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    The Summer We Came To Life
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    The Summer We Came To Life
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    The Summer We Came To Life
    Ebook315 pages5 hours

    The Summer We Came To Life

    By Deborah Cloyed

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook



    Every summer, Samantha Wheland joins her childhood friendsIsabel, Kendra and Minaon a vacation, somewhere exotic and fabulous. Together with their mixed bag of parents, they've created a lifetime of memories. This year it's a beach house in Honduras. But for the first time, their clan is not complete. Mina lost her battle against cancer six months ago, and the friends she left behind are still struggling to find their way forward without her.

    For Samantha, the vacation just feels wrong without Mina. Despite being surrounded by her friendsthe closest thing she has to familyMina's death has left Sam a little lost. Unsure what direction her life should take. Fearful that whatever decision she makes about her wealthy French boyfriend's surprise proposal, it'll be the wrong one.

    The answers aren't in the journal Mina gave Sam before she died. Or in the messages Sam believes Mina is sending as guideposts. Before the trip ends, the bonds of friendship with her living friends, the older generation's stories of love and loss, and Sam's glimpse into a world far removed from the one in which she belongs will convince her to trust her heart. And follow it.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarlequin MIRA
    Release dateJun 1, 2011
    ISBN9781459205918
    Unavailable
    The Summer We Came To Life
    Author

    Deborah Cloyed

    Deborah Cloyed lives in Los Angeles, in Humphrey Bogart's old room with a view. As a photographer, travel writer, or curious nomad, she's previously resided in London, Barcelona, Thailand, Honduras, Kenya, and New York City. She's traveled to twenty other countries besides, several as a contestant with her childhood best friend on CBS' The Amazing Race. She runs a photography school for kids and is happily at work on her next book.

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    Reviews for The Summer We Came To Life

    3.5/5

    7 ratings7 reviews

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    • 3/5
      For me the book started out very slow and I wasn’t sure if I could get through it. I finally hit the point where I couldn’t put it down about half way through. Journal entry vs. current day and the physics were a little oft putting.

      This is a story about 4 friends that started when they were children until now when they are in their 30s. The girls thought it wasn’t right to do this with Mina missing, but in the end they all realize that she would have wanted it to stay the same. The older generation (the mother’s) tell their stories of love and choices that they made. It was a great way to realize how we are all connected no matter our age.

      I like that the choices that we make connect us all. It’s amazing the strong bond of “family” they have created through the years. The book while it did wonder in places was good once it got to the end. I was a book that made you think.
    • 4/5
      The Summer We Came to Life by Deborah Cloyed in not what I expected when I picked it up. It is so much more. I originally thought it was a just a story about friends trying to move on after the death of their close friend, Mina. It is but it's also so much more. The first line of the book, "Birth and Death are the two occurrences in a person's life that seem to say one thing: we are not the one's calling the shots.", sets the tone for the entire novel. The story surrounds four friends: Samantha, Isabel, Kendra and Mina. They have been best friends since childhood. They're so different from each other yet their personalities complement one another. Isabel, Samantha and Kendra are morning the loss of their friend Mina. She passed away six months ago from cancer. In the past they've taken a trip every summer but this year, without Mina, it doesn't seem worth it. However their parents take charge and they set out on not only a vacation but also set out on a journey of self discovery. The Summer We Came to Life has great characters. Samantha has just gotten engaged, maybe. She has some tough decisions to make. She's also deeply missing Mina. We get to see Mina's character through flashbacks, memories and journal entries. She wrote each of her friends a journal with advice and encouragement for their lives. Isabel has just lost her job and she doesn't know what her next move should be. Kendra is a control freak who has her life planned out. She discovers that she's pregnant and it turns her world upside down. She has had some tough choices to make as well. Their parents: Jesse, Lynette, Cornell and Arshan come with them on their vacation. Together the parents try to impart their wisdom and life lessons on survival, courage and sacrifice. The plot was really good. This story is told through the different characters. I really like the flashbacks. It gives you an insight to the characters. I especially like the past recollections by the parents. Jesse, Lynette, Cornell and Arshan each have something to share with the girls of their past. The hardships that they endured help the girls to understand themselves more. Another interesting theme in this novel is answering the question, "What happens after we die?" Deborah Cloyed takes a stab at this question through Mina. This was an interesting aspect to the novel because this question is timeless. It's been asked since the beginning and will be asked until the end of time. Death can be a mystery in itself. Overall I really liked this book. I enjoyed the flashbacks and learning the histories of each character. This book will make you want to take a vacation with your best friends. This is a great summer read.
    • 3/5
      I thought I was going to like this story better, but as it went on, I found myself less invested in what happened to these four life long friends after one has passed away. After going on summer vacations all over the world growing up, Samantha, Isabel, two of the moms and dads meet up in Honduras to recapture the feel of those summer treks. Their fourth friend Mina passed away six months previous and left them all journals with kind words and advice as they soldier on in life without her. Although not her career path right now, Sam studied in physics and much of her journal details plans of how Mina could reach them after she's gone.
    • 3/5
      I really expected to like this book based on several reviews I had read. It has a strong metaphysical bent, my cup of coffee, and a strong female center. The principle theme is, of course, grief, and how we deal with it.Samantha is having a hard time getter over the death of her close friend Mina. Her two other friends, Kendra and Isabel, also share the sadness. The annual vacation get together has a big hole in it because of their friend's absence. How loss is reconciled is the essential plot of this book, especially through the eyes of Samantha.And that is the real problem with this book: too many shifting POVs, and odd ways of presenting information (different styles). The book would have been quite a bit stronger, and more firmly structured, with the single POV of Samantha. The mysterious character Ahari came to late to the party for his role.Still, for those who enjoy novels of friendship, this can be a good read.
    • 4/5
      Uniquely written, inspirational tale of true love beyond everyday friendship. I enjoyed the uniqueness of this book and was pleasantly surprised to find it not to be your typical boring bunch of gals on a vacation kind of book. Instead it is a mix of what was, what is and what could be all wrapped up into an interesting little package. While the main character and narrator Sam struggles with many things in her current life, her main concern are her feeling of disconnection. Something many of us artist struggle with. As a starving artist living alone in Honduras Sam's thoughts weigh in on her current relationship with her boyfriend and whether she should relinquish control and have someone else take care of her for a change. With the fresh wounds from the death of her friend Mina still lingering in the air, Sam struggles with feelings of wanting to be alone, when her friends decide they want to drop in on her life instantly for a vacation. Mina was not just a childhood friend, but Sam's best friend. Mina was the one Sam could relate to the most when it came to their group of four, her friendship soul-mate. The story takes an unexpected twist as you find out the planning and promises of Sam and Mina to contact each other after Mina's death. I love the time spent by the friends in Honduras and the indigenous village they visit, the dancing with the elders, like two dimensions intermingling. The parents who tag along on the vacation and their mix of culture and past experiences brings this book to life. The possibility of alternate dimensions intertwined into the story was another exciting twist that I liked. Whether Sam actually has an after death experience or it was just a hallucination, the point is clear. What matters most in our lives is that we all have the gift of free will and whatever your past or your culture may be true love is the act of being there for each other through life's good times and bad without judgement.
    • 5/5
      The Summer We Came to Life is anything but typical and girlie. Rich and enchanting, it is unconventionally intellectual and weighty . . . while still being a great beach read! It delves right into real life personal issues women face today. Should Samantha really marry her French playboy boyfriend Remy? Samantha, like us women do, turns to her best friends for help. This in turn prompts the best friends’ parents to weigh in with their own love stories in detail they’d never told their daughters. All of this soul searching centers around the recent death of Mina. When death strikes too early, loved ones naturally ask - how could this possibly be the end? The journals Mina and Samantha kept examine the possibility of multiple realities in a desperate attempt to communicate after death. This exploration of scientific theories adds a fresh perspective on coping with death and mourning. The novel also explores social and cultural issues of the Baby Boomer’s generation – power and corruption during the Panamanian Revolution, the ideological terror of the Iranian Revolution, and brutal racism during Civil Rights in the South – reminding us that history books are really only the cliff notes of millions of very personal experiences. But for me, the greatest strength of the book is the enviable bond of Samantha and her best friends and her unlikely family. It’s an interesting commentary on our times – that with single parents, broken families, and women delaying starting their own families – best friends and extended circles become our soul mates and tribes. Samantha describes her friendship with Mina as “happiness that bubbles between us like warm, oozing honey.” A pretty good description of how I feel about this book!
    • 1/5
      Unfortunately, I found that I just kept putting this book down. I couldn’t get into. No matter how hard I tried, I just wasn’t being pulled into the story.It is very very rare for me to not finish a book. Even when I don’t get pulled in right away, I will normally finish it. Mainly because OCD forces me to… LOL! Unfortunately, this was not the case in this book. I hate to say that, but I didn’t finish this book. I guess it just wasn’t my cup of tea.I felt that it was too slow moving. It changed perspectives too often. I didn’t feel like the characters were really animated. But those are just my personal opinions. I am sure that there will be someone who will like it. It just wasn’t me.I honestly did try to read this one for the past several weeks now. In conjunction with the Wakela's World Disclosure Statement, I received a product in order to enable my review. No other compensation has been received. My statements are an honest account of my experience with the brand. The opinions stated here are mine alone.