I bought this book on Kindle hoping to get a typical corny summer teenage romancey novel. However both stories had major flaws. I loved Laguna Cove and its storyline but it ended so abruptly that I did not even realize it was over until I was onto the next story and I was so disappointed with the lack of real closure that it was hard to appreciate the good parts during the story. Frankly, I found Cruel Summer very annoying. The main character, Colby is very immature and constantly complains about hating her life and circumstances, while spending the summer in a picturesque beachy Greece island location-- who would complain about that?? And when I say complain, it is CONSTANT complaining. Understandable to try to cope with her parents' problems and changing life, but she just sounded so young and spoiled that it was hard to get through. I finished the first book, and I can't say I'm impressed. It was over-all pretty anti-climatic. I can admit that while Ellie does get her little surf sponsorship, that was kinda cute and it was a little happy ending. But nothing really happened during the book. Everything that took place happened really fast, like it happened and then was forgotten really quickly, which makes you believe nothing was really important. So I couldn't pick out a really good plot line. All the characters were too similar to pick them apart and they all blended into one in my mind. My favorite part was the last chapter, because it was pretty adorable, with Lola wrecking her cotillion hair celebrating over her friend's victory and Ellie and her dad holding hands to go get the sponsorship.The seconds book was way better, but it wasn't AMAZING. I liked the character progression of Colby even though it was kinda predictable. The book was overall pretty cute. She was extremely whiny at the beginning, but it was realistic for her to be, being that she's a teenager and the circumstances were unfavorable for her.
