Cover Image: Our Italian Summer

Our Italian Summer

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Member Reviews

Three generations of Ferrari women taking a fabulous trip around Italy to trace their family roots and rekindle the connection between each other.
Va bene! My soul wanted this book! It truly needed! And thankfully the publishers gave me the arc urgently requested!
Let’s take a look to the storyline and meet with 3 generations of amazing Ferraris!

Francesca is independent, single mother, workaholic, disciplined, buried her head into her work, forgetting real human connection, getting estranged with her own daughter Allegra who needs her attention, getting bored from her inner circle of school friends, looking for a thrill by befriending wrong kind of crowd which resulted with her arrest for drug possession. Of course Francesca gets pissed a lot, loses it, suffering from panic attacks, barely keeping together.

Thankfully Sophia, grandmother who is also suffering from deadly illness insists (keeping this secret from them)to show her ancestors to both of them, wanting to bring peace between Francesca and Allegra.

As Sophia does everything she can to bring smile on her granddaughter’s face, Allegra is adamant to make her own mother’s life miserable.

But they finally start to rediscover themselves at the magical, historical beauties of magnificent Italian cities, meeting new people, resonating with their stories, finding a way to make peace each other and learn to look at the things from different perspectives.

It’s heartwarming, soul searching and healing, uplifting, extremely beautiful feel-good novel about life, missed opportunities, second chances, dysfunctional relationships, resentments and forgiving.

I’m giving my four blazing Ferrari girls stars!
This was kind of noon should be prescribed by your doctors to brighten your mood and heal your mental state.

And if you’re so obsessed with beautiful Italian sightseeings, this is a great fit for your appetite.

Special thanks to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for sharing this remarkable arc with me in exchange my honest review.

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What a realistic yet dreamy story. Trip of a lifetime.
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There’s no perfect family. Every family is loaded with trials and tribulations and the family in this story is particularly unique.

We have a single mother of an almost 18-year-old. Along with her aging mother, the dynamics are what you would expect in an all-female layout. One’s a workaholic. One is insecure and wants the love and attention that she so desperately needs. And the other is dedicated to her granddaughter and tries to take care of everyone.

Needless to say, tense situations arise until it is almost a requirement to take a much-needed vacation. And what better place than to travel to beautiful Italy.

It’s a destination full of amazing works of art, fabulous farmland, and beautiful cities. The women finally start relaxing and learning about each other.

Meeting other people and discovering love in unexpected places is a wonderful part of the story. Probst tells a beautiful tale that brings healing, tender hearts, and best of all, acknowledgment for the depth of love and the strength of women.

This bookish trip to Italy leaves you with the warmth and understanding of family connections, love and first crushes, learning to let go, and acceptance of others. A beautiful story that makes you want to book your own trip and just believe in a happily ever after.

Probst is a go-to queen of sweeping women’s fiction abundant with romance and family ties. What a realistic yet dreamy story.

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Love, love, love this book! This book about three generations of women traveling through Italy in a last ditch effort to mend their fraying relationships was enchanting. I was captivated by the beautiful descriptions of the country and its food. I could relate to all three of the women. My heart was warmed by the growth of the characters and the love and strength that was portrayed. Highly recommend as a beach read. Perfect for a girls trip or book club.

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Our Italian Summer was the next best thing to an Italian getaway. Personally, I had a strong connection to the book as I went on a trip through Italy taking the almost exact route (and yes, Assissi does have THE BEST lasagna!!). I loved how the book was told from different viewpoints from the three generations of women. Even not going to Italy, it is so easy to have a connection with the characters: a workaholic, fear of declining health mom/grandmother and teen screaming for attention and finding who she is. A very lovely summer (or anytime!) read.

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This intergenerational novel was part travel journal, part coming of age, part romance and very enjoyable. All three women's stories rang true and I liked the different life choices that were discussed. Hopefully young women have more freedom to choose their paths now without having to make such huge sacrifices. story

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Traveling vicariously to Rome and Assisi through a familial story which resonates. Jennifer Probst taps into the struggles of parenting, youth and matters of the heart. Inspires me to look for this author’s other titles as well!

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This was a delightful book written about three generations of women. All three are experiencing life challenges when they agree, some reluctantly, to take a summer vacation in Italy. This proves to be a well needed, transformative experience for all of them. They delve into their feelings and develop a better understanding of each other and learn what truly matters to them as individuals and also as a family unit. Well done and very enjoyable! #OurItalianSummer #JenniferProbst #NetGalley

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Francesca, Allegra, and Sophia take a trip of their lifetime to Italy in this delightful novel. You will see the sights of Italy along with them and experience their trials and tribulations as well. It was a fantastic read. I recommend it to everyone who loves to travel and may have problems with over-working and teenage drama.

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Thank you to Netgalley and Berkley Books for my digital copy in exchange for an honest review.

And honestly? From the second I saw this cover, I knew I was going to love this book. Sometimes I choose a book by it's cover and I am disappointed but not in this case. I 100% loved this book just as much as I thought I would. Essentially it is about 3 generations of women in one family...who all have mother/daughter issues. The matriarch has cancer and doesn't want to tell anybody and also wants to live out her dream of visiting the part of Italy her ancestors came from. HER daughter owns her own company and is much too busy to take that much time off of work to go on a tour of Italy with her mother. And HER daughter is bored with school and bored with her friends and wants to spend the summer traveling with some new friends. Once she gets into trouble and her Mom starts having panic attacks, it is pretty much a given. Italy is going to happen. Their time in Italy is so full of growth, both individually and as a family, that if you don't laugh and cry while reading it, there might be something wrong with you.:) Loved it all the way through. I am ready to sell everything I own and head on over there now :)

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I wanted to like this book more than I did, but is was still enjoyable and a very breezy read. I liked how each chapter switched between characters, but the workaholic mom and rebellious daughter was a little to cliche for me.

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Thank you NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for this advanced copy.

I struggled with this book at first. I didn't identify with any of the characters and really disliked Francesca at the beginning. But now that I've read the book, I think that was the point. I wouldn't have appreciated her metamorphosis if I had liked her from the start.

I am a homebody and don't really have a desire to travel, but this book made me want to go to Italy. The food, countryside and art were all beautifully described. The relationships felt authentic.

I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to others.

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Three generations of women vacation in Italy. Each has a secret and the relationships are strained. Will vacation help them reconnect and find a way to communicate? A story of family and misunderstandings and discovering what is truly important.

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Our Italian Summer by Jennifer Probst was a beautiful story of 3 generations of women & their summer spent in Italy. Allegra is 18 and a soon to be senior in high school who is struggling to find her true self; Frannie is Allegra’s mother, an intense workaholic who has a strained relationship with her daughter & has recently began suffering panic attacks from work overload & Sophia is the mother of Frannie and grandmother of Allegra and desperately wants to see her 2 favorite girls get along and strengthen their relationship. This book was extremely descriptive & well written; at times I felt as if I was in Italy on vacation with the girls.

This is a story of family, first loves and old loves, finding oneself & being true to who you are. I really enjoyed the alternating viewpoints throughout the story & the growth that I felt the main characters experience.

Thank you to Berkley & NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

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Our Italian Summer talks about finding ourselves and loving our family members even through tough times, we must stick together. Jennifer Probst gives as a great story to read when discovering the truth about family.

Francesca is a workaholic, constantly working and barely making time for her daughter, Allegra or her mom, Sophia. One day, after Allegra gets arrested for drug possession, Francesca suggests they all drop everything and take a vacation to Italy on a tour. Francesca, Allegra, and Sophia all have things to discover while they travel to Italy.

I gave Our Italian Summer four stars, enjoying the way all three women grew as characters and towards each other as family. This book was a great self-discovery book especially when Francesca needed to discover how important it was to really take time off for herself and not just focus on work the whole time. It was also important for her to realize how important her family was and to discover her connection with her daughter.

I liked the point of view switch between Francesca, Allegra, and Sophia because they all had different individual growth they needed to find in Italy, especially Francesca and Allegra. They all found love in Italy and reading about the way they began to handle those relationships in Italy added to their importance of finding who they were to themselves.

I think the most important growth was Francesca’s especially to find her family and discover work was not the most important thing in her life, but her daughter. Both Francesca and Allegra were drifting apart and were not as connected so when they began to open up to each other more it made the book even more special.

I really enjoyed reading this book because it really taught us the importance of family. I was at first not expecting to like this book and was not a fan of the way the beginning was rather slow but all in all I’m glad to have read this and ended up enjoying this a lot more than I expected.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

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*3.5 stars*

This was a fun, breezy read featuring Italian vistas, mouth-watering food, and plenty of family drama.

I went into this book expecting something similar to the other Berkley titles I've been reading recently, but OUR ITALIAN SUMMER was much more charming and wholesome than what I normally read. Usually, encountering this would turn me off, but this book struck the perfect tone for what it was trying to do.

Though much more about the relationships between the 3 generations of women, there are several romances throughout and some truly poignant and complex romantic moments between couples that I really enjoyed. Ultimately, I think the target audience for this book is a bit older than the title had me believe (and older than me), but I enjoyed the book nonetheless and felt moments of identification with each of the three women, regardless of our relative ages.

If you're wishing you could jet off somewhere right now, but can't for obvious reasons, I think you'll enjoy this book as a vacation in itself. If you yourself are a mother, I think you'll love this even more!

*Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

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Fans of Probst will appreciate the more personal tone of Our Italian Summer. Following three generations of the Ferarri family on a summer trip to Italy, Probst weaves years of residual angst and misunderstandings into a solid read. Each of the three main characters are stereotypes for their generations, but after a slow start, it works. The main point of this love story is for the three women, what happens to them with significant others is just a bonus.

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I am a huge fan of Jennifer Probst books and this one did not disappoint. Our Italian Summer was so different from any of her other books and I could tell it was from the heart. Three generations of women, each with their own secrets, insecurities and dreams, escape to Italy for an extended vacation to try to "patch things up" in their broken family. The chapters are being told from the characters points of view and alternate between all three. It was uncanny how the voice and misinterpretations of the high school senior made me gasp at the reality as I too have a daughter this age. The family dynamics between mothers and daughters was spot on and really made me rethink how I handle situations with my own daughter. I loved that this book showed love can find you at any age in life and true special love is worth the wait.

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