[Review] Love & Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch

Love & Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch
Publisher: Simon Pulse (May 2, 2017)

Blurb:
Lina is spending the summer in Tuscany, but she isn’t in the mood for Italy’s famous sunshine and fairy-tale landscape. She’s only there because it was her mother’s dying wish that she get to know her father. But what kind of father isn’t around for sixteen years? All Lina wants to do is get back home.

But then Lina is given a journal that her mom had kept when she lived in Italy. Suddenly Lina’s uncovering a magical world of secret romances, art, and hidden bakeries. A world that inspires Lina, along with the ever-so-charming Ren, to follow in her mother’s footsteps and unearth a secret that has been kept for far too long. It’s a secret that will change everything Lina knew about her mother, her father—and even herself.

People come to Italy for love and gelato, someone tells her, but sometimes they discover much more.

I’d like to thank Pansing Malaysia for sending me a copy of Love & Gelato for review.

Rating: 4/5

---

If the cover of Love & Gelato doesn’t immediately evoke a craving for gelato in you, I don’t know what is wrong with you, friend.

“You know, people come to Italy for all sorts of reasons, but when they sat, it's for the same two things."
"What?"
"Love and gelato.”

Set in Italy—the place for summer romances, in my opinion—Love & Gelato follows the story of Lina who finds herself in sunny Tuscany for the summer, upon her mother’s request on her deathbed.

So what if Tuscany is a haven for the most delicious food and gorgeous, panoramic views of the Italian landscape. Lina is definitely not in the mood for it, especially when she is there to meet her father who was absent throughout her entire life. Until now.

When she receives her mother’s old journal that catalogued her summer in Tuscany before Lina was born, it could possibly be the closest thing she has of her mother.

I hope I didn’t spoil too much of the plot for you but I guess depending on your love for contemporary YA romances, it kind of does involve a more than charming guy. So, yes. Expect lots of witty banter between Lina and the ever-charming Ren who is too charismatic for his own good.

“What I really want is someone who will wake me up early so I don't miss a sunrise.”

What drew me into the story was the fact that it was set in Tuscany—I fell in love with it when I saw Letters to Juliet back when I was a smol bean—and I was so thrilled that Love & Gelato is a love story set in the beautiful countryside of Italy.

Reading it definitely sparked the wanderlust in me as I have always wanted to visit Italy and spend hours reading outside, having my very own gelato-filled summer.

“So... Italian gelato. Take the deliciousness of a regular ice-cream cone, times it by a million, then sprinkle it with crushed-up unicorn horns.”

However, what surprised me was that I wasn’t that invested in Lina and Ren’s relationship. No, m’am. I was actually more interested to find out more about Lina’s mother and reading her journal entries. And discovering what happened between Lina’s parents. What was really sweet was that Lina trying to getting the whole Tuscan experience as she tried to do everything her mother did during her Italian summer years ago.

See, guys? I told you that I had a heart.

Besides Love & Gelato being a sweet romantic story, especially based on the cute cover, I was pleasantly surprised by the emotional depth that Lina undergoes as she reconnects with her mother through the journal and that was really touching, I felt.

For me, Love & Gelato was a light, summery romance that focused on the story of a girl discovering herself and those who matter to her, that I devoured and I liked that it came with quite a surprising twist in the end. Though I was quite sure of the ending and who Lina’s father was, I was still shocked by the ending. But fret not, it is a heartwarming ending that Lina deserves.