Best Friends Forever - Not the Best Read Ever

I finally finished my most recent read, Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner.  I have never read any of her books, so I felt very proud of myself for venturing out of my normal author circle, comprised of Sophie Kinsella, Madeline Wickham (actually Sophie Kinsella)and Lauren Weisberger. 

At the beginning, I really thought I would like the book.  The premise is that our protagonist, Adie, has lost touch of her best friend from childhood.  In the first several pages, best friend, Val, is introduced as she bursts back into Adie's life after having committing a 'crime' at their high school reunion, which Adie did not attend.  This is were Jennifer Weiner starts losing me.

What follows is chapter after chapter of slow dialogue and thinking aloud by our characters.  I can't figure out if there were just too many 3rd person omniscient characters, or that the writing was just unimaginative.  I found myself scanning pages, instead of reading them, trying to get to the good part.  The problem is, I never found it.  The ending was anti-climatic.  I was never on the edge of my seat with suspense.  I didn't really get that many laughs out of it.  Maybe a small chuckle every now and then, but that's about it.

Reviews on amazon.com and Facebook Visual Bookshelf are mixed.  Best Friends Forever got 3/5 stars on Amazon and 2/5 on Facebook.  Based on this, I'm not sure if I'll try another one of her books or not.

I am disappointed, I was hoping I had found a new light girlie read writer, but the search must continue.  Anyone else have any other authors they enjoy for this type of reading?  I have Emily Griffin on my list and think I may try The Heart of the Matter next.  I asked Winston, but it didn't seem like he was concearned, other than me wrapping up so I could play catch with him.  :)

Would I recommend this book to a friend?  Absolutely not!


My book reviews are meant to give readers a snapshot of the book premise/storyline and not to give away any spoilers.