FRIENDS LIKE US

A young woman who introduces her best friend to her formerly nerdy high-school companion has mixed feelings about the situation when the two begin a romantic relationship.

Drifting in a way typical to recent college graduates, aspiring illustrator Willa takes considerable comfort in the fact that her roommate Jane is in the same boat. Sharing a dingy Milwaukee apartment, the girls are closer than sisters and have similar lanky, curly-haired good looks. Jane, who works as a housecleaner but writes poetry on the side, is, in Willa's mind, a sunnier and more confident version of herself. Their cozy twosome is altered forever, though, with the arrival of Ben. Willa and Ben were inseparable in high school, and after a seven-year separation meet again at a reunion, where Ben confesses to a longtime crush on her. Willa senses Ben's appeal, but after an awkward first kiss relegates him to the "friend" role. And soon after Ben meets Jane. Willa, happy to see her two favorite people in love, initially blesses their union, and they become a happy trio, doing everything together. Willa also takes an easy job in a flower shop and dates a slippery Irishman named Declan, but Ben and Jane remain the center of her world. But when Ben asks Jane to marry him, Willa panics, worrying that life is going forward without her. Jealous of what Jane has, and still hurting over past events (such as the demise of her parent's marriage), Willa makes an irreversible decision guaranteed to have painful repercussions for everyone involved. In spite of the novel's predictable scenario, Fox (Still Life with Husband, 2007) has a talent for language and her wounded, witty Willa is a remarkably complex creation.

Moving, artfully written Gen-Y roman à clef.