ARC Review: The Square Root of Summer by Harriet Reuter Hapgood

Book Title: The Square Root of Summer
Author: Harriet Reuter Hapgood
Series: Standalone
Release Date: May 3rd, 2016
Genres: Young Adult, Romance, Sci-Fi

This is what it means to love someone. This is what it means to grieve someone. It's a little bit like a black hole. It's a little bit like infinity.

Gottie H. Oppenheimer is losing time. Literally. When the fabric of the universe around her seaside town begins to fray, she's hurtled through wormholes to her past:

To last summer, when her grandfather Grey died. To the afternoon she fell in love with Jason, who wouldn't even hold her hand at the funeral. To the day her best friend Thomas moved away and left her behind with a scar on her hand and a black hole in her memory.

Although Grey is still gone, Jason and Thomas are back, and Gottie's past, present, and future are about to collide—and someone's heart is about to be broken.

Being a maths/science geek at heart, this book was calling out to me when I caught the first sight of it. The Square Root of Summer is one of those nerd lovers book that incorporates a number of physics theorems in a coming-of-age story of a girl who tries to come to terms with the losses in her life. 

This is what it means to love someone. This is what it means to grieve someone. It's a little bit like a black hole. It's a little bit like infinity.

We have Gottie, our heroine who has a intense liking for physics and the secrets of the universe. But if there's one thing that Gottie knows well, it's the feeling of losing someone. Her life had consisted of a series of losses; the death of her mum while birthing her, her best friend, Thomas who moved away, losing her grandfather to cancer and lastly, her boyfriend, Jason who left her when she needed him most.

Honestly this book was way different than what I've imagined prior to picking it up and based on the blurb alone. It was interesting yet strange in many ways, there were timejumps that had me confused for a while there. For a moment I wasn't quite sure if Gottie was imagining her 'blackhole' moments or if there was a time-travel element. In a way, it got me very curious to read on as I really wanted to know if there is some time space continuum thing going on. 

Infinite worlds, infinite universes, infinite possibilities. 

I think it was clever how the author manage to infuse the knowledge of physics here and there were interesting diagrams riddled across the book! My inner nerd self died when there was a mention of the Schrodinger theory and how brilliantly it was infused with this read. 

Jason was my Schrondinger. Inside the box was us; a secret, something special; no one else could take it over or spoil it. But we'd been together a few weeks, and now there was another thought inside the box: I wanted him to claim me out loud. 

However there were times that the scientific jabber became too convoluted for me and temporarily left me at a disconnect with the read. Gottie could come off overly eccentric at times which leaves me perplexed and I just wasn't sure what exactly what going on with this read. However I did love the slow romance thing going on with her best friend Thomas who came back from Canada after moving away. 

Overall I think the book will appeal to those who appreciate their science in their reads. It's a little quirky, it has some cute romance moments and it gets intriguing when you try to piece it all together in the end. Honestly I wished I could understand the whole picture better but I still enjoyed it for the most parts. The author certainly has a clever way with her words as my favorite quotes of the read are those that are infused with physics. 

The geometry of spacetime is a manifestation of gravity. And the geometry of heartbreak is a manifestation of a stopped clock. Time stands still. 

Advanced review copy received from Pan Macmillan publisher in exchange for an honest review. 

Harriet Reuter Hapgood is a freelance fashion journalist and author of THE SQUARE ROOT OF SUMMER (coming May 2016). Her first-ever professional writing credit was for Just Seventeen magazine, and she's been YA obsessed ever since. She likes burritos, cats, Gwyneth Paltrow and young adult fiction, which she plans to write more of, though she's also considering a PhD in Dawson’s Creek. Follow her on Twitter: @hapgoodnessand on Instagram: @hapgo0dness if you like pictures of cats