Lina is spending a magical summer in Italy.. and she hates it. She’s only there because it was her mother’s dying wish for Lina to go live with her long lost father, Howard. Upon arrival Lina’s given the journal her mom held when she herself had lived in Italy many years ago. The diary contains shocking answers to all of Lina’s questions about her mother. Also, beautiful Italian love interest, Ren, follows her around the whole time. 

I was looking for a cute little romance with this book, and mission accomplished. Found it.  

But we all have our flaws, and Lina had a few. She’s literally in ITALY, going out every night, hanging around with the boy of her dreams, and she hates it. Can’t wait to get out and go back home to small town, USA! She’s so dramatic; you’re 16, calm down, not everything is the end of the world. 

Besides Lina, everyone else is kinda two dimensional – It’s literally her world, they’re all just living in it. 

But that’s okay, because I like Howard. He’s sweet, the perfect confused first-time dad.

I also like Ren! He’s not over forgiving or unrealistically kind – Ren has a backbone, something most of the insufferable love interests in these types of books lack. AND he’s got a hobby (just one. But we’re making progress.) outside of thinking about Lina! Yay! 

The love story was cute and all, but I just don’t believe Ren and Lina actually love each other. Like, what did she like about him that the other rich Italian boys didn’t have? Their chemistry was basically trampled by all the solving-her-family-history action. Maybe they’re just trauma bonded or something.

This book follows two timelines simultaneously: Lina in the present, and Hadley’s dairy from 17 years ago. The two love stories kinda take away from each other; Neither one had a chance to fully shine. 

She’s got an Italian love story, a grieving girl, a familial mystery, and a tragic betrayal all going on at the same time and it’s suffocating all the character depth. She was really trying to shove every trope she could think of into one book, but at least it makes for a very fast pace story.

I regret reading this in the middle of winter. It’s obviously a summertime book and I totally ignored that. My bad, now I’m sad. 3 stars. 

https://www.goodreads.com/joliedx2