Friends with Secrets: A Novel

This was an engaging and exciting read. It’s been decades since I was a young mother, but I still found it interesting and relatable. I liked the mystery, relationships, humor, characters, values, point of view and issues.. This author, I think, knows her audience and how to reach it.

It did not bother me that all the men were either saints or despicable. I’m accustomed to the long tradition of many authors treating the opposite sex as caricature, and their own sex as nuanced and interesting.

It’s not meant to be great literature, but neither is it a vapid beach read. It’s entertaining and yet it has some substance. In fact, it could be a good movie. I think It would be a good book for book groups of mainly women 18 - 60. Older women like myself would probably enjoy reading it too, but IMHO maybe want to discuss other books in their groups. 4.5 stars.

Let me first say that this was not the book I expected. It was better in so many ways than what I expected. There were a few parts of the story that felt a bit far-fetched, mostly things falling into place a little too easily. Yet, I love the genuineness of our two main characters, Nikki and Ainsley. I never thought I'd say this about a character who's living a millionaire (nearly billionaire) lifestyle, but they are relatable characters. Both women deal with the pressures of trying to fit in. Both are really great women who want what's best for their families. They are great friends.

This book has some mild swearing. I didn't count the swear words, but there were probably no more than about 6-8. As a warning to readers, this book does deal with some pretty serious issues. Let's just say that the book fits in well with the "Me Too" movement, including women who dealt with it when they were underage or barely legal. I felt like it was handled in a sensitive way without going into too many graphic details. The actual sexual content and violence is minimal.

I got this as my First Reads book for July, and is definitely worth reading.

I immediately became vested in the character’s stories and could not stop reading. I loved the relationships of female friends, parents and children, siblings and spouses. It was tense, funny—I literally laughed out loud at times, I cried in other places—my heart broke and expanded. When I was younger, I saw the world in black & white; right & wrong. Now I know we need to understand people’s stories; we need to open our heart to see people and learn from each other.

I waffled on how many stars to give this - it's 4.5. It is well worth the read and I hope it's not the last we hear from Ainsley and Nikki.

I was sucked in from the first chapter when Nikki was struggling to manage her four kids, including a newborn, in the grocery store. She was also bemoaning the recent loss of her job while being glad that she got more time with her newborn - I've been exactly there in the past. She becomes energized when she starts to find purpose outside the home again - boy did that resonate. And, while she has a passing care about what people think about her, she doesn't really give it much thought - me again! Ainsley, the other lead, will be relatable to women/moms who don't relate to Nikki - so consumed with being "perfect" that she's fried and terrified.

There's also a heartrending mystery at the center of all this that helps bring the women together and protect themselves and their kids. There's a twist towards the end I guess, but you'll probably figure it out in advance. No matter. This book is more about the relationships between the women than anything else.

I also loved the sex worker point of view - truly. If you go to a strip club, hire an escort, etc., the least you can do is treat the workers with respect. These are people you are hiring for a service, not people who you're allowed to treat poorly for fun. This was handled just wonderfully.

Why is this not a 5-star rating? There are a few early plot holes that were quickly resolved but need not have been there at all. the two main leads need a little more character development - they felt like the same personalities just dropped into different circumstances. I do not know whether this book will resonate with women who don't have kids and spouses. That's pretty much it, though - the grit they displayed and look at careers, motherhood, and relationships and yourself more than made up for any plot holes.

The climax is long and very well done. I was so nervous I had to close the book a couple times, which never happens!

Again, I hope we hear more from these two!

This was an Amazon First Reads, and it was a good choice this month.

The story was intriguing, the characters were interesting and well-defined, and the book was entertaining and held together very well until the last few chapters. The set-up in the last scene fell flat.

I have found this to be the case with more and more books. You're tearing through it, loving the story, anxious to get to the climax and finish; and then somehow, the author doesn't really bring it home.

Despite that, it was an enjoyable book, well written and certainly worth reading.

This was a good book. The descriptive blurb suggests it's "funny" but I wouldn't call this funny in a laugh out loud way, however the author has a clever way with words that keeps the reader engaged. The story moves along at a fast pace and the main characters are human yet likeable. The dialogue and prose are intelligent and the story never drags.

The book deals with some nasty people and unpleasant themes yet it avoids overly graphic violence, sex or language.

This book was an interesting mix of very funny and insightful, while dealing with the dark topic of sexual exploitation. I both laughed out loud and nodded my head in recognition at many of the challenges and perils and insecurities of motherhood, often so humorously recounted. I also think that anyone who has straddled the worlds of working class or middle class, then risen to upper middle class or beyond world, will identify with the "impostor syndrome" fears illustrated. Finally it is a sweet recounting of the making of adult women's' new friendship, something that is often not so easy to do in reality. That being said, I found many aspects of the main plot to be highly improbable. It is the type of book that you have to not think about too much, just let go and suspend disbelief as necessary and enjoy the ride for what it is.

I found the characters and plot fun, if a little over the top at times. It's not a particularly unique plot or message, plenty of things were predictable, and the author could have probably benefited from a thesaurus with how often she repeated certain words (prance and atavistic are first to come to mind), but it was funny and I had a good time.

I do wish the author would have done a little more around destigmatizing sex work and pole dance. The dancers are usually described as being dancers to escape desperate situations, and there's a lot of focus on the negative aspects of club work with only a few instances where one of the main characters reflects that it wasn't all terrible. This just felt disingenuous to me as someone who has a lot of friends who work in clubs and enjoy in, and as someone who pole dances for fitness and recreation. The book didn't feel against the work, but it also didn't exactly feel in support of dancers and destigmatization.

Also, neither really here or there and pretty niche, but I'm curious how many clubs the author actually visited while writing this book. Very few clubs or studios use brass poles, especially clubs and studios in places as humid as the DC metro, so it just kind of took me out of the story a bit.