MY BEST FRIEND'S GIRL

Author: Dorothy Koomson ISBN: 9780553591415 4/2008 FICTION Publisher: BANTAM

How far would you go for the best friend who broke your heart? From the moment they met in college, best friends Adele Brannon and Kamryn Matika thought nothing could come between them—until Adele did the unthinkable and slept with Kamryn’s fiancé, Nate. Now, after years of silence, the two women are reuniting, and Adele has a stunning request for her old friend: she wants Kamryn to adopt her five-year-old daughter, Tegan. Besides the difference in skin color—many will assume that headstrong, impulsive Kamryn is Tegan’s nanny—there’s the inconvenient truth that Kamryn is wholly unprepared to take care of anyone, especially someone who reminds her so much of Nate. With crises brewing at work and her love life in shambles, can Kamryn somehow become the mother a little girl needs her to be?

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

MY BEST FRIEND'S GIRL by Dorothy Koomson is a delightful, heart-tugging tale that will keep reads both crying and laughing as they travel the journey of love, loss, and life's complications with its heroine.

Kamryn Matika is ready to enjoy her 32nd birthday, when everything comes to a screeching halt upon receiving a card from her ex-best friend, Adele Brannon. With that card, Ryn is summoned from her home in Leeds to a hospital in London to find that the woman she hasn't seen in two years is dying of leukemia. Adele asks that Kamryn take care of her daughter, Tegan, after she passes. But because of the betrayal Kam suffered at the hands of her former best friend and former fiancé Nate, she doesn't want to make any promises to Del, though she does agree to go see Tiga, who is staying with Del's parents, and make sure she is all right. But what Kam finds is a little girl who is dirty, starving, and showing the marks of physical abuse, much the same of what Del had described her growing up to be. She immediately takes Tiga away from the home of her abusive caretakers, and gets a hotel near the hospital to make it easier for both her and the little girl to take see Del in the hospital. As the visits seem to lift Adele's spirits, Kam hopes that her friend will get better and she won't have to take on the care of a child, something she had never wanted. But all too quickly, Del passes away and Kam is left to raise and care for Tiga, who now calls her Mummy Ryn.

The story is the tale of how Kam copes in the next two years as she tries to raise, and adopt, a child who is dealing with the grandiose loss of her mother, while she herself deals with the guilt left over from not having responded to Adele sooner, not having said a proper goodbye to her best friend, and more importantly, not having let Adele explain why she slept with Kamryn's fiancé Nate, and made a child, Tiga, with him two years earlier. The novel moves back and forth from the present to the past and as the pages turn, we learn more about all the principal players, Kamryn, Adele, Nate, and Tegan, as well as the new man in both Kam and Tiga's life, Luke.

MY BEST FRIEND'S GIRL is one of the best novels I have read so far this year, which is surprising, to say the least. I am not one for chick-lit novels, but this one just pulled me in from the very beginning when Adele learns that she is going to die and must leave her precious Tegan behind. The story is told mostly through Kamyrn's point-of-view, though we are given glimpses from Adele's as she fills in some of the holes. The characterization in this novel is so wonderfully done by Koomson, that I felt that I really came to know and understand each of the characters and what drove them to their actions and their feelings. They each became very dear to me, and as I neared the end of the novel, I became sad that my time with them was coming to a close. Though the novel was somewhat light on the sensual aspect, I felt there was enough of it as the story was more than just two people finding love. It was about the different kinds of love that are found in our lives. The relationships of lovers, friends, and even those between a child and their parent were all explored throughout the pages of this deeply emotional read, and that was its true center.

I would recommend Dorothy Koomson's MY BEST FRIEND'S GIRL to romance and chick-lit readers alike, but really, this novel would be enjoyed by anyone who can appreciate the complex relationships in life.

Maame Kanbi