Summer of ’69 by Elin Hilderbrand – Book Review

2019 Copyright 450 Pages

‘Summer of 69’ is about four siblings tackling life in 1969. The oldest, Blair, just married a NASA official and is having a very emotional pregnancy. Kirby, the independent middle sister, fights for civil rights while attending an all-women’s college. Right out of high school, Tiger has been called up to serve in Vietnam at only nineteen. Their youngest sister, Jessie, is struggling with all the teenage angst she is feeling. The story goes between each family member, reviewing their past and present trials and triumphs.

Jessie feels forced into spending the summer months with her mother and grandmother in the family’s Nantucket summer home. As the summer heats up with the sibling’s adventures, throw in the worried mother who has developed a drinking problem and the grandmother who appears to live in the past archaic beliefs of the Bostonian upper class. Both have secrets they are trying to hide from everyone.

1969 was a year of many historic happenings; man’s first landing on the moon, the Vietnam War, Woodstock and Senator Kennedy involved in the Chappaquiddick incident just to name a few. All these events and more are mentioned in ‘Summer of 69’; some more detailed than others. I love history and reading historical novels. I would have enjoyed reading more specifics about these historical events and how they effected the individual characters or the family. If they were worth mentioning in some detail there must have been more to their relationship than we are led to believe, right? The ending is nice but typical, bringing the family together with hopes for the future. Not one of my favorite books, but it filled some of my time while social distancing. Happy Summer!