I am a sucker for books about reporters; fiction, mysteries, memoirs. Mary Kay Andrews, who is a former journalist for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, brings readers a fabulous novel, the story of one reporter, the dying newspaper business, a small town newspaper, and a local scandal that becomes national news. Hello, Summer, with its newspaper background and Andrews’ trademark appealing characters, is one of my favorite books of the year.

Conley Hawkins is just about to make the jump from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution to a prestigious position in Washington, D.C. when that opportunity collapses. With no job, and a dying newspaper business, Conley heads south to the family home in the Florida Panhandle, in Silver Bay. She can always stay with her G’mama at the beach house while she sends out resumes. But, when she arrives in town, she finds her G’mama and her housekeeper still at home. While G’mama and Winnie are willing to move out to the Dunes with her, G’mama urges her to work with her older sister, Grayson, at the family newspaper, The Silver Bay Beacon. There’s no love lost between the two sisters, and Conley is reluctant to work for a weekly paper just to rewrite the society column, “Hello, Summer.” After all, nothing ever happens in Silver Bay.

Or, at least nothing ever happens until Conley runs into a neighbor, Sean Kelly, Skelly, in a bar, and he offers to run her home. On a deserted country road, they come across an overturned SUV with the driver still in it. Conley and Skelly try to pull him from the vehicle, but their efforts fail when the car goes up in flames. But, she’s a reporter. Conley films video. It’s all she can do while the rescue teams try to save the man.

With the discovery that the victim of the accident was U.S. Representative Symmes Robinette, Conley, her sister, Grayson, and the small team at the Beacon, have video and a local angle that no other news team has. And, as Conley and her co-workers dig, they discover a local resident, a war hero, with secrets that only local residents know, but those secrets could blow up into national scandal.

When I love a book with a complex plot and engaging characters, I want to share. But, I want other readers to have the same pleasure in discovery that I did. If you want a story of a newspaper team that digs for answers, a driven reporter, small town secrets and small town romance, along with the love and arguments that come from family, try Mary Kay Andrews’ Hello, Summer. 


Mary Kay Andrews’ website is www.MaryKayAndrews.com, and she can be found on Facebook at MaryKayAndrewsAuthor.

Hello, Summer by Mary Kay Andrews. St. Martin’s Press, 2020. ISBN 9781250256928 (hardcover), 480p.

*****
FTC Full Disclosure – The publisher sent me a copy of the book, hoping I would review it.

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Note: Although libraries may be closed, most bookstores can still handle sales of books, so you can find the book through your favorite bookstore. In addition, if your library has Overdrive, you may be able to check Hello, Summer out as an ebook or audiobook. And, a reminder that public libraries do pay for copies of the items supplied to users online.