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Book Summary and Reviews of These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean

These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean

These Summer Storms

A Novel

by Sarah MacLean

  • Critics' Consensus (5):
  • Readers' Rating (6):
  • Published:
  • Jul 2025, 400 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

From New York Times bestselling author Sarah MacLean, These Summer Storms is a razor-sharp, wildly sexy novel about a wealthy New England family's long-overdue reckoning ... and the one week that threatens to tear them apart.

Alice Storm hasn't been welcome at her family's magnificent private island off the Rhode Island coast in five years—not since she was cast out and built her life beyond the Storm name, influence, and untold billions. But the shocking death of her larger-than-life father changes everything.

Alice plans to keep her head down, pay her final respects (such as they are), and leave the minute the funeral is over. Unfortunately, her father had other plans. The eccentric, manipulative patriarch left his family a final challenge—an inheritance game designed to upend their world. The rules are clear: spend one week on the island, complete their assigned tasks, and receive the inheritance.

But a whole week on Storm Island is no easy task for Alice. Every corner of the sprawling old house is bursting with chaos: Her older sister's secret love affair. Her brother's unyielding arrogance. Her younger sister's constant analysis of the vibes. Her mother's cold judgment. And all under the stern, watchful gaze of Jack Dean, her father's intriguing and too-handsome second-in-command. It will be a miracle if Alice manages to escape unscathed.

A smart and tender story about the transformative power of grief, love, and family, this luscious novel explores past secrets, present truths, and futures forged in the wake of wild summer storms.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"MacLean's first foray into contemporary family drama has notes of Succession along with the steamy romance she's known for in her historical novels. The Storm family is full of complicated, flawed characters, and sticking them together on an island for a week leads to lots of delightfully dramatic fights, secrets, and reveals." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"MacLean doesn't completely abandon her romance roots or trademark humor, but the family relationships drive this fun plot. This steamy love-child of Succession and Elin Hilderbrand is a perfect beach read." —Library Journal (starred review)

"Poignant overtures of grief, deliciously complicated family dynamics, and forbidden love thread together in a perfect tapestry of mystery and romance. These Summer Storms is like a hurricane that blows in from the ocean—powerful, tragic, and beautiful. Is there anything Sarah MacLean can't do?" —Ashley Poston, New York Times bestselling author of The Seven Year Slip

"From the first rumbles of thunder to the final torrential downpour, MacLean takes readers for a wild ride!" —Abby Jimenez, New York Times bestselling author of Just for the Summer

This information about These Summer Storms was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

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Janine_S

Does money make you happy?
I've never read anything by this author who usually writes historical romances with this being her first contemporary fiction novel, and it's a compelling one. Filled with romance, family secrets, forgiveness and hope, this book catches you from the beginning. Alice Storm hasn't seen her family in five years. She's returned to the family-owned island to put her father to rest. Third child of Franklin and Elizabeth Storm, Alice has created a life without her father's money and she feels she really doesn't her inheritance but her degree gas imposed a condition - each of the children, Greta, Sam, Alice, Emily, and mother, Elizabeth, must complete certain tasks in order to inherit. If one doesn't, no one inherits. What transpires over the course of a week changes the lives of the Storm family. I really had a hard time putting this book down. There are twists and turn that keep you guessing. This is a book too that asks does money really make you happy. Enjoyed the read.

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Author Information

Sarah MacLean

Sarah MacLean is the author of sixteen New York Times bestselling novels that have been translated into more than twenty-five languages. She is the co-host of the weekly romance novel podcast, Fated Mates, and a leading voice in the romance genre. A product of Rhode Island summers and New England storms, MacLean now lives with her family in New York City.

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