I love summer, but I admit I was glad to see the end of the aforementioned season in Effie Olsen’s Summer Special.

Effie Olsen returns to Alder Isle not for love or nostalgia but for a job. The next best opportunity on offer is no longer at a restaurant in Bali or Paris but at Brown Butter – a Michelin-starred restaurant on her home island in Maine. Also on the island is Eddie Callahan, her BFF who in high school wanted to drop that second ‘F’ and take their relationship to the next level… a revelation that literally made Effie vomit. And then she took off for sixteen years.

The book starts with Effie waking up in her future boss’s bed. They didn’t manage to stay conscious long enough to have a one night stand, but after some post-interview drinks they did get partly naked and end up sharing a mattress. It’s a jarring, unexpected beginning to the book, and the first chapters swing between information dumps and scenes with very little context, as if the story knows you’re there but isn’t always inclined to fill you in. It’s got a devil-may-care attitude like the heroine herself, and it seems, initially, at least intriguing in its unusualness.

But that doesn’t last. Like a kitchen knife, the writing gets dull, and soon there’s nothing notable about it except for the odd brand references peppered in: Sunoco, Mr. Coffee, Bitcoin, Toyota. It’s more than a little ironic that a book with a major plot point involving farm-to-table restaurants and their reputation for local ingredients should namecheck major brands instead of regional ones that might be more evocative of the setting!

As for the characters, there’s a reason Effie’s name is the only one in the title. It’s her book, all told from a distant third-person PoV. I wanted so badly for this man to give a primal scream, burn a (metaphorical) bridge and run like hell away from Effie to find a story where there’s room for his name in the title, too. He’s dealing with a lot – an in-remission-from-cancer parent with medical bills, specifically, but the realities of what that’s like for him, and how he might draw strength from a romantic partner, aren’t really explored. He’s Effie’s love interest, not a person of his own. He acquiesces to her in every way from the beginning which destroys any potential tension or narrative arc for their romance. As Ernie and Effie’s relationship doesn’t generate much plot, the story relies on a #metoo storyline involving Effie’s work for its major developments.

When we do get Eddie and Effie romance scenes, they’re colossally unconvincing. I’m sorry, but there’s no coming back from ‘he-told-her-he-loved-her-and-she-puked’. Effie and Eddie keep avoiding getting physical. Interruptions, we-should-know-better conversations – they use every excuse to stay platonic. After they skinny dip, Eddie “made them tea and said he was tired”. The moment that just about did me in was when they practice safe sex – WHILE SEXTING. Eddie literally messages Effie that he’s putting on a condom (one wonders if he actually put one on sitting by himself?). My cheap drugstore heating pad gets to higher temperatures than these two.

I can say that Effie Olsen’s Summer Special takes very seriously the ‘all’ in the expression ‘And they all lived happily ever after’. Even the friends and family secondary characters get a serving of something good in their lives at the end, which is sweet. But a good dessert can’t salvage a poor romantic main course.