mrs_mander_reads
Written on Dec 14, 2020
Summer in Sand Lake isn t complete without a trip to Meade Creamery the local ice cream stand founded in 1944 by Molly Meade who started making ice cream to cheer up her lovesick girlfriends while all the boys were away at war. Since then, the stand has been owned and managed exclusively by local girls, who inevitably become the best for friends.
- ISBN10 1481452320
- ISBN13 9781481452328
- Publish Date 24 April 2018
- Publish Status Active
- Publisher Simon & Schuster
- Imprint Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 368
- Language English
Reviews
Sam@WLABB
Written on Jul 7, 2018
This was Amelia's last year as a Meade Creamery girl, and the last summer before she and her best friend were to go their separate ways. She was determined to make it the best summer yet! However, the untimely death of Molly Meade changed all her plans.
Molly Meade left her all girl ice cream stand to a boy?
This revelation sent shockwaves through the creamery girl syndicate, and may have marked the beginning of the end for Meade's Creamery.
• Pro: The peeks into Molly's life really tugged my heartstrings. Those flashbacks and diary entries took us back to WWII, and they were a great reminder of how women had to be so supportive of each other. With many men away at war, those at home had to pitch in more, they had to go without, and they had to worry for their loved ones. I found Molly and her story very inspiring.
• Pro: I was so glad that Amelia was able to finally see why she was selected as head girl. She may have thought it should have been her best friend, Cate, but Molly saw more in Amelia, than Amelia saw in herself, and it was such a wonderful thing, when she finally recognized and utilized her potential.
• Pro: ICE CREAM!! There was a lot of ice cream making and eating in this book, and as it is one of my favorite foods, I was delighted by all of this. The small town setting was also very lovely and I thought it was well utilized in the story.
• Pro: How can I not be delighted by the idea of the creamery? This was a special place that Molly created. These girls weren't just employees of the creamery, they were part of a sisterhood, which endured even after their time at the stand had ended. This was a place where young women learned to lead, support one another, and work together. It was a beautiful legacy Molly left for the world.
• Pro: That time between high school and college is so tricky, and it was captured quite well. There were a lot of things changing and fears of the unknown, and Amelia was grappling with those things, as well as worrying about her changing friendship with Cate. Vivian's exploration of these things were so well executed, and Amelia's struggles came across as really authentic.
• Pro: HOLY COW! I was really surprised by this little twist Vivian threw in there. Nicely played. I had no idea and never saw it coming, but it made me add another check mark in the "why-she's-amazing" column. Yeah, I'm keeping the "she" to myself.
• Pro: I knew there was going to be romance in this book, but I was a little leery of Grady. However, Vivian revealed him to be a lot more complex, than I initially thought, and I grew to adore him along with Amelia.
Overall: This book made me feel so many things! My emotions were sort of all over the place, but the one enduring feeling was happiness. I was left feeling joyous, and I couldn't have asked for a more precious story to do the job. I found this to be a sweet summer read about friendship, love, figuring out who you are and who you want to be.
*ARC provided in exchange for an honest review.
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girlinthepages
Written on May 17, 2018
Now that I've devoured Stay Sweet (pun intended) and fully understand the significance of the secret password, I can fully say that is met almost every expectation I had. I am first and foremost a HUGE dessert person, and I've never met a scoop of ice cream I didn't like. Getting to spend a summer with the Meade Creamery girls and watching them scoop handmade, simple yet irresistible ice cream flavors was like my dream book. And getting to learn about what went into the ice cream process? Maybe I'm strange but I found it SO compelling. I would have given anything to have been a Meade Creamery girl back in high school!
Aside from this book being every ice cream and pastel lover's dream, there was actually a lot of depth to the story. The history behind the stand was fascinating, with Molly Meade, the founder, starting it during WWII as a distraction from her fiancé being overseas fighting the Axis powers and a way to also generate income for her family. Seeing her start a business from the ground up in the war time economy, and also seeing her successfully keep it going after the war was so empowering, and I loved that it was female run and operated for the 6+ decades it had been open! So much female empowerment and entrepreneurship happened in this story which was 100% a message I love to see.
It was also my first time interacting with Siobhan Vivian's writing, and I have to say I was quite impressed. It was told from a third person perspective which I find to be rarer in YA contemporary novels, and had almost a story like quality to it, like someone was telling me a tale rather than me reading it. It was almost dream like in a way? I loved Amelia and identified with her so much, from her desire to always do the right and responsible thing to her innate tendency to care (and sometimes stress) about things rather than just being able to brush them off. I feel like often times these are traits that are seen as negative or something a protagonist needs to overcome, so it was refreshing to see her use these elements of her personality to evoke change and be her own person. There were a lot of friendship feels while I was reading, and while there were times Cate REALLY irritated me (Amelia's blonde BFF who can be found on the back of the cover), I appreciated that their relationship was tested in a real way.
The one thing I could have lived without in this novel was the romance. I feel like it really didn't need it and I would have loved to see the story be more about the ice cream and the business and Amelia finding her place in the company without the romantic build up. It's not the main focus of the story so it was easy enough to tune out (it really felt like it was honestly there for plot convenience to cause trouble between Amelia and the other girls), but I easily could have done without it. Also, while I loved the diary entries from Molly that helped flesh out the founding story of Meade Creamery, I also found the text to be super tiny and hard to read in her handwriting (but that could also just be me getting old! RIP my youthful eyes).
Overall: I ADORED Stay Sweet and definitely always felt the urge to indulge in a scoop while reading because it made me feel like I was right there in the stand with the Meade Creamery girls. I loved the focus on a female founded and run company and also the college vibes as it was set during the summer before the protagonist heads to college. Someone please make the flavor Home Sweet Home a real thing one day!This review was originally posted on Girl in the Pages
nightingalereads
Written on Apr 29, 2018
Overall, a cute contemporary that's perfect for the summer.