A Midsummer's Nightmare by Kody Keplinger

A Midsummer's Nightmare (Hamilton High)

by Kody Keplinger

Whitley Johnson's dream summer of shopping, partying and tanning on the beach has just turned into a nightmare. Because Dad didn't tell her he doesn't live by the beach anymore, or that he's no longer a bachelor. He's picked up and moved to a tiny, lame town called Hamilton and gotten himself a fiance. A fiance whose son just happens to be what's-his-name from last week's drunken graduation party one night stand. Just freakin' great.
As if the summer couldn't get worse, Dad seems to forget Whitley's even there. She doesn't fit in with his perfect new country club family, and Whitley does what any kid lucky enough to go all summer unsupervised does: she parties. Hard.
So hard that she doesn't even notice the good things right under her nose: a younger future step-sister who is just about the only person she's ever liked, a best friend (even though Whitley swears she doesn't 'do friends') and a smoking hot, sweet guy who isn't her step brother (yet) and who actually seems to care for her. It will take all three of them to convince her that they're not phoneys, and to get Whitley to get through her anger and begin to put the pieces of her family together.

From the author of The Duff - now a major film starring Bella Thorne, Mae Whitman and Alison Janney, out in DVD in Summer 2015.

Reviewed by Amber on

4 of 5 stars

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Really liked this. It lost a star because the MMC frustrated me and I still didn't like him at the end.

Full review here: http://booksofamber.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/a-midsummers-nightmare-by-kody-keplinger.html

More awesome work from Kody Keplinger. As usual, she is able to perfectly capture a teen lifestyle and mould it to fit the deeper issue at hand.

Whitley is suffering from her parents' divorce, and she is dealing with it by acting out as a cry for help. In the summer before college, she's going to spend the summer with her dad... and his new family that she knew nothing about.

I loved Whitley so much, just like I love all of Kody's main protagonists. I did find her to be annoyingly judgemental at times, particularly when she was at a party held by one of Kody's other MCs. Besides that, I loved her and her relationship with her new step sister and her step mother, which had both positive and negative moments. I wasn't a huge fan of her gay best friend, as he seemed very stereotypical and I feel he could have been fleshed out a bit more.

Nathan is Whitley's love interest and her soon-to-be stepbrother. If you were reading my updates on Goodreads then you will know that I didn't like him AT ALL. He was a horrible person and he was a bastard to Whitley. I'm sorry, but I could not root for the two of them after he flipped out over stupid things and called Whitley a whore. No thank you. I'm not a fan.

Aside from him, I really did like this book. I absolutely love Kody Keplinger's writing, and while I didn't love this book as much as I loved The DUFF, I still really, really liked A Midsummer's Nightmare.

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 11 June, 2012: Finished reading
  • 11 June, 2012: Reviewed