The Book of Summer by Michelle Gable - Reshelved Books

Hello dear For the Love of Dewey Readers!

I recently just finished Michelle Gable's The Book of Summer.  I book-lusted after this novel for quite a while after seeing it on display in Barnes and Noble, but I wasn't sure I was going to buy it.  You know, I really don't need to keep buying books... actually I really need to stop. But my public library system did not own a copy, and when I saw it sitting on the shelf at my favorite local used book store in Montclair, I just knew it was meant to be. 

Aren't the hydrangeas on the cover (and in my garden) just gorgeous?! 

I totally and 100% judged this book by the cover and by how it's location is set in Nantucket.  I guess I'm a total cliche when it comes to great summer reads.  What I liked about this book was that it isn't just another summer story, but rather takes an actual environmental issue that has happened in Nantucket (the erosion of the Sconset Bluff) and personifies it to show the reader how this has effected not only one individual but also an entire family history.  Gable does this by telling the story both from present day and from a historical flashback to the 1940's, making this novel just as much as a Nantucket novel and environmental novel, as it is a WWII novel.   

A brief synopsis of the story lines:

Bess Codman is visiting Nantucket to try to get her mother to pack up her belongings and leave the house that her family has owned for generations on Sconset Bluff.  The years of erosion have slowly taken the property and sacraficed it to the ocean below.  The foundation is weak and being in the house for too much longer can be deadly.  Bess herself is going through a terrible divorce and just found out that she is pregnant.  Her mother does not leave the house easily, and is fighting to have measures taken to prevent further erosion from taking place.

Ruby (Bess' Grandmother) was married on the eve of WWII.  She struggles with her husband, brothers, and friends going off to war, while also suffering from numerous miscarriages.  The house on the bluff becomes her home as well as her strength as it is passed down onto her and thus onto the one child who she does carry to term.  

My take:

At first I thought that this novel came across as a little slow, but it soon picked up.  I loved the blending of a Nantucket summer novel, with environmental issues, and a WWII story.  It was well done and cohesively put together.  I also liked how Gable included information at the end of the novel about Sconset Bluff and the erosion.  

So dear readers, I leave you with a For the Love of Dewey rating of 4.5 out 5 Coffee Beans. 

For more information on Sconset, check out Gable's sources:

Sconset Beach Preservation Fund 
Vanity Fair: Nantucket and Malibu Disappearing