Aug 27

Aug 27 Summer (Seasonal Quartet, #4)

Author: Ali Smith
Publisher: Vintage
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

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Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

In the present, Sacha knows the world's in trouble. Her brother Robert just is trouble. Their mother and father are having trouble. Meanwhile, the world's in meltdown--and the real meltdown hasn't even started yet. In the past, a lovely summer. A different brother and sister know they're living on borrowed time.

This is a story about people on the brink of change. They're family, but they think they're strangers. So: Where does family begin? And what do people who think they've got nothing in common have in common?

Summer.

TL;DR Review

Summer is a fantastic finale to this hopeful, poignant quartet about the kindness of strangers during troubling times. It tied all four books together in a fun, impactful way.

For you if: You like to read stories that fuse excellent characters with astute social commentary.

Full Review

Well, friends, my year-long, seasonally timed journey through Ali Smith’s Seasonal Quartet has come to an end. What a lovely reading experience this has been. (Extra thank you to @caseys_chapters for hosting a fantastic year-long buddy read!)

I’m not British, but from what I have heard and can tell, there’s nobody out there who can capture the modern British experience like Ali Smith. Four books in less than four years — including this one, which came out in August 2020 and yet still had COVID lockdown as a central plot point?? So impressive. I think if I were British and felt that final degree of personal connection to the current events these books comment on, they would have fallen into the LOVE category; as it is, Ali Smith is undeniable, and they’re still firmly in LIKED A LOT.

Summer focuses on a young pair of siblings, the younger of whom is an especially gifted boy whose response to bullying has been a particularly vile form of acting out. Art and Charlotte (from Winter) enter the scene as well. We also get a glimpse into the mind of Daniel (yes, Daniel from Autumn) and his memories of time spent in the German internment camps that England set up during WWII, separated from his beloved half-sister. (The juxtaposition of these memories alongside commentary on Brexit was particularly excellent.)

I absolutely loved coming back to all these great characters and spotting the threads that tied the books together. Given that I read one of these books every three months or so, I’m sure there were plenty I missed as well. Honestly, I’d love to reread these books closer together; someone in the buddy read said they might do that before reading Companion Piece, and I like that idea too.

Thank you, Ali Smith, for this hopeful, poignant quartet about the kindness of strangers during troubling times.