Review of Summer in Salem by Brina Courtney
5 stars
“Summer in Salem” is a totally delightful and enchanting novel, multilayered and multileveled. There is so much going on in this book, and all of the subplots are just as delectable-and just as essential-as the apparent main plot. The author does a tremendous job of balancing plot lines and multiple characters, and of interweaving the story lines. The reader doesn’t have a spare moment to be bored, because the novel is exciting throughout.
On the surface, Teagan, almost twenty-two, moves out of her parents’ home to stay with her grandmother for the summer, due to her grandma’s propensity to independence and health concerns. Yes, that’s the surface; but beneath that is Teagan’s own situation: her beloved boyfriend Jason, who was also completely enraptured with her, just “disappeared” nine months earlier, gone without a trace. Her grief and depression led to her dropping out of college temporarily and returning to her folks, and put a hiatus on her paintings.
Add to that: the disappearances of girls in Salem, even apparent murder, of girls who look identical to Teagan. Add the intuition of Teagan’s since childhood that she is under observation. Add how smoothly her introduction to Salem, to a job, to a new best friend, flows. Add the secrets her Mom and Gran are keeping from her-about her, and about Jason….I could go on and on, but I won’t spoil this wonderful story, which deserves a very wide readership, both among YA fanciers and among adult readers too.
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