Championing Contemporary YA: Twenty Boy Summer

The lovely Bee at Dreamcatcher's Lair is hosting Championing Contemporary YA between the 3rd and 10th of June. In her words, "Championing Contemporary YA is a movement in celebration of June as the Contemporary month over at The Contemps." I love contemporary YA (shocker, I know), so I'm thrilled to participate in this movement by discussing a few of my favourite contemporary YA books.

Today's Book: Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler

"Don't worry, Anna. I'll tell her, okay? Just let me think about the best way to do it."

"Okay."

"Promise me? Promise you won't say anything?"

"Don't worry." I laughed. "It's our secret, right?"

According to her best friend Frankie, twenty days in ZanzibarBay is the perfect opportunity to have a summer fling, and if they meet one boy ever day, there's a pretty good chance Anna will find her first summer romance. Anna lightheartedly agrees to the game, but there's something she hasn't told Frankie—-she's already had that kind of romance, and it was with Frankie's older brother, Matt, just before his tragic death one year ago. (Summary and picture are from goodreads.)

This book was released June 1st, 2009, and I should have read it that July.


Instead, I picked it up in the bookstore approximately a million times, stared at the cover because it's gorgeous, read the back cover and knew it was book I'd enjoy. But, I always put it back down, because I couldn't get past the title.


I was almost eighteen, an adult according to Nova Scotia's laws. I was going to university in the fall as an English major. I couldn't read books about boys--especially twenty boys!--and summer anymore. I was mature, an intellectual, someone who loved William Wordsworth and The Canterbury Tales and would force herself into liking Shakespeare (ugh, Past Me and Present Me don't get along too well.)


I do love William Wordsworth and The Canterbury Tales. The only Shakespeare play I've ever loved is 1 Henry IV (I know, but Hal's my boy), I've liked a couple others, and hated the rest. In July of 2009, I entered into the weirdest relationship of my life, and it was with boys and summer.


I went away to a small town for a week in July where no one knew me, much like Anna and Frankie do in Twenty Boy Summer (though New Brunswick isn't quite California.) I met a boy. He taught me how to flirt. He and I had conversations I'd written, but I never thought I'd get to experience. He gave the best hugs, taught me how to play basketball, and was the closest I'd ever come to something. 


Then the week ended, I went home, and had a five-minute conversation with him over MSN. That was the last time I talked to him.


And it was hard, because I missed him, because I wanted to know what would happen if we'd had more time, because we never defined what we did have and I didn't know if it was something I could miss. When I read Twenty Boy Summer almost two years later (so, last week), I was over it, but I wished I would've read this book back then. I know it would've helped, and maybe I'd have another #YASaves story to tweet.


It's hard not to get spoiler-y here, so all I'll say is that temporariness is a theme of this book, and I love the way it's handled. Ockler recognizes that nothing lasts forever, and through her characters, expresses that, sometimes, that really sucks. I love that, because it validates every single time I've missed someone, and haven't moved on when, according to everyone else, I should've. That goes for the boy I met two summers ago, and to people I miss much more deeply than that, like my mom. There's a brilliant passage on the back cover which talks about how the acceptable grieving period is three months. As any book--including this one--and any person whose ever lost someone will tell you, the grieving period never ends, and it can be as intense ten years after you lost someone as it was the day you lost them. That's really hard, and Ockler shows that it's ok for it to be that hard.


But, Ockler also shows that temporariness can be beautiful, and even hopeful. She shows how everyone you meet and everything you do shapes who you are, and thus people never really leave you. I was so hopeful after I finished this book.


That's what affected me the most about this book, but there were so many other great things about it. It made me fall in love with summer all over again, a season I honestly believe is magical. As a Nova Scotia girl whose always been in love with the ocean, I appreciated all the attention Ockler gave to the ocean. Frankie and Annie's friendship is one of the best portrayals of friendship I've ever read.


Don't judge a book by it's title.


Have you read this book? What do you think of it? What's your favourite contemporary YA book?