I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!
Brandon's life seems pretty normal to everyone. But that's just on the outside, as he has to cope with his abusive father, who's also an alcoholic, and has to pay off his car although a friend crashed it. Working in a record shop as one of his two summer jobs, he meets Marvel and perhaps life isn't so bad after all. But when a teenage boy is found murdered in the sleepy town of Appleton the summer will turn even more remarkable.
When I started reading I couldn't figure out the main character's gender. I never read the blurb before starting a novel and it has a first person POV, so I didn't have any clues. The writing, at least at the beginning didn't help me either. But then of course I figured out it's a boy.
It reminded me a bit of the film 500 days of Summer, but to be honest I don't remember enough about that movie to be able to tell whether the resemblance ends with the name of the girls in the title.
The story is quite slow at times, but I didn't mind it. There were some moments though where I was thinking 'Just tell it!', because they were hinting a lot but it then took them a long time to actually tell what they wanted to say. The ending was very open, but for me this isn't the kind of novel that needs a sequel. As Brandon said, he felt Marvel was a summer girl (not necessarily a girl for just one summer, he just didn't know how she would move to the autumn) and that's what we get. One summer with Marvel.
One little nice extra: This book features a record shop so at the end of the novel there's a playlist with music you probably should listen to while reading the book. Only, as I read the e-book, I only noticed it when I finished reading.
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