is trying to adopt who is also Ryans biological niece.
In reality, the novel drags through Zoe and Ryans instalust and contrived emotional upheaval with a whole bunch of totally random conflict shoved in the last/th to make some sort of riveting plot line.
It fails.

First, khakis are not sexy, Light blue polo shirts are not ultramasculine,year olds should seriously consider before donning miniskirts, While I can understand the author wanting to somehow give Zoe “character,” I got real tired of her miniskirts and skanky blouses.
What kind of FBI/security agent was/is she And would a woman who dressed like that really find Italian suits that attractive I got very tired of hearing about Ryan's “sexiness” which could be another rant.
The English vocabulary has many wonderful alternatives to sexy, Why not broaden the vocabulary some when he simply walks around in something Jake from State Farm would wear.


Second, the most annoying part of this book was the writing, I cannot even begin to express it, The author rarely tells something, She bludgeons you over the head with it, and in case you missed it repeats the process twenty times.
The novel dies a slow and painful death at the hands of an abundance of entirely generic adjective and adverbs.
Youre told everything and yet can picture nothing, People “paused on purpose” as opposed to pausing not on purpose, “asked affronted,” or perform actions like “shuffling papers on his desk for no apparent reason” maybe the papers needed shuffling
The majority of the writing is dialogue but even this is disappointing.
It is so wordy and slow that no living person could actually have a conversation that way the characters have to stop and consider everything, both out loud and for the reader.
How about this:
Zoe accepted the picture and glanced down at the photo of the teenager, frozen in time at around the same age as Sam.
Zoe sucked in a startled breath, “Wow,” she said, staring at the eerily familiar features and blond hair, “You werent kidding. ”
He shook his head, “Starling resemblance, isnt it”
“My thoughts exactly,” she said, placing her hand over his, “Im so sorry. ”
He met her gaze, his eyes warm and grateful, “I appreciate that. ”
“Why didnt you show this photograph to me before”
He shrugged as he placed the picture back into his pocket.
“You didnt ask. ”
She shifted uncomfortably in her seat,

Third, the plot drags out over several hundred pages and rushes into the ending much too fast with little real resolution or sense.
Sure, it comes as a shock that the one upstanding and loving figure in Ryans life is a total jerk who drove away his sister and stole from everyonegood thing no one considers that what he did was TOTLLY ILLEGAL.
He should be going to jail, Not calmly continuing on and working out those issues with his family, I totally did not buy his work with the mafia, I did not buy his interaction with his niece, Was he evil Wasnt he Selfmotivated Genuinely trying to help The novel muddles through that section and the only real implications to his behavior seems to be that some small business owners had higher insurance.
but hes probably evil because he set a mobster on ayear old girlwhy again To find a safety deposit box thing he knows about how In order to find something that is probably not there Which no one would have thought to look for if he hadnt drawn attention to it Way too much contrivance that did not fit well together.

The story didnt need the dramatic, confrontational climax, There was enough angst to be worked through between the two main characters without adding the “thriller” bit.
Poorly structured thriller, as it stands, that barely made sense,

Fourth, the faux psycology in this book drove me crazy,
A part of Ryan wanted to get the hell out of the dark, dank basement and read his sisters words in warm, familiar surroundings, and another part of him wanted right now to see what shed left behind.

Many paragraphs like that provide entirely irrelevant and often annoying “glimpses” into the characters emotions.
The problem is, none of it feels real, Its difficult to relate at any level to them, Ryan supposedly sought his sister for over ten years maybe The math got confusing but overcomes the emotional upheaval of why she left relatively quickly.
After all, hes got a hot woman to make out with now,
Zoe supposedly has textbook commitment issues and blames it on her parents passion for each other.
Her struggle did not make sense to me, I could think of many good reasons for her not to get it on with a complete stranger but this idea that she would “lose herself in a man” wasnt one that readily came to mind.
She already had a career which she gave up because she didnt want to “follow the rules” so she had to have left home at some point, right Its not like shes been living in her parents basement.
Despite frequent references to the movie, this is not My Big Fat Greek Wedding.
Even acknowledging that she “struggles” with commitment issues and leaving home, she agonizes over it FOREVER.
I got sick of her attitude and mindset,
Honestly, as a couple, Ryan and Zoe did not make sense.
Their commonality basically is in their lack of friends, messed up families, and sexual appeal, All they want to do is makeout and have sex, There is no evidence their relationship exists beyond that, It seems like a lonely standard to build a relationship on to me,

Fifth, the sexual innuendos were downright awkward, There was nothing sexy about it, The sex scenes were so bad they turned you off, This author has an uncomfortable obsession with body fluid and that is all I will say on the subject.
But really, for no other reason, avoid the book for that!

I am sure there is more to criticize.
I am sorely disappointed. A little embarrassed to have finished it, Bemused that someone actually published Summer Lovin, Was there not an editor involved I cant even give this novel kudos for potential, There was basically nothing redeeming about it except perhaps in the twin sisters and their relationship.
That epilogue though.
Um. weird Am I supposed to go daww happy day more twins My actual response was more along the lines of What.
The. Heck. No. Followed by Wait they are married Sooooo she knew him like two weeks before they got engaged and like a month before they were married Not rushing anything at all.
Noooo.
I really enjoyed Summer Lovin' Carly Phillips writes with such a great description, She describes the Costas family as the Adams family and some of the "jobs" they had done in the past.
The birthday party for Samantha was described in such detail that I felt like I was actually there at the party with Spanky myself.

The attraction of Ryan and Zoe is evident from the very first time our author allows us to meet them and runs through this book.
We get to know Zoe Costas's amazing and very quirky family and Ryan Baldwin's very stiff high society family as well.
Samantha or Sam as she is known to all is the reason for Zoe and Ryan to meet and in this book we learn if an old dog can learn new tricks.

I really liked this book and look forward to more in this series, ARC for honest review with no compensation,stars

Summer of Love is thend book in the Costas Sisters series and Carly Phillips has written another good book! This is a reissued book formerly called Summer Lovin.
. .

This book is about Zoe, an exFed, Special Services and is starting her own security business and part of an old Greek family.
Her family is fostering ayear old girl named Samantha and after having her for a year the family decides to adopt her.
but in comes Ryan Baldwin

Ryan Baldwin is from Boston and part of a welltodo family who disowned their daughter, Faith.
Ryan has been trying to find Faith for a long time but she changed her name so many times that it was hard to track her and finally found out his Faith has died but she had a daughter.
Hiring

a PI to find his niece he ends up at the Costas celebration for adopting Samantha she is Faiths daughter now he has to decide if he wants to let the Costas adopt her or take her back to Boston but after being with Samantha he realizes that she is so much like her mother that being with his family would destroy her just like his sister.


Zoe and Ryan decide to not tell the Costas who is really is until he gets to know the family and Samantha.
. . in the meantime these two develop feelings for each other but will he follow his heart and have Zoe and let Samantha be adopted or will he fall back on his upbringing and destroy them all.