Romance fans rejoice: Carley Fortune has landed a Netflix deal
Welcome to sexy, sexy Prince Edward Island
Yet another one of star Toronto author Carley Fortune’s saucy romance novels is getting a film adaptation.
Today, Netflix announced a 10-episode series based on Fortune’s best-selling novel This Summer Will Be Different, a story told over several summers in sexy, sexy Prince Edward Island. The story follows Lucy, a young woman who falls head over heels for a PEI local while vacationing on the island, only to discover he’s her best friend’s younger brother.
Related: How Carley Fortune is reinventing the romance novel
Cue a story of forbidden romance under the beating sun. As Lucy returns to the isle again and again over the years, she keeps finding herself tied up with Felix, and what begins as a purely physical escape soon begins to grow into something more.
The Netflix adaptation will film in both Toronto and PEI, and it’s packed with Canadian talent, with the production team boasting credits on North of North, Sort Of and Small Achievable Goals.
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This will be the third of Fortune’s books to be optioned for the screen. The author made headlines in 2023 when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle optioned her book Meet Me at the Lake. And while it remains unclear if that film will ever get made, an Amazon Prime Video adaptation of her debut novel, Every Summer After, is well in the works.
In addition to being a big win for Fortune, This Summer Will Be Different (the series) could also be a boon for the PEI tourism board. Once Fortune’s fans (who are legion) get a cinematic glimpse of the romantic, wind-swept beaches, red cliffs and shimmering seas she evokes in her writing, they’ll no doubt flock in droves.
Anthony Milton is a freelance journalist based in Toronto specializing in long-form magazine writing. He previously worked as an assistant editor at Toronto Life, where he launched the Front Row newsletter. He regularly contributes all sorts of stories to the magazine, including deep dives on sports, business and housing as well as short-form commentary on our ever-changing city, from its obsession with cherry blossoms to its maddening NIMBYism. His work has also appeared in Maclean’s, Ricochet, TVO, the Trillium and more.
