The Summer of Skinny Dipping by Amanda Howells

The Summer of Skinny Dipping

Author:  Amanda Howells

Publisher:  Sourcebooks Fire

Released Date:  June 1st 2010

From Goodreads:

 "Sometimes I still wake up shivering in the early hours of the morning, drowning in dreams of being out there in the ocean that summer, of looking up at the moon and feeling as invisible and free as a fish. But I'm jumping ahead, and to tell the story right I have to go back to the very beginning. To a place called Indigo Beach. To a boy with pale skin that glowed against the dark waves. To the start of something neither of us could have predicted, and which would mark us forever, making everything that came after and before seem like it belonged to another life.

My name is Mia Gordon: I was sixteen years old, and I remember everything...."

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The Summer of Skinny Dipping is the recalling of the most memorable summer in Mia’s life. After getting dumped by her boyfriend, nothing sounds better than a summer in the Hamptons. Mia and her family travel to the Hamptons to spend the summer with her aunts, and cousins. She is looking forward to the fun her and her cousin will have, like they use to, but she quickly realizes times are changing, and nothings like it used to be.

Though predictable I enjoyed The Summer of Skinny Dipping. The setting of this YA novel is ideal for a beach read. Why not read a coming of age story set in the beach, at the beach. The tensions are high in the summer cottage between the adults, as well as the teenagers, and you know something is brewing. Mia is from a small town, and her ways are too, her cousins are New Yorkers, and though previously her and her cousin Corrine always had a strong bond, the bond is no longer there. Mia can’t recognize her cousin anymore, and though they don’t have much in common anymore, she does try to fit in the clique. In comes Simon, the boy next door. He is also not part of this elusive clique, that is where the first initial bond begins between them. As outsiders they find a friendship, and first love that is real in a place full of artificial people.

Summer of Skinny Dipping is about first loves, discovering who you are, and not conforming to fit in. A quick enjoyable read.

Rating: 3.5