Book Review: Rules for the Summer

I finished reading Meghan Quinn’s Rules for the Summer a few days ago – a fun romcom before summer ends.

The novel follows Renley Gossage and Theo Williams. Renley lives in a small, coastal town in Massachusetts that has a lot of upper class residents and tourists, but she is just getting by doing odd jobs and handywoman work around town. She has lived with her eccentric Aunt Kitty since her father passed away years ago. Now she has won the bid to take over the candy store in town – a store that holds a lot of memories for her – but what she didn’t know until now is that her aunt wrote down on the application that Renley had $20,000 to put in to the store renovations, but she doesn’t. After learning that the town’s business board only gave her the bid because they secretly believe she’ll fail and then they can let a fancy chain store come in that is willing to pay a lot of money. After getting drunk with Kitty to drown their sorrows, they think they’re signing up for a website to be matched with a financier, but they actually signed Renley up to be matched with a fiancé!

Theo is the son of a Lord in England. He does not get along with his father and after getting drunk with his best friend, Rupert, he signs up for a fiancée website. When the media gets hold of the news and he wakes up, hungover, and being yelled at by his father for the bad publicity of a lord’s son signing up on a website for a bride, Theo digs his heels in during their argument and says he’s serious about getting married and he intends to find his wife through the website. He matches with Renley and heads to the United States with Rupert to meet her.

Renley thinks she’s matched with a financier to help her open her dream candy store. Theo thinks he’s meeting a woman who wants to marry him. After the initial shock over the misunderstanding, Renley wants nothing more than to move on and for Theo to go away. Not wanting his father to win, Theo is determined to win Renley over. With no other choice, Renley accepts Theo’s investment in her shop and is willing to be friends. Theo is determined to get Renley to say yes to his marriage proposal by the end of the summer. Will he win her over?

I really liked Renley and Theo. They were fun characters and once Renley wasn’t so adverse to Theo, their chemistry was fun. Meghan Quinn’s books are usually very funny and the characters do hilariously unhinged things. I thought it was a little off in this book. Some of the unhinged behavior was just that and not very funny. It was like the funny moments were too forced and like she was trying too hard. The Aunt Kitty and Rupert friendship/flirtation was just weird and I don’t think it needed to be there at all even though it does contribute to the storyline and some of the conflict. I think it could’ve been done a different way.

Overall, I liked the book but it was definitely not my favorite Meghan Quinn. It might actually be my least favorite Meghan Quinn, but I still gave it 3 stars.

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