The stories that are familiar will always be our favorites.

This was another HRCYED challenge pick for me as it was a 2025 Booktube award winner (top 3). I will be honest and say I probably would not have picked this title up without the nudge of the challenge but I’m so glad I did! A work of contemporary fiction set during the time of COVID, it follows a farming family in Michigan. The MC, Lara, and her husband run a fruit farm but due to COVID restrictions and difficulties getting workers to help with the summer cherry harvest, all 3 of their young adult daughters are home. As they are settling into the unsettledness of coming back to live with their parents as adults, as they spend more time together, their mother tells them a story about her life when she was their age, and a summer spent in summer theater, and the (now) movie star she once loved, and how her life changed so much over the course of that summer.

The book has as a theme one of my favorite plays, Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, and I think the story probably resonated with me a lot since I also spent several summers doing summer stock and those were very defining months of my life (although I didn’t fall in love with a soon-to-be movie star). The book deals with themes of family, love, aging, making choices and the lives we create for ourselves with those choices.

I particularly loved the pacing of this book and the way that the author gave out little hints about moments during Lara’s youth that influenced where she is today, like the names of her daughters, and how she met her husband. A somewhat bittersweet ending but one I enjoyed and this was a title I’m glad I read – a thoroughly enjoyable read!

4-1/2 stars