The Summer Place: A Novel
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of That Summer comes another “fun, feisty” (The Washington Post) novel of family, secrets, and the ties that bind.
When her twenty-two-year-old stepdaughter announces her engagement to her pandemic boyfriend, Sarah Danhauser is shocked. But the wheels are in motion. Headstrong Ruby has already set a date (just three months away!) and spoken to her beloved safta, Sarah’s mother Veronica, about having the wedding at the family’s beach house in Cape Cod. Sarah might be worried, but Veronica is thrilled to be bringing the family together one last time before putting the big house on the market.
But the road to a wedding day usually comes with a few bumps. Ruby has always known exactly what she wants, but as the wedding date approaches, she finds herself grappling with the wounds left by the mother who walked out when she was a baby. Veronica ends up facing unexpected news, thanks to her meddling sister, and must revisit the choices she made long ago, when she was a bestselling novelist with a different life. Sarah’s twin brother, Sam, is recovering from a terrible loss, and confronting big questions about who he is—questions he hopes to resolve during his stay on the Cape. Sarah’s husband, Eli, who’s been inexplicably distant during the pandemic, confronts the consequences of a long ago lapse from his typical good-guy behavior. And Sarah, frustrated by her husband, concerned about her stepdaughter, and worn out by the challenges of the quarantine, faces the alluring reappearance of someone from her past and a life that could have been.
When the wedding day arrives, lovers are revealed as their true selves, misunderstandings take on a life of their own, and secrets come to light. There are confrontations and revelations that will touch each member of the extended family, ensuring that nothing will ever be the same.
From “the undisputed boss of the beach read” (The New York Times), The Summer Place is a testament to family in all its messy glory; a story about what we sacrifice and how we forgive. Enthralling, witty, big-hearted, and sharply observed, “this first-rate page-turner” (Publishers Weekly) is Jennifer Weiner’s love letter to the Outer Cape and the power of home, the way our lives are enriched by the people we call family, and the endless ways love can surprise us.
When her twenty-two-year-old stepdaughter announces her engagement to her pandemic boyfriend, Sarah Danhauser is shocked. But the wheels are in motion. Headstrong Ruby has already set a date (just three months away!) and spoken to her beloved safta, Sarah’s mother Veronica, about having the wedding at the family’s beach house in Cape Cod. Sarah might be worried, but Veronica is thrilled to be bringing the family together one last time before putting the big house on the market.
But the road to a wedding day usually comes with a few bumps. Ruby has always known exactly what she wants, but as the wedding date approaches, she finds herself grappling with the wounds left by the mother who walked out when she was a baby. Veronica ends up facing unexpected news, thanks to her meddling sister, and must revisit the choices she made long ago, when she was a bestselling novelist with a different life. Sarah’s twin brother, Sam, is recovering from a terrible loss, and confronting big questions about who he is—questions he hopes to resolve during his stay on the Cape. Sarah’s husband, Eli, who’s been inexplicably distant during the pandemic, confronts the consequences of a long ago lapse from his typical good-guy behavior. And Sarah, frustrated by her husband, concerned about her stepdaughter, and worn out by the challenges of the quarantine, faces the alluring reappearance of someone from her past and a life that could have been.
When the wedding day arrives, lovers are revealed as their true selves, misunderstandings take on a life of their own, and secrets come to light. There are confrontations and revelations that will touch each member of the extended family, ensuring that nothing will ever be the same.
From “the undisputed boss of the beach read” (The New York Times), The Summer Place is a testament to family in all its messy glory; a story about what we sacrifice and how we forgive. Enthralling, witty, big-hearted, and sharply observed, “this first-rate page-turner” (Publishers Weekly) is Jennifer Weiner’s love letter to the Outer Cape and the power of home, the way our lives are enriched by the people we call family, and the endless ways love can surprise us.
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Community Reviews
Really 2.5 stars. I enjoyed this while listening, especially with Sutton Foster narrating, but the more I thought about the ending, the less I liked it. I can't believe that the family would be okay with Sam ending up with Gabe, and in this age of social media, wouldn't he have seen a picture of Gabe somewhere along the way? Sarah was a bit holier than thou about everything, and I think Owen got the shaft when she accused him of wanting her to buy his family land for him. And at the end, if they were at a memorial service for Sarah and Sam's mother, why were Gabe's mother and aunt and Eli's brother even there? Not my favorite Jennifer Weiner, for sure.
Mei Ling's pick. 👍🏻
Chick lit. Story of a Cape Cod wedding and the family secrets that come out. Filled with over-the-top drama. Very much a "beach read."
The Summer Place is the sprawling, epic story of a family and the challenges the individual members are facing. They survived the COVID-19 quarantine, but can they make it through the preparations for and Ruby's upcoming July 4th wedding at the family home on Cape Cod?
Weiner says she wrote The Summer Place during late 2020 and early 2021 because she wanted to tell a story set right after the pandemic about "a family whose members had come through the pandemic year, . . . " that would be a cross between "a Noël Coward farce and A Midsummer Night's Dream, where the pairings are driven by otherworldly interference." She also wanted to examine the myriad ways in which the quarantine "exposed the fault lines in relationships and the buried foundations of money and privilege and sacrifice that hold up our lives, whether or not we acknowledge that they're there."
Weiner could not foresee that her mother would be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March 2021 and succumb to the disease a mere nine weeks later. Suddenly, the story also became about loss, as well as the relationships between mothers and daughters, "and how the torch gets passed from one mother to the next." And The Summer Place became a love letter to her beloved mother's spirit.
Weiner focuses each chapter in The Summer Place on one of her characters, revealing their history and background, life experiences, and the choices that brought them to their present circumstances. Ruby met Gabriel Andrews in college and he is the first boy she has ever loved. "Ruby For Sure," as her father, Eli, calls her, makes up her mind and gets what she wants. And what she thought she wanted was to marry Gabe, who makes her feel safe and loved. During the pandemic, she and Gabe lived with Eli and her stepmother, Sarah, along with her two younger half-brothers, in the family's four-story brownstone in Brooklyn. Now they have settled into their own apartment. When she announced their engagement at Shabbat dinner, she expected someone to try to talk her out of it. Surprisingly, no one did, and Ruby is becoming increasingly convinced that she has made a bad decision. Perhaps for the first time.
Eli Danhauser, a periodontist, was a single father for seven years after his wife, Annette, left him and Ruby. She made it clear that she never wanted to marry, have children, and settle down. In fact, when she discovered she was pregnant, she didn't even plan to tell Eli. But he found the pregnancy test and convinced her they should marry so he could provide insurance for her and the baby. He also promised that if Annette was truly unhappy, she could walk away without repercussions. Annette was very clear about her lack of maternal instinct. Eli was equally clear, except he only wanted to defer having a family, while Annette never wanted one at all. And when Ruby was just a year old, Annette did, in fact, leave.
At just twenty-five years of age, Sarah wasn't really equipped to become a stepmother. And it wasn't easy. But she loved Eli, and her parents, Lee and Veronica, adored Ruby and loved spending time with and doting on her. Sarah wisely gave Ruby space to grow fond of her and eventually that's what happened. Sarah and Eli's marriage has been happy, especially with the addition of their two sons to whom Ruby has been a devoted big sister. As a young woman Sarah made the difficult decision not to pursue a career as a concert pianist. Instead, she earned a liberal arts degree and has enjoyed a successful career developing music curricula. But she has always harbored doubts as to whether she chose correctly.
Veronica, aka Ronnie, always wanted to be a writer and eventually accepted that her novels were commercial works. She acquired an agent, fielded offers from several publishers, and her first book was not only published. It was also adapted into a film. Her second novel was also published, but Ronnie was living dual lives. She loved her husband, Lee, an attorney, but when she went to New York City for meetings and events, she was a different woman. She was Veronica, a successful writer who even dressed differently than Ronnie. And she had an affair about which Lee never found out. She was never sure if Lee fathered Sarah and Sam, but he didn't suspect that he might not be. Ronnie never stopped writing, but she did not publish any more books. Now widowed, she lives full-time at the Cape, maintaining her secrets, including the unpublished novels tucked away in her closet. But she may have to confront the truth, depending on the results yielded by the DNA testing kits her sister has purchased as birthday presents for Sarah and Sam.
Until he was thirty-four years old and met Julie, a single mother, Sam's relationships with women never lasted more than six months. He was the "dumpee" so many times that he began breaking up with his girlfriends before they could dump him. But he and Julie were happy because Julie was needy, and she made him feel capable and strong. Her son Connor's biological father was perpetually absent which gave Sam a chance to form a strong bond with the boy, fortunately. Because when tragedy struck, Connor needed the stability and love that Sam provided him. Over the years, some of his girlfriends and Sarah observed that Sam didn't appear to really know who he was, having been been something of a chameleon his entire life. "I feel like there's this piece of you that maybe you're not entirely sure about yet," Sarah told him. Sam decides it's time to finally figure out what is missing from his life.
The COVID-19 pandemic takes a toll on each of Weiner's characters, but none more so than Sarah. Suddenly she and Eli are both working at home, and the boys are attending school via Zoom. They urge Ruby to come home for the sake of her safety, and permit her to bring Gabe with her. Eli becomes withdrawn, uncommunicative, and Sarah grows convinced that he must be having an affair, although she can't imagine when he would have time to get involved with another woman when he is always at home, traipsing through the house in his noisy flip-flops and getting on Sarah's nerves. As the pandemic draws to a close and the world begins opening up, the boys return to school and Sarah returns to work, too. But she rents a studio and escapes there to find solace and practice the piano, as she ponders why her once-happy marriage seems to have fallen apart and Eli refuses to even discuss what's wrong. Things become even more complicated when she runs into Owen, her first-ever love who broke up with her via email when he left for college and refused to ever speak to her again. He's now a handsome FBI agent who wants to explain what actually transpired two decades ago.
All of Weiner's characters are fully developed, with lush backstories that inform and provide context to their present circumstances and conundrums. Each character is empathetic, relatable, and flawed in some fundamental fashion. Although she loves her children dearly, Sarah questions the life-defining choice she made years ago. Was giving up her potential career as a professional musician the right move? Can the problems in her marriage be repaired, particularly given that she has no understanding of what or who has managed to drive a wedge between her and Eli? Gabe's presence dredges up a brief time in Eli's life when he exhibited poor judgment and engaged in behavior about which he has remained deeply ashamed. He can't bring himself to discuss it with Sarah, instead growing increasingly neurotic and permitting himself to become estranged from the woman he loves. He suspects there is a terrifying link between his conduct and Gabe that could derail Ruby's plans for a happy married life. But he is thwarted in his efforts to obtain confirmation before traveling to Cape Cod for the wedding. Ronnie receives disturbing and unexpected news from her physician during her annual check-up. She knows she has to share the information with the family, but is set on doing so after the wedding so as not to ruin Ruby's special day. Sam is surprised by the dawning realization of what the "missing piece" of himself might be, and begins exploring his feelings, making a new friend in the process. But he resolves to sneak away for a bit and put his theory to the test when he and Connor are in Cape Cod for Ruby's wedding. Ensconced in Ronnie's guesthouse, her wedding dress in its clear plastic garment bag, hanging on the back of the bathroom door, Ruby makes a momentous decision and shortly thereafter encounters her mother, Annette, arriving for the ceremony.
Weiner deftly orchestrates the revelation of her character's secrets and the fallout from them. Not every secret, once brought to light, is destructive, and some end up having no impact at all or actually bring about healing. Other truths remain hidden, and Weiner leaves it to her readers to decide if that outcome is wise or could constitute a smoldering mistake with the potential to have draconian consequences at some future time. There are confrontations that bring resolution and misunderstandings that are ironed out, much to the relief of those affected. At least one development is shocking, wildly improbable, and so outrageous that it is almost exquisitely perfect.
The story moves at a brisk pace and the dialogue is crisp, often witty, and believable. The characters' internal struggles are compelling and emotionally resonant. But Weiner injects humorous aspects to the story that keep it from becoming maudlin or cloying, and she astutely prevents the characters from taking themselves too seriously, the one exception being Eli. But his earnestness and struggle to forgive himself are core aspects of his personality.
The Summer Place depicts family members who are devoted to each other but don't always listen to or find it easy to love one another. The pandemic was a trying period of time for Weiner's characters, just as it was, in varying degrees, for every single one of her readers. It caused Weiner's characters to do what so many people around the world did: reevaluate. Being quarantined for months with close family members highlighted habits and idiosyncrasies that might easily be overlooked under normal circumstances. Weiner compassionately examines how one family not only survived, but managed to emerge from those dark days with a greater appreciation for each other, reconciled to their pasts, and committed to the future. Together. And she does so in entertaining and big-hearted fashion, making The Summer Place a book everyone who enjoys family dramas should read at the beach or by the pool this summer.
Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy of the book.
Weiner says she wrote The Summer Place during late 2020 and early 2021 because she wanted to tell a story set right after the pandemic about "a family whose members had come through the pandemic year, . . . " that would be a cross between "a Noël Coward farce and A Midsummer Night's Dream, where the pairings are driven by otherworldly interference." She also wanted to examine the myriad ways in which the quarantine "exposed the fault lines in relationships and the buried foundations of money and privilege and sacrifice that hold up our lives, whether or not we acknowledge that they're there."
Weiner could not foresee that her mother would be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March 2021 and succumb to the disease a mere nine weeks later. Suddenly, the story also became about loss, as well as the relationships between mothers and daughters, "and how the torch gets passed from one mother to the next." And The Summer Place became a love letter to her beloved mother's spirit.
Weiner focuses each chapter in The Summer Place on one of her characters, revealing their history and background, life experiences, and the choices that brought them to their present circumstances. Ruby met Gabriel Andrews in college and he is the first boy she has ever loved. "Ruby For Sure," as her father, Eli, calls her, makes up her mind and gets what she wants. And what she thought she wanted was to marry Gabe, who makes her feel safe and loved. During the pandemic, she and Gabe lived with Eli and her stepmother, Sarah, along with her two younger half-brothers, in the family's four-story brownstone in Brooklyn. Now they have settled into their own apartment. When she announced their engagement at Shabbat dinner, she expected someone to try to talk her out of it. Surprisingly, no one did, and Ruby is becoming increasingly convinced that she has made a bad decision. Perhaps for the first time.
Eli Danhauser, a periodontist, was a single father for seven years after his wife, Annette, left him and Ruby. She made it clear that she never wanted to marry, have children, and settle down. In fact, when she discovered she was pregnant, she didn't even plan to tell Eli. But he found the pregnancy test and convinced her they should marry so he could provide insurance for her and the baby. He also promised that if Annette was truly unhappy, she could walk away without repercussions. Annette was very clear about her lack of maternal instinct. Eli was equally clear, except he only wanted to defer having a family, while Annette never wanted one at all. And when Ruby was just a year old, Annette did, in fact, leave.
At just twenty-five years of age, Sarah wasn't really equipped to become a stepmother. And it wasn't easy. But she loved Eli, and her parents, Lee and Veronica, adored Ruby and loved spending time with and doting on her. Sarah wisely gave Ruby space to grow fond of her and eventually that's what happened. Sarah and Eli's marriage has been happy, especially with the addition of their two sons to whom Ruby has been a devoted big sister. As a young woman Sarah made the difficult decision not to pursue a career as a concert pianist. Instead, she earned a liberal arts degree and has enjoyed a successful career developing music curricula. But she has always harbored doubts as to whether she chose correctly.
Veronica, aka Ronnie, always wanted to be a writer and eventually accepted that her novels were commercial works. She acquired an agent, fielded offers from several publishers, and her first book was not only published. It was also adapted into a film. Her second novel was also published, but Ronnie was living dual lives. She loved her husband, Lee, an attorney, but when she went to New York City for meetings and events, she was a different woman. She was Veronica, a successful writer who even dressed differently than Ronnie. And she had an affair about which Lee never found out. She was never sure if Lee fathered Sarah and Sam, but he didn't suspect that he might not be. Ronnie never stopped writing, but she did not publish any more books. Now widowed, she lives full-time at the Cape, maintaining her secrets, including the unpublished novels tucked away in her closet. But she may have to confront the truth, depending on the results yielded by the DNA testing kits her sister has purchased as birthday presents for Sarah and Sam.
Until he was thirty-four years old and met Julie, a single mother, Sam's relationships with women never lasted more than six months. He was the "dumpee" so many times that he began breaking up with his girlfriends before they could dump him. But he and Julie were happy because Julie was needy, and she made him feel capable and strong. Her son Connor's biological father was perpetually absent which gave Sam a chance to form a strong bond with the boy, fortunately. Because when tragedy struck, Connor needed the stability and love that Sam provided him. Over the years, some of his girlfriends and Sarah observed that Sam didn't appear to really know who he was, having been been something of a chameleon his entire life. "I feel like there's this piece of you that maybe you're not entirely sure about yet," Sarah told him. Sam decides it's time to finally figure out what is missing from his life.
The COVID-19 pandemic takes a toll on each of Weiner's characters, but none more so than Sarah. Suddenly she and Eli are both working at home, and the boys are attending school via Zoom. They urge Ruby to come home for the sake of her safety, and permit her to bring Gabe with her. Eli becomes withdrawn, uncommunicative, and Sarah grows convinced that he must be having an affair, although she can't imagine when he would have time to get involved with another woman when he is always at home, traipsing through the house in his noisy flip-flops and getting on Sarah's nerves. As the pandemic draws to a close and the world begins opening up, the boys return to school and Sarah returns to work, too. But she rents a studio and escapes there to find solace and practice the piano, as she ponders why her once-happy marriage seems to have fallen apart and Eli refuses to even discuss what's wrong. Things become even more complicated when she runs into Owen, her first-ever love who broke up with her via email when he left for college and refused to ever speak to her again. He's now a handsome FBI agent who wants to explain what actually transpired two decades ago.
All of Weiner's characters are fully developed, with lush backstories that inform and provide context to their present circumstances and conundrums. Each character is empathetic, relatable, and flawed in some fundamental fashion. Although she loves her children dearly, Sarah questions the life-defining choice she made years ago. Was giving up her potential career as a professional musician the right move? Can the problems in her marriage be repaired, particularly given that she has no understanding of what or who has managed to drive a wedge between her and Eli? Gabe's presence dredges up a brief time in Eli's life when he exhibited poor judgment and engaged in behavior about which he has remained deeply ashamed. He can't bring himself to discuss it with Sarah, instead growing increasingly neurotic and permitting himself to become estranged from the woman he loves. He suspects there is a terrifying link between his conduct and Gabe that could derail Ruby's plans for a happy married life. But he is thwarted in his efforts to obtain confirmation before traveling to Cape Cod for the wedding. Ronnie receives disturbing and unexpected news from her physician during her annual check-up. She knows she has to share the information with the family, but is set on doing so after the wedding so as not to ruin Ruby's special day. Sam is surprised by the dawning realization of what the "missing piece" of himself might be, and begins exploring his feelings, making a new friend in the process. But he resolves to sneak away for a bit and put his theory to the test when he and Connor are in Cape Cod for Ruby's wedding. Ensconced in Ronnie's guesthouse, her wedding dress in its clear plastic garment bag, hanging on the back of the bathroom door, Ruby makes a momentous decision and shortly thereafter encounters her mother, Annette, arriving for the ceremony.
Weiner deftly orchestrates the revelation of her character's secrets and the fallout from them. Not every secret, once brought to light, is destructive, and some end up having no impact at all or actually bring about healing. Other truths remain hidden, and Weiner leaves it to her readers to decide if that outcome is wise or could constitute a smoldering mistake with the potential to have draconian consequences at some future time. There are confrontations that bring resolution and misunderstandings that are ironed out, much to the relief of those affected. At least one development is shocking, wildly improbable, and so outrageous that it is almost exquisitely perfect.
The story moves at a brisk pace and the dialogue is crisp, often witty, and believable. The characters' internal struggles are compelling and emotionally resonant. But Weiner injects humorous aspects to the story that keep it from becoming maudlin or cloying, and she astutely prevents the characters from taking themselves too seriously, the one exception being Eli. But his earnestness and struggle to forgive himself are core aspects of his personality.
The Summer Place depicts family members who are devoted to each other but don't always listen to or find it easy to love one another. The pandemic was a trying period of time for Weiner's characters, just as it was, in varying degrees, for every single one of her readers. It caused Weiner's characters to do what so many people around the world did: reevaluate. Being quarantined for months with close family members highlighted habits and idiosyncrasies that might easily be overlooked under normal circumstances. Weiner compassionately examines how one family not only survived, but managed to emerge from those dark days with a greater appreciation for each other, reconciled to their pasts, and committed to the future. Together. And she does so in entertaining and big-hearted fashion, making The Summer Place a book everyone who enjoys family dramas should read at the beach or by the pool this summer.
Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy of the book.
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