This young adult fiction book that I read, called ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ by Jenny Han, takes place during the summer time at a beach house with Isabel, also known as Belly, Steven, Laurel, Susannah, Conrad, and Jeremiah. It is a tradition for them to go every year to Cousin’s beach house because Laurel, Belly and Steven’s mom, and Susannah, Conrad and Jeremiah’s mom, grew up together and are practically sisters. In the past years, Belly was always left out because she was the youngest and the only girl. Steven, her brother, would never go a day without teasing her. But this summer was different. Everyone got older and taller. Belly and Jeremiah are the best of friends that care for each other, while Conrad acts as a father to her. Belly is stuck in a love triangle; She likes Conrad because of his smirky mouth, being mysterious, and most of all, unreachable. She also likes Jeremiah, for having a sweet personality, kind heart, and isn’t ashamed of anything. Belly was trying to figure out who was the one that whole summer.

Jenny Han was born in Richmond, Virginia and writes teen novels. She attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and acquired her MFA (Master of Fine Arts) at the New School. She now lives in Brooklyn, New York. Jenny’s first book, Shug, was published in 2006 and written when she was attending college. She then wrote a trilogy: ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’, ‘It’s Not Summer Without You’, and ‘We’ll Always Have Summer’ which instantly became New York Times best sellers. In 2011, Jenny and Siobhan Vivian wrote a two-part series. The first book, Burn For Burn, published in 2011. The second book, Fire With Fire, published in 2012. Jenny then published ‘To All The Boys I’ve Loved’ in April 2014.

There were many themes in this story, but the biggest one is moving on. Belly had to learn to let go and move on with her life. She didn’t want to stay in the same place, but persevere. She knew that Jeremiah and Conrad broke her heart and she didn’t want that to stop her from anything.

I feel that this book had a strong beginning and pulled me in. Everytime I opened the book, I felt as if i was there too. I definitely would read the other two books of the trilogy. Although there wasn’t a lot of interesting verbs, there was a lot of dialogue. I recommend this book to my female peers because it’s mostly about teen girl romance. ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ by Jenny Han is one of the best books I’ve ever read, so go out and read it!