Night Owls and Summer Skies by Rebecca Sullivan

 
Night Owls and Summer Skies by Rebecca Sullivan
My Rating: ★★

I received a copy from Wattpad Books through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

When Emma Lane is stuck spending her last summer dictated by her parent’s custody arrangements, her expectations of being stuck with her homophobic mother go from bad to worse. Not only does it turn out her mom remarried and never said anything, but she’s dropping Emma off at summer camp while she goes on her honeymoon. Angry and hurt, the last thing Emma wants to do is return to the same summer camp that lives on in her nightmares. The only thing left for her to do is unleash hell on her cabinmates so she can get kicked out.

I had a hard time getting into this book because I found Emma to be an extremely unlikable character. I understand that she’s upset that she’s been dropped off at summer camp, but teenage me would’ve avoided her like the plague in and out of summer camp based on her entire personality. That said, I do think that Emma’s an interesting character. While she’s abrasive and only focused on herself, she doesn’t put up with anyone’s crap, and that includes the camp bully, Lauren. Honestly, I think this is the only thing I liked about Emma.

That said, I did love some of the other characters, especially Gwen, Vivian, Walter. They’re such sweet and funny characters that they really are the saving grace of the story. Whatever happens, one of them turns up and made me ready to continue reading. Although, I do think it would’ve been quite interesting if these characters didn’t appear often and we got to see a full showdown occur between Emma and Lauren.

Speaking of the camp bully, Lauren is truly an awful character. I think that she was a pretty realistic bully, but I don’t buy her reason for bullying. It just didn’t make any sense, especially when the main reason she bullied Gwen was because she wanted to become a camp counselor. While the reasons bullies are the way they are rarely make much sense, even this was a bit out there for me to find plausible.

The story itself was okay. I’ve been going back and forth about how I feel about it because on one hand, there’s some good things here. We see Emma dealing with one supportive parent. There’s a lot of talk about mental illness and how that effects people on the daily. We’ve got a bully who eventually finally reaps what she sows rather than getting a slap on the wrist in the end. I also love that Emma basically gets adopted by the family running the camp, providing her more of the support she needs.

However, the issues I have with the story keep pulling me down. Emma gets the same slap on the wrist as Lauren for terrorizing her campmates while trying to get kicked out. Lauren’s reasons for bullying doesn’t make any sense to me. I find it hard to believe next to no one in charge noticed that one of their own, Gwen, was being isolated and bullied by a camper. I love the relationship between Emma and her father, but I find it hard to believe that her dad wouldn’t investigate why he hadn’t heard from her nearly all summer. I know she’s mad when he drops her off at her mom’s place, but he'd try to call or text and know something was up when he got nothing in reply.

All in all, I don’t think it’s bad. If I take a step back and ignore its issues, it’s a cute story about a girl finding herself while being adopted by her found family.