"Summer Sons" by Lee Mandelo is a dark and enigmatic novel that blends elements of supernatural mystery and contemporary fiction. While it presents a compelling premise and delves into complex themes, it also comes with certain drawbacks that affect the overall reading experience.

One of the strengths of "Summer Sons" is its exploration of deep and thought-provoking themes, including trauma, identity, and the supernatural. Mandelo delves into the complexities of the protagonist's psyche as he grapples with personal demons and uncovers unsettling truths about his past. The novel's examination of the protagonist's struggle with addiction and mental health issues adds depth to the character and the narrative.

The writing style is atmospheric and evocative, creating a sense of unease and suspense that pervades the story. The author's ability to craft vivid and haunting descriptions of both the physical and emotional landscapes enhances the book's dark and enigmatic tone.

However, "Summer Sons" may not be for every reader. The narrative can be challenging to follow at times, with shifts in perspective and timeline that may require careful attention. Some readers may find the nonlinear structure disorienting, which can impact the overall readability of the novel.

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the advanced copy!

Unfortunately, this was not for me. I was unable to get past the first few chapters. I believe this is just an issue of my taste not aligning with the story. I recommend others try it!

Andrew and Eddie were best friends since childhood. They separate for a while under mysterious circumstances. Just as Andrew is returning to his friend, he finds out Eddie has killed himself. Andrew is crushed. He tries to juggle school, new aggressive friends, ghosts, and the mystery of Eddie's death.

This unfortunately just wasn’t for me. I didn’t realize that this book is pretty heavy on the horror. Not for me would be interested in seeing what else this author writes but would definitely be weary picking it ul

I had a hard time with this one. It’s a bit too slow for my liking and it was so sad that it just put me down

This book was difficult for me to get through. I loved the characters, but I became extremely disjointed from the story. Maybe it was me.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* really wanted to like this book but it was really hard for me to get into this book, i think i thought it would be less paranormal? might consider rereading it in the future though

3.5 - 4 stars

This one was very heavy and sad for me. While I did feel drawn into the mystery and atmosphere of it all that was very overshadowed by the deep sadness and unfairness of it all. A very compelling story and group of characters but I just couldn't get passed the non-realized love story between **SPOILER** Andrew and Eddie **SPOILER** characters are put under a spoiler tag but it's very obvious who the love was between. I also feel like I couldn't feel too invested in the present day love interest because I felt so drawn and tied to the love that could have been. Also, the atmosphere was very ooky spooky and I was here for it and I feel that that was largely due to having listened to the audiobook, the narrator was very good and the emotions absolutely cracked and bled from his voice.

ARC given by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

This was something I really wanted to like. My aspirations were high at first, but then they were dragged through the mud. I just did not enjoy or enjoy this book. For the most part, this book seemed like a snooze fest. From beginning to end, this book is exceedingly monotonous and slow to read. I expected it to build up speed, but it never does. I couldn't stand a single character. I understand Andrew's grief over his best friend's suicide, but I was never a fan since he never rehabilitated himself and, in my opinion, continued growing shittier. Also, this isn't a scary movie. It isn't frightening or weird in any way. It's about a bunch of people who are dealing with the death of one of their friends by driving fast automobiles and using drugs. It's a coming-of-age narrative, but it's not one I enjoyed. I wish I could say something good, but I was too bored to care.

This was a slow start of a book that has tons of description of magic and death. It did confuse me with the main character’s objective. Some scenes were dull but other scenes were pretty good. It kept me interested and sometimes it didn’t. Overall it was a not bad book. The narrator sometimes made me space out for some reason but he did manage to keep it interesting.

This is a story about denial.

This book was not for me 🤷‍♀️. It was atmospheric & conceptually very cool- I loved the occult vibes and undercurrent of tension. Unfortunately, I hated the protagonist, and most of the side characters. I also felt like the interesting aspects of the magic system weren’t explored enough, and the miserable inner workings of the characters brain were explored too heavily. I think some readers will probably love this, but alas.

Thank you so much netgalley and Macmillan & Tor-Forge for the eArc & Alc copies!

This book was amazing, LGBTQ+ and I enjoyed it immensely. I definitely recommend this book and I suggest adding it to your Fall TBR. I gave the book 4.5 stars and I don't give such high ratings easily.

I'm here to say that Summer Sons needs to be on everyones radar. Lee Mandelo delivers some truly lush prose in their debut, while telling a propulsive, nightmarish story of grief & love & obsession & betrayal. This book is INTENSE. With drag racing, the dark academia vibe, and more than a little bit of the occult in the mix, SUMMER SONS definitely shares a bit in common with THE RAVEN BOYS. That said, this is unequivocally a horror novel, and it’s frequently quite disturbing.
Full review to come on YouTube.

When Andrew goes to Nashville, Tenn, to attend graduate school at Vanderbilt, his academic endeavors are completely sidetracked by his desire to investigate the apparent suicide of his foster brother and best friend, Eddie. Those efforts are not very productive as Andrew's haunted by Eddie's revenant and seems to spend most of the first half of the book being drunk, high, fighting, or driving too fast. Andrew does apparently find himself about midway through and finally starts trying to understand just where Eddie's research into southern Gothic folklore was headed. Unfortunately, no one at the University or in Eddie's circle of friends seems to have any of his documents or files. By time the story does gets more interesting, it's clear that Andrew and his friends are up against nothing as benign as ghostly folk tales, but dangerous curses. Fine audio performance by Will Damron.

Some people like a “slow burn,” but there really has to be a limit as to how slow a book can burn, and Summer Sons really pushes it. It’s marketed as dark academia meets fast cars & hot boys, but there is literally no academia in the whole damn book, unless you count skipping class. As for the fast cars and hot boys, yes, there are a few car scenes, and lots of descriptions of hot boys and abs, and shoulders, and jaw curves- but that does not make a solid story.
This is the story of Andrew, whose best friend Eddie just died of apparent suicide, and left Andrew his house at college. Andrew doesn’t believe that Eddie killed himself, so he moves into Eddie’s house and immerses himself in Eddie’s last few months of life to try and unravel this mystery. Mostly this book is the reader knowing everything & just waiting on the main character to figure anything out. It’s a long wait.
Props to this book for being full of non-stereotypical queer guys and for one really hot sex scene, but that was just about it for me.
Honestly, I kind of wished I had DNF’d. The ending was that anticlimactic to me.

Oh wow this book was so good - the audio was a bit funky, but I was okay with dealing with it. I freaking loved this book and the characters - comparing a book to fast and furious automatically makes me read it.

I’ve never read anything like this and I can gladly say summer sons didn’t disappoint whatsoever. This book was so much more than a queer mystery - there’s so much character development.

I highly recommend this one!

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher I was able to listen to the audiobook format in exchange for an honest review.
***
Summer Sons is a story of grief and loss and so much yearning.
Andrew has been looking forward to going to Nashville, so he could finally see Eddie again. Eddie who kept pushing him off, but can’t any longer because Andrew is finally joining him at the university there. Or, that was the plan.
Days before Andrew is to join Eddie again he is found dead, an apparent suicide. Andrew doesn’t believe Eddie is capable of that and he’s going to get answers. He moves into the house Eddie has been using and immerses himself in the life Eddie has been living without him for the last six months, meeting the people Eddie met and trying to pick up where his studies left off, if for no other reason than they might tell him more.
All the while Andrew struggles with ghosts, literally actually, and hauntings he’s struggled with ever since he was a teen and something happened to Eddie and him. Andrew has contented himself with trying to forget everything about that event but it seems Eddie has gone hunting for answers and Andrew finds himself drawn into a history that affects him just as much as it did Eddie.
Andrew struggles over his loss of Eddie and the time he wasn’t able to have with him. He also struggles with all the repressed feelings he had for Eddie that will never be answered while finding himself on a path to learning more about himself and what he wants in life going forward.
****
This story is haunting, atmospheric and beautifully written. It is described as queer Southern gothic and that is pretty fitting. I enjoyed the story overall. It was, however, a bit of a downer and took awhile for me to get through because my brain wasn’t really in the place for this particular style of story at the time, hence why my review is coming out so late.
The story is well written but it got a bit meandering and repetitive at times. The mystery was pretty easy to solve too once the different pieces of the puzzle were put forward, even a bit before that actually. Andrew is not a particularly likable character at the beginning of the book because his need to get answers about Eddie trumps being a barely decent guy for a bit there but as he gets closer to his roommate Riley, and Sam, Riley’s cousin, he gets a bit better.
I listened to the audiobook format of this book and the narrator was really good, and definitely kept me going through the book the most.
I feel would definitely read another book by this author again. My rating is more of a 3.5 than 3 but not entirely sure I can round up based on my person struggles with getting into the book.

I didn't get very far into the book before giving up on it. It wasn't that it was bad. I thought it had some interesting ideas and the writing was okay, but it's just not my speed. It's very dark, broody, and angsty. If you like those things, then this book is for you. I don't mind a dark story once in a while, but I'm picky about how it presents itself, and this one just didn't do it for me. I also didn't really care for the narrator. I liked his accent, but it was a little distracting to be honest. Maybe I'll pick it up again in the future, but that probably won't happen for a very long time.
I do love that cover though!

“That friendship was a muted fraction of the real thing, the marrow-thing, that tied them together…he couldn’t find a label that fit where he needed it to go. Maybe instead, just a hard stop: he was yours.”

Hot, smoldering southern nights. Fast cars and rough boys. A jealous revenant, insistent on being heard. Tattoos, shared in blood over clasped fists. Hungry land and family curses from a bygone era. An aching, insatiable want.

I would have read SUMMER SONS based on these vibes alone, but Mandelo delivers on so much more. The story, in brief: Eddie and Andrew have been best friends since childhood, closer than brothers. In the wake of Eddie’s apparent suicide, Andrew moves to Nashville and starts the same graduate program that Eddie was in, working to solve the mystery of his death and the darkness that has haunted them both for years.

This novel is a searing modern gothic about the weight of grief, the impenetrable uncertainty of why someone leaves us, and what it means to mourn a love that was never allowed to come to fruition. It’s very much about coming out, but not in a tidy, finished way (as if it’s ever that). Andrew’s realizations about himself are tied to bone-deep sorrow, unfulfilled desire, regret about his past actions, and confusion about what he wants now. Watching him slowly pull the pieces together about his queerness and the nature of his relationship with Eddie and start to work through some of his internalized homophobia absolutely tore my heart out - the ending just barely started to repair it.

The representation of masculinity in this book burns hot; these men remind me in many ways of the tough, rural boys I grew up with, branded by the toxic veins of masculinity, but with a vulnerable, soft underbelly that gutted me. Mandelo reckons with the crushing racism of academia, the legacy of slavery and how it manifests in the South, and how oblivious white people - even/especially white queers - can be to these facts. The immersive writing, combined with the powerful, almost sultry audiobook narration, stripped me bare; there is a raw physicality to this book, sometimes gritty and sometimes sensual, bringing to life both body horror and tender affection. And I haven’t even begun talking about the trans and poly rep!

An absolute favorite of this year and a book I won’t forget for a long time. Thank you to Tor.com for the ARC and Macmillan Audio for the ALC!

Content warnings: discussions of suicide, driving while intoxicated, violence, homophobia, dead/mutilated animals, death of a loved one

TL;DR: A tantalizingly queer, supernatural, slow-burn, romantic thriller, embroiled in toxic academia. First third is a bit slow but things come together, with some stellar character development and plot twists. My rating: 4 of 5 stars.

First things first, because I listened to this as an audiobook I have to say--killer choice of narrator. His southern accent contributed a lot to the atmosphere of the story.

Summer Sons is as unnerving and twisty as any good supernatural thriller, but it’s also a lot more. Andrew is haunted by his dead best friend--literally, but also metaphorically--as he struggles with his grief, anger, and confusion about their complicated relationship and its implications for his own sexual identity. This book deftly tackles lots of challenging subjects: grief, coming out, toxic work and personal relationships, rural poverty, historical legacy. And Andrew is a great character through which to do so as he straddles many worlds, walking the line between supernatural/normal, academia/laypeople, queer/straight, rich/poor, southern/non-southern.

For personal reasons, I really connected (in a somewhat triggering way) with his navigation of power dynamics in academia as a PhD student. I think first gen college students would also find a lot to relate to. Summer Sons has a lot to say about experiences of marginality more broadly. But then Mandelo lightens the mood with sexy, fun drag racing scenes.

My only qualms about recommending Summer Sons was that I found the first 30-something percent quite slow. I felt like I knew little more at that marker than I did from the first chapter or two. Andrew’s motivations for getting closer to the gang his deceased friend Eddie spent time with were initially unclear. Frankly, the character didn’t seem to know himself very well and just seemed unmoored. Though not unrealistic for a character grieving and being haunted, it was frustrating as a reader. That said, if you can hold out for the plot and Andrew’s state of mind to stabilize, it is well worth the ride.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for giving me advance access to this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.