I won't be recommending this to a lot of my students. The multiple points of view are too much for them to manage at their lower reading levels. It's a fun book, just not what I'm looking for.

I've enjoyed other books by this author but this one wasn't for me, I'd still recommend her earlier work though!

Wow, this was so good. It's sort of like The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants meets Things I Can't Forget. It's all about sisterhood, friendship, toxic relationships, and more in this way that feels so real but also very uplifting.

There are four first person POVs in The Summer of Impossibilities, which is a lot, but they're done really well. I rarely had any issue with keeping them separate, because they all have unique voices. Skyler, Scarlett, Amelia Grace, and Ellie's POVs all dragged me into the story, and I read this one straight through, because I had to know where life was going to take them. Because it's an Allen book, there's a lot of nuance, and there's no perfect rom-com sort of ending, but the book as a whole made me feel so happy.

The plot of the book centers on a summer trip to Skyler and Scarlett's family lake house, after their mother discovers their father has been cheating on her. The mom puts a call out to her sorority sisters /best friends for help, and they all show up with their daughters to stay for the summer. Though the mom plot line is very much background, it's really lovely how the whole thing is about the life-long bonds between women and how incredibly important those friendships are.

The girls (Skyler, Scarlett, Amelia Grace, and Ellie) start up their mothers' club from when they were teens, which largely consists of making an "impossible" goal for summer, and these goals are their catalysts for change, though often in ways they do not expect. IMO this made a really great set up, with nice tropiness coming from the plot to add cuteness to a book with a lot of heavy topics. There's really great balance to this novel.

Skyler's struggling with juvenile arthritis, which by this point is basically preventing her from being able to play, her hands constantly feeling like she has shards of glass for bones. Her story involves invisible disabilities and her feeling that she cannot cause problems in the family. Skyler's such a freaking sweetie, but she's too afraid to make waves, and it's making things worse for her. She has a cute little romance, but it doesn't get much screen time. This book's way more about friendships than it is about romance.

Scarlett thinks her big problem is having been dragged off for the summer just when things were getting good at home. Thanks to her awesome boyfriend, she's accepted now and she's not cutting anymore. Sure, she's nervous about the possibility of having sex with him, but she's sure she'll be ready soon. Allen really delves into what makes a healthy relationship here, and it's on point and something teen girls would definitely benefit from considering.

Amelia Grace just came out to her whole town basically, caught in her first kiss ever with another girl. Immediately, she's ostracized, and her mother drags her away from the summer hoping things will blow over. Amelia's story is a crisis of faith. Very religious all of her life, she doesn't want to have to give up either her sexuality or her faith, but she doesn't believe she can have both. One thing I admire so much about this book is how thoughtfully religion is discussed (with Skyler's love of many religions, Amelia Grace's deep faith, Scarlett's agnosticism, and Ellie being Muslim). There's no judgment of faith or a lack of it, only of not being a good person inside of whatever you believe. And there's also a cute f/f romance, though again it's a small part of the book.

Ellie took me the longest time to warm up to, mostly because there's so much in Ellie that I related to. Ellie's absolutely desperate for friendship in a way that makes her awkward and push too hard, and oh man do I feel that deep in my bones. There's a special kind of psychological pain that comes from being entirely friendless, from never being wanted around, from always being excluded from groups, and it can really do a number on you. This is the summer of Ellie finally making friends and finally realizing that maybe she was going after the wrong people. Girl, I feel you. There's also some great stuff about the dangers of fitness inspiration stuff on the internet and a little bit on eating disorders.

The Summer of Impossibilities is a such a beautifully accepting book. The girls have a wide range of views on things (religion, sororities, drinking), and it really upholds the important of doing what's right for you and not judging others for being better off with something else. It's so motivational and heartwarming. Recommended for anyone looking for a book full of sisterhood and friendship. This may be my favorite Allen book so far!

DNFed at 30%.
Unfortunately, this book simply didn't engage me and I didn't have any motivation to finish it. The style of writing just wasn't for me and the plot did not hold my interest.

This was a very sweet summer read. It has some heavy topics (divorce, religion) while still being a light summer book. I enjoyed the four different POV’s. The writing is appropriate for a younger YA audience and I would recommend to teens.

The Summer of Impossibilities by Rachael Allen reminded me a lot of the sisterhood of the travelling pants which I loved reading growing up so the nostalgia factor was on max for this one. 5 star read highly recommended.

A cute, quick summer read. I enjoyed the feeling of friendshp portrayed in this story, and the range of female characters was a nice change. Some nice LGBT representaton too. Some of the plot points were a little predictable, but it was a heartwarming story nonetheless.

Perfect for a summer holiday, for ages 14+.

Every now and then authors get it into their heads to try and recreate the success of Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. And then we get books like this one, of a group of vastly different girls thrown together by some circumstance. Each girl has some serious struggle she's dealing with in secret, a struggle that is threatening to overwhelm her. And its only through sharing and sisterhood that they can find their way out. So this all seems obvious and predictable. Even all the twists and turns, the way secrets come out and threatened to tear them apart. This is exactly what we expect from main stream fictions. There were some subtleties that I did like. I liked Scarlet's relationship as compare to her mothers and the abusive one. We see then how people get into unhealthy relationships, the things that drive one to stay in it. The comparison, though, lacked in finesse. Overall, I liked the plot and the characters more than I anticipated but this isn't one I'd turn to first.

I have very mixed feelings about this one. Kind of, I wasn't the right reader, or maybe I read it at the wrong timing. Still, I enjoyed this book more than I was expecting. The premise of the book made me go for it, but after starting it, it felt like a NO for me. But after I finished it, I felt like it was worth it. One thing I highly appreciate about this book is the dynamic and character development. I liked how each of the characters was distinct their own way. The writing style was something entirely new to me and I liked it for that too. Overall, I think it is a good book to read on a hot summer day.

This was a fun read all about sisterhood and camaraderie as four friends weather love and conflicts together in one turbulent summer. I enjoyed the diversity present, especially the neuro- and physical- diversity (we still don't see much of either in middle grade and YA books). A more relevant Traveling Pants type book.

Four girls are forced to spend a summer with each other as their mothers are best friends from way back in their college days. A crisis is what brings them all together, but could the bonds of the mothers extend to the girls themselves?

Though I struggled getting started with this book as most of the characters seemed superficial and self involved to start, this book really grew on me and I ended up loving it! The relationships young women have with their friends and family are complex and at time heartbreaking. It was an interesting progression through the book to see how each girl was hiding a secret and each girl was afraid to trust the group; however they grew together to not only reveal the darkest parts of themselves to each other, but also leads to personal revelations. They learned how strong the bonds of friendship can be and the heartwarming true meaning of family.

Reading this book felt like a warm hug. There was something so comforting and home-y about it. It’s a love letter to female friendship, and to growing up and growing into yourself. Loved the representation, loved the character growth, loved the summer-y lake house vibes

5/5 stars

This book was just the joy I needed at exactly a terrible time. It has that essence of YA contemporary that I love so much, that bright joy and fun and dealing with hard topics but ultimately leaving you with hope.

It's a four-POV book, and at first it took a bit to figure out the particularities of each MC, especially with two of them being twins whose names start with the same letter — reading fast I had a hard time distinguishing between them. By maybe 15% of the way through, though, each POV was crystallized and that made it so pleasant to read and follow these journeys.

There was a lot of exploration of hard things in this book (bullying, pain, marital stress, etc), juxtaposed with fun moments like parties on the lake, so many descriptions of food and fun, and great friendship vibes.

Overall, would definitely recommend as I think it's a great book that touches on some hard things while remaining overall upbeat and positive, and is skillfully crafted what with those four distinct POVs.

I've loved the other books by Rachael Allen in the past - I think she's a super underrated YA writer with a lot of quiet books that more people should read! I've always thought that she did a nice job of writing real teenagers.

This book, unfortunately, missed that element for me. This is definitely a story where an old person like myself needs to turn on their teen brain and see where they're coming from, so don't read this if you're finding yourself unable to do that. I still felt that a lot of their inner thoughts and feelings were a bit unrealistic for characters their age. 

I struggled to keep all of the characters straight, which is frustrating, because they're all honestly quite different from each other. I could tell you details about each of them and their defining characteristics, but their inner thoughts and POVs didn't distinguish enough from each other. I constantly forgot who I was reading about. Skyler and Scarlett are twins - Skyler is dealing with juvenile arthritis and struggles to tell her mom that the pain meds aren't working, while Scarlett is having issues with her "perfect" boyfriend and has had issues with self-harming in the past. Ellie is a biracial Muslim girl who loves tennis, has had issues with eating (borderline eating disorder), and has struggled with bullies and making friends. Amelia Grace loves going to church but is trying to reconcile her sexuality with her love of God, all while harboring a longtime crush on Scarlett. All of the girls are at the lake house for the summer because their moms were sorority sisters and needed to come together to help one of them. 

So, as you can tell, there was kind of a lot going on... while at the same time, the plot never really kicked into gear for me. They would try to go to a party, talk about some stuff, hang out with their moms... and that's about it. So much of the book was just their internal thoughts about each other and overall feelings, without moving toward anything interesting.

I really enjoyed the Carolina lake setting and would have been curious to read more summery vibes in this one, as we're heading into May and I love reading summertime books now. Allen did a good job of touching on all kinds of marginalizations and problems teens could have, but it was a lot to read without really making progress toward a cohesive story. I really needed this book because it was easy to crank through, but I didn't love it as much as I hoped!

Don't you love summer books? The Summer of Impossibilities by Rachael Allen is a lovely book about summer, friendship, and learning to accept yourself for who you are.

It revolves around four main characters:

Skyler - she suffers from juvenile arthritis, and although she loves playing softball, it's incredibly painful to play. She doesn't want to disappoint her family by telling them her hands hurt.

Scarlett - Sky's twin sister, she's not sure about her boyfriend.

Amelia Grace - She's interested in girls and also likes church, but when her church finds out that she likes girls, doesn't want her to be a youth pastor anymore.

Ellie - She's been homeschooled for most of her life and has trouble making friends.

When Skyler and Scarlett's parents are having marriage troubles, the girl's parents take them to a lakeside cabin for the summer and the girls all share a cabin together. They follow in their mothers' footsteps by creating the Southern Belles Drinking Club - which doesn't necessarily involve drinking because Ellie is Moslem and doesn't drink. Together, they make a pact to do something impossible over the summer.

The growth and the friendship of these girls is sweet, and this makes a wonderful summer book. I only wish I had friendships like these. In the background of these girl's friendships, their parents are also dealing with things, and their difficulties bleed into the girl's lives--as they can in real life. I loved how the girls dealt with their family amidst their growing independence.

Although I enjoyed the book, my biggest problem was that sometimes I had difficulty distinguishing the voices of the various characters, especially at the beginning. I generally was able to tell the different characters apart mostly by what they were dealing with or by flipping back to see what name was at the chapter header, not by their different ways of speaking. But this is a minor issue.

I definitely think this is a fun book for teens to read this summer.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC of The Summer of Impossibilities by Rachael Allen.

Sisters Scarlett and Skyler are shocked to come home one day to find their mother throwing out all of their father's possessions.  He has been cheating on her, and she is taking her two girls to see her best and longest girlfriends in their summer home.  Scarlett and Skyler are now going to be spending all summer with their "Aunties" and their aunties own teen daughters.  Some of them know each other, some of them don't, but all of them are holding in secrets and looking for new friendships and romance.

Ok, this book covered a lot of totally legit teen issues.  Sexual orientation, romance, health, pain, sex, divorce, emotional abuse, friendship and a need to belong.  I appreciated all of that, this is a book that I think I would have really enjoyed as a teen.  

Having said that, I think it could have been better.  A lot of the plight's of the teens felt a bit unbelievable and contrived.  The secret club that they formed was silly, and even the in-fighting between the girls was OTT.  However, there was nothing overtly wrong with the story, in my opinion, but I think it could have gone deeper.

An ideal YA book for a group of friends to read together. Four seemingly different girls grouped by their mothers must spend a summer in the same cabin. The chapters hop from girl to girl so there are no true secrets from the reader only from the characters. A coming of age story that will hit home with more then one kind of young woman due to the insight of multiple personalities and situations. Children ages 14 and up.

I love summer. I love summer novels and this was one filled with friendships, falling in love and discovering yourself. This was amazing. the perfect summer novel.

I truly enjoyed the way Allen explored the relationships between the four girls, and used them to pull out various aspects of each character. There were frustrating elements of each character, where you at times just wanted them to do the very obvious thing they needed to do - but that's OK! Sometimes life is like that, and the thing that you need to do is the hardest. I thought it was a cute premise and setting, and enjoyed spending time in the world Allen created.

"I didn’t realise friendship could be a thing that makes you feel like you’ve been cracked wide open, but in the best possible way."

Perfect for fans of: The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants and readers who love Kasie West and Morgan Matson

Review:

The overall execution of the story was really well done. When it comes to multiple POV’s, it’s sometimes hard to distinguish between the different voices but all of the four girls had distinct tones to their chapters and their own individual goals that they were trying to make a reality.

The Summer of Impossibilities highlights friendship in all its glory. From the quiet anxieties everyone faces when trying to make new friends (am I likeable? Should I be funnier? Why don’t they want to hang out with me? is it them – or me?) to the best part of having a friend group (spending time together making the ordinary feel extraordinary), Allen encompasses a lot of different dynamics and preconceived notions about what a friend should be like in this novel.

Though the tone of the book is light, the topics addressed are on the darker side of things. Amelia Grace deals with the fallout with her church after she has been outed as gay during a sermon, Ellie struggles with building friendships because she doesn’t know how to be herself around other people and feels the pressure to be the best she can be on the tennis court, Scarlett used to cut herself and is still recovering and Skyler is frightened to tell her parents that her juvenile arthritis has deteriorated. It’s a lot to tackle in one novel and while there were some parts of the individual’s stories that could have used more page time for the reader to empathise, it was also extremely refreshing to have their issues be part of their personality instead of taking over every single aspect of their lives. In the end, it’s the friendships these guys develop that help them find a way to cope with their problems and feel supported enough to make their voices heard.

The romantic relationships definitely take a back burner in this one, and while I understood that for the most part seeing as friendship was the focus, I would have wished for a bit more development when it came to romantic interests – there was a very caricature-y way both Scarlett’s boyfriend and Amelia Grace’s and Skyler’s summer flings were described. Despite that, the LGBT aspect kept me turning the pages to find out what happens between Amelia Grace and her long-term crush on one of the girls at the lake house.

Altogether, this was a cute and quick read, an homage to friendships and dreamy summers, perfect for everyone who needs a pick-me-up and some feel-good vibes to brighten their day!