Book Review: A Midsummer's Nightmare by Kody Keplinger

"There's a type of raw energy about this book. Nothing held back..."

Reading Level: Young Adult
Publication Date: June 2012
Publisher: Poppy
Pages: 304
Series: no
Acquisition: I received a free ARC for review at BEA 2012

Summary:

Whitley Johnson's dream summer with her divorcé dad has turned into a nightmare. She's just met his new fiancée and her kids. The fiancée's son? Whitley's one-night stand from graduation night. Just freakin' great.

Worse, she totally doesn't fit in with her dad's perfect new country-club family. So Whitley acts out. She parties. Hard. So hard she doesn't even notice the good things right under her nose: a sweet little future stepsister who is just about the only person she's ever liked, a best friend (even though Whitley swears she doesn't "do" friends), and a smoking-hot guy who isn't her stepbrother...at least, not yet. It will take all three of them to help Whitley get through her anger and begin to put the pieces of her family together.

Filled with authenticity and raw emotion, Whitley is Kody Keplinger's most compelling character to date: a cynical Holden Caulfield-esque girl you will wholly care about. (from Goodreads)

My thoughts:
This book is good. Like, I'll read a chapter or two before bed but no really I'll be staying up till 2 in the morning to finish it good.

I don't know how it happened but I got so caught up in Whitley's story that seriously, the book did not leave my hands until I read every word on every page. And! And? I cried. For serious. Real tears. Whitley had so much pain in her life and she went through so much and so many horrible things happened and so many wonderful things happened it was really just too much for me! In a good way :)

There's a type of raw energy about this book. Nothing held back, tell it like it is rawness that really got under my skin. Whitley is entirely herself and at the same time, she's been so molded by the people and circumstances of her life that she doesn't really know who she is.

And oh god I hated her father. I hated her mother. I hated everyone who had ever hurt her. Because even though she's a bitch to most people and she never lets people get close and she really doesn't give a shit you can't help but love her. You can't help but feel her pain and want to make everything better. You want her to have her happy ending.

The amount of emotion I felt reading this book is hard to compare. Damn you Kody! (the happy kind of damning...I swear) .

Final verdict:
In the end, it's a story about a girl and her family. But it's not just any girl and she doesn't have just any family.

She's full of piss and vinegar and I bet that you've met a girl like her before. A girl who always gets the guy and laughs off the horrible names everyone calls her. A girl who uses people and lets herself be used. A girl who stopped caring a long time ago. Ever stop to think about what happens to that girl in the end? Kody did. She wrote A Midsummer's Nightmare to give us Whitley - at least it feels that way to me. Whitley you won't have to wonder about. Whitley you won't forget.

Overall Rating:

5 / 5 Stars

Author's website / Goodreads / IndieBound