This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki
Published 2014 · 10,000 words · about 1 hour at an average pace · Coming-of-Age, Graphic Novel
How hard is This One Summer to read?
This One Summer scores 24 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 12 out of 100
- Simple, naturalistic dialogue. The girls speak like real preteens. No specialized vocabulary.
- Sentence structure: 12 out of 100
- Sparse dialogue and minimal narration. The art carries the emotional weight. Text is simple and conversational.
- Abstraction: 25 out of 100
- Adult problems—miscarriage, relationship abuse—are glimpsed obliquely through a child's partial understanding. The reader must interpret what Rose cannot.
- Information density: 18 out of 100
- The watercolor art creates atmosphere rather than information density. The narrative unfolds slowly through mood and implication.
- Narrative indirection: 35 out of 100
- Rose observes adult situations she does not understand. The reader must decode the parents' conflict and the teenage drama from fragmentary evidence. The most indirection-heavy book in this batch.
- Symbolic density: 30 out of 100
- The lake represents the depth of adult life beneath the surface. Horror movies mirror real-world fears. The blue-purple palette symbolizes the twilight between childhood and adolescence.
- Ironic distance: 20 out of 100
- The gap between what Rose sees and what she understands creates dramatic irony. The Tamakis maintain a measured, observational distance.
- Resolution withholding: 32 out of 100
- The parents' conflict is never fully explained. The teenage pregnancy subplot resolves offstage. The summer ends with Rose changed but without clear answers.
- Structural complexity: 18 out of 100
- Linear summer narrative with parallel storylines—the family conflict, the teenage drama, the girls' friendship—that intersect obliquely.
How This One Summer is regarded
This One Summer holds a literary regard score of 57 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.