Invincible Summer

April 11, 2016
Adams’s fun and memorable debut is a tale of the friendship of four British college chums. Working-class Eva falls in with a magnetic pair of siblings, rakish Lucien and artistic Sylvie. Sylvie’s trajectory to success (according to the group) seemed “inevitable” due to “a certain shine, a vividness about her... causing people to cluster around her.” And finally there is Benedict: wealthy, humble, and a talented student of physics. Upon graduation in 1997, Eva, Sylvie, and Lucien head to London, where Eva has secured a traineeship at an investment bank, while Benedict stays behind in Bristol for a Ph.D. That summer, just prior to Eva starting her adult life, Benedict invites Eva to his family’s vacation home in Greece and almost manages to make a move on her, wondering, “Did she genuinely not know how beautiful she was?” From there, the story follows the group chronologically through the years as they make choices that bring them by turns closer to and further from each other and from the dreams they’d had as students. Adams’s characters have many ups and downs, disappointments and adjustments, but they are believable due to her understated exposition of the characters’ psychologies. The reader will stick with the book, not from a real sense of jeopardy about how things will turn out, but because the characters are such good company.

April 1, 2016
Adams' sensitive debut follows a tightknit quartet of college friends as they navigate their shifting relationships--and evolving identities--over the course of two decades. After graduating from university in Bristol, Benedict, Eva, Sylvie, and Sylvie's brother, Lucien (technically not a student but a group member nonetheless), are on the cusp of their futures. Eva, a quietly rebellious physics grad, is poised to start a fancy finance job in London. Benedict--posh, studious, and in love with her--is staying on for a Ph.D. Artistic and free-spirited, Sylvie is off to travel for a year with Lucien, a caddish playboy who has long monopolized Eva's romantic attentions. The world seems alight with possibility; their bond feels unshakable. But as the years pass, and the disappointments of adulthood accumulate, the ties that once bound them begin to fray. Once, they hiked through Spain together; as they approach their 30s, they meet occasionally for distracted lunches and harried drinks. Their lives don't look the way they'd imagined they would: despite her talent, Sylvie isn't famous; despite their connection, Benedict and Eva haven't ended up together. And then--one personal crisis at a time--the four friends find their ways back to each other, forging new relationships that are deeper and more complicated than the ones they'd had at school. Adams doesn't stray far from convention here, but it hardly matters: her characters are nearly impossible not to root for, and she captures their often troubled dynamics with tremendous empathy and charming wit. And while the novel wraps up just a touch too neatly--the resolution isn't quite as much fun as the struggle--there is something pleasantly satisfying about its profound sense of hope. Breezy with substance; an absorbing summer read.

COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

June 1, 2016
In the summer of 1995, four British university students part ways after graduation, thinking they'll always be a group, despite the fact there's really very little that holds them together. Wealthy Benedict has been pining after Eva for four years, hoping she'll take her eyes off of the rakish Lucien long enough to notice he's been waiting in the wings. Lucien's sister, Sylvie, has no real ambition other than to be an artist, whatever that really means. Over the years, the friends are pulled apart and brought together multiple times in different ways as real life takes over. The novel moves chronologically through the next two decades, finding Benedict marrying a fellow researcher, Eva getting a high-powered trading job in London against her progressive father's wishes, and the siblings mucking about without much ambition. Adams' debut is an interesting and thoughtful character study that examines the finer points of long-term friendship.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2016

In the new millennium, siblings Sylvie and Lucien enjoy life as an aspiring artist and club promoter, respectively; Eva crushes on Lucien while ignoring her Socialist upbringing by working for a bank; and Benedict crushes on Eva while earning a PhD. Then they hit their thirties. British-based Adams's debut is going out with a 100,000-copy first printing.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.