{"id":46335,"date":"2025-07-07T15:51:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-07T15:51:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/46335\/"},"modified":"2025-07-07T15:51:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T15:51:08","slug":"these-summer-storms-review-family-drama-romance-and-inheritance-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/46335\/","title":{"rendered":"‘These Summer Storms’ review: Family drama, romance and inheritance games"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s one thing to look at someone like Jeff Bezos<\/a> or Elon Musk<\/a> and envy their wealth and success. It\u2019s a totally different thing to be the child of a tech pioneer, with a reputation to uphold lest stock prices suffer \u2014 at least according to Sarah MacLean\u2019s latest novel, \u201cThese Summer Storms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alice Storm\u2019s world is immediately captivating. Her childhood feels completely alien; an upper-class New York City upbringing taking helicopters to Rhode Island to spend summers at Storm Manor under an oppressive father and stifled mother \u2014 whom my brain immediately cast as Jessica Walter<\/a> a la \u201cArcher\u201d or \u201cArrested Development\u201d \u2014 gin and tonic always in hand, heavy on the gin. But Alice hasn\u2019t seen her family in five years, since she was excommunicated from the Storm empire. And while she\u2019s enjoying the independence and accomplishment that comes from building a life for herself by herself, the death of tech mogul Franklin Storm, the patriarch, is enough to drive her back to the family\u2019s secluded, stormy island one more time.<\/p>\n

So if there\u2019s a hookup with a strange, handsome man on the way there, who cares? Alice is grieving. She can have this one thing and move on, right?<\/p>\n

Wrong! MacLean wouldn\u2019t dare let the romance end there. \u201cThese Summer Storms\u201d may be a genre shift for the author, but it doesn\u2019t mean she\u2019s leaving romance completely behind. A steamy undercurrent of lust runs through a passionate enemies-to-lovers plot alongside the shifting sands of a shaken family in great need of some therapy, who find themselves thrust into an inheritance game Franklin manufactured before his death.<\/p>\n

If Franklin\u2019s widow and four kids want to see a penny of his enormous wealth, they\u2019ll have to follow his rules, which range from saying nice things about him and not speaking during odd hours to revealing grave truths and upending years-long relationships.<\/p>\n

The drama is intoxicating, and it feels great to get swept up in an imaginary rich family\u2019s problems. \u201cThese Summer Storms\u201d is pitted with little mysteries and interpersonal land mines. While the novel loses some momentum in the final act, it\u2019s a fun beach read, perfectly positioned for summer; on one level, it\u2019s a light read with rich-behaving-badly appeal. But it also goes deeper, into grief and emotional healing. MacLean writes with a strong narrative voice filled with humor and beautiful word-paintings.<\/p>\n

And, of course, plenty of storm metaphors.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP book reviews: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/book-reviews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s one thing to look at someone like Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk and envy their wealth and…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":46336,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[36028,1578,33973,1022,36029,36032,36030,171,3607,36027,4061,36031,405,403,404,406,2737,2740,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-46335","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-alice-storm","9":"tag-associated-press","10":"tag-book-reviews","11":"tag-books","12":"tag-books-and-literature","13":"tag-coping-with-grief","14":"tag-donna-edwards","15":"tag-entertainment","16":"tag-fiction","17":"tag-franklin-storm","18":"tag-jeff-bezos","19":"tag-jessica-walter","20":"tag-new-york","21":"tag-new-york-city","22":"tag-new-york-city-wire","23":"tag-ny-state-wire","24":"tag-rhode-island","25":"tag-ri-state-wire","26":"tag-united-states","27":"tag-unitedstates","28":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114812753382659343","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}